Tag Archives: the joyce theater

CHILDS, CHU, AND ASSAF: GIBNEY AT THE JOYCE

Gibney Company will be at the Joyce May 6–11 with three premieres (photo by Hannah Mayfield)

GIBNEY COMPANY
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at Nineteenth St.
May 6–11, $62-$82
www.joyce.org
gibneydance.org

“This season at The Joyce embodies what Gibney Company stands for — bringing together choreographers with distinct voices, movement languages, and artistic philosophies to shape a program that challenges, inspires, and moves us,” founding artistic director and CEO Gina Gibney said in a statement. “Lucinda Childs, Peter Chu, and Roy Assaf each bring a unique lens to dance, offering profoundly different yet equally compelling perspectives on how movement can communicate, resonate, and evolve.”

The New York–based dance and social justice troupe will be at the Joyce May 6–11, presenting three works. The evening begins with the US premiere of Roy Assaf’s A Couple, a fifteen-minute duet about relationships, set to music by Johannes Brahms performed by Glenn Gould and featuring “Perhaps you are a couple” text by Ariel Freedman; the pairings will be Graham Feeny and Zack Sommer, Madison Goodman and Lounes Landri, and Madi Tanguay and Andrew McShea.

The bill continues with two world premieres, first Peter Chu’s Echoes of Sole and Animal. The full company, consisting of Tiare Keeno, Jie-hung Connie Shiau, Feeny, Sommer, Goodman, Landri, Tanguay, and McShea, explore how sound shapes space, with movement inspired by animal Qi Gong and Taiji philosophies in search of human compassion and connection, with music and sound design by Djeff Houle in addition to immersive guitarist Ferdinand Kavall’s 2024 “Flageolets.” Chu also designed the costumes with Victoria Bek.

The program concludes with Lucinda Childs’s Three Dances (for prepared piano) John Cage, which takes Childs back to her Judson days, examining transdisciplinarity and formalism through structured repetition. The twenty-minute work, performed by all eight dancers, is set to recordings of Cage’s 1944–45 three-part piece played by Xenia Pestova and Pascal Meyer.

“Gibney Company is built on the idea that dance is a conversation — between artists, disciplines, traditions, and generations,” company director Gilbert T. Small II added. “This program brings together choreographers whose work is shaped by their histories, their influences, and the questions they explore through movement. We are honored to collaborate with such extraordinary artists whose work expands the boundaries of contemporary dance.”

Some shows are nearly sold out, so act fast to get tickets. The May 8 performance will be followed by a Curtain Chat with Childs and biophysicist and applied mathematician Dr. Michael Shelley, who participated together in the Open Interval residency combining dance and science.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

TIME AND “TIME AGAIN”: TRISHA BROWN AT THE JOYCE

Opal Loop / Cloud Installation #722503 is part of Trisha Brown season at the Joyce (photo by Maria Baranova)

TRISHA BROWN DANCE COMPANY
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at Nineteenth St.
April 29 – May 4, $52-$72
www.joyce.org

For its 2025 season at the Joyce, Trisha Brown Dance Company looks back at its seminal Unstable Molecular Structure Cycle while also forging ahead into the future.

Running April 29 through May 4, the program features three dances, beginning with the world premiere of Time again, which explores the concept of change, repetition, chance, and familiarity. Choreographed by Lee Serle, who was mentored by Brown in 2010 through the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Initiative, the work features set and visual design by Mateo López, who was mentored by William Kentridge in 2012–13 in the Rolex program, lighting by Jennifer Tipton, and music by Australian sound artist Alisdair Macindoe. It will be performed by TBDC members Savannah Gaillard, Rochelle Jamila, Burr Johnson, Ashley Merker, Patrick Needham, Jennifer Payán, and Spencer James Weidie.

Following intermission, the company returns with two pieces from the Unstable Molecular Structure Cycle, which executive director Kirstin Kapustik calls “a series of works that embrace fluidity, unpredictability, and the beauty of constant change.” First up is 1980’s Opal Loop / Cloud Installation #722503, a collaboration with Japanese fog artist Fujiko Nakaya that invites the audience “to bring together images within themselves.” Merker, Needham, Payán, and Weidie perform to the sounds of water passing through high-pressure nozzles, with costumes by Judith Shea and lighting by Beverly Emmons.

The evening concludes with 1981’s Son of Gone Fishin’, which Brown called “a doozey. In it I reached the apogee of complexity in my work.” The full ensemble randomly selects sections of Robert Ashley’s score from his three-opera opus Atalanta, with costumes by Shea and lighting by Emmons evoking the original set design by Donald Judd.

To dive deeper, there will be a Curtain Chat following the April 30 performance.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

FORTY YEARS OF EVIDENCE: RONALD K. BROWN AT THE JOYCE

Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE returns to the Joyce for the company’s fortieth anniversary

Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE, a Dance Company
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at 19th St.
January 14–19 (curtain chat January 15), $52-$72
www.joyce.org
www.evidencedance.com

One of the highlights of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s recently completed winter season at New York City Center was a new, even more exhilarating twenty-fifth anniversary production of Ronald K. Brown’s 1999 Grace The piece will now be performed by Brown’s Brooklyn-based Evidence, a Dance Company, as part of its winter season at the Joyce — and the troupe’s fortieth anniversary. Running January 14-19, it consists of two programs, both beginning with the company premiere of 2001’s Serving Nia, a sequel to Grace, set to music by drummer Roy Brooks and trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie and performed by eight dancers. That will be followed by 2005’s Order My Steps, a work for nine dancers, with music by Terry Riley, Bob Marley, and David Ivey and text by the late actor Chadwick Boseman, delivered live by his brother Kevin.

Program A concludes with the spectacular Grace, which features twelve dancers moving to a melding of modern dance and West African idioms as only Brown and co-choreographer Arcell Cabuag can do, with music by Duke Ellington, Roy Davis Jr., and Fela Aníkúlápó Kuti and live vocals by Gordon Chambers; the beats will stay with you long after the show is over. Program B ends with 2001’s High Life, a work for eight dancers, set to music by Oscar Brown Jr., Nikki Giovanni, Nikengas, Kuti, and Wumni.

Evidence’s spectacular costumes, by Omotayo Wunmi Olaiya, are always a treat all their own, as is the lighting, by Tsubasa Kamei, helping make every evening with Ronald K. Brown a special event, as it has been across its forty-year history.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

A DYSTOPIC LAND OF WONDER AT THE JOYCE

GALLIM returns to the Joyce with New York premiere of evening-length Wonderland (photo by Dan Chen)

GALLIM: WONDERLAND
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at Nineteenth St.
November 13-17, $62-$82
www.joyce.org
www.gallim.org

Brooklyn-based GALLIM explores the us vs. them mentality so prevalent in contemporary American society — and at the center of the recent presidential election — in the New York premiere of Wonderland, running November 13-17 at the Joyce. GALLIM presented a thirty-minute iteration of the work in its 2010 Joyce debut, but two years later founding artistic director Andrea Miller expanded it to an hourlong evening-length piece that takes place in an antitotalitarian dystopia.

The cast features Gothenburg Ballet’s Arika Yamada as Megalomatrix, Vivian Pakkanen as the Fool, Georgia Usborne as the Guilty, Donterreo Culp as the Beloved, guest artist Billy Barry as the Jester, Bryan Testa as the Dog, India Hobbs as the Seer, and Nouhoum Koita as the Everyone, with the Pack consisting of Jasmine Alisca, Victoria Chassé Dominguez, Briana Del Mundo, Waverly Fredericks, and Thomas Hogan. (Barry and Yamada originated their roles in 2010.)

“We are witnessing an extreme departure from one another’s physical and emotional individuality, from the foundations of human dignity, and from the very elements that make us free,” Miller said in a statement. “On social media, millions join virtual armies, charging against each other like packs of vicious wolves — same species, unseen enemies — driven by forces of real terror that we fail to fully comprehend. Wonderland navigates these dark pathways of daily alienation, inducement, and mutual aggression.”

Among Miller’s inspirations for the show is Cai Guo-Qiang’s Head On, an installation of ninety-nine life-size stuffed wolves charging toward a glass wall, part of his 2008 “I Want to Believe” exhibition at the Guggenheim. The score ranges from Chopin, Joanna Newsom, and the Chordettes to William Basinsky, Black Dice, and Jeannie Robertson, with atmospheric sound design by Miller and Jakub Kiupinski and Cristina Spinei of Blind Ear Music. The set is by Jon Bausor, lighting by Vincent Vigilante, and costumes by Jose Solís.

Wonderland pits the individual against dangerous groupthink with animalistic movement in a world threatening to go off the rails. Miller added, “Can we imagine — or perhaps remember — the destructive outcomes on the other side of totalitarian promises and societies? Maybe art, maybe dance, through their creative freedom, can remind us of the way back to empathy and shared humanity.” There will be a curtain chat at the November 14 show to provide further illumination.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

WEST SIDE FEST 2024

The High Line will host special programming at West Side Fest (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

WEST SIDE FEST
July 12-14, free
Multiple locations between Bank & West Thirtieth Sts.
www.westsidefest.nyc

Every June, the Upper East Side hosts the Museum Mile Festival, when seven or eight arts institutions, including the Met, the Guggenheim, the Cooper Hewitt, the Jewish Museum, and El Museo del Barrio, open its doors for free and turn Fifth Ave. into an arts-based street fair.

The West Side is getting in on the action with its own celebration with the weekend-long West Side Fest, running July 12-14, featuring live performances, guided tours, open studios, interactive workshops, special presentations, and free entry at many locations between Bank and Thirtieth Sts., including the Rubin, Poster House, the Whitney, Hudson Guild, Little Island, the Shed, Dia Chelsea, and the Joyce. Below is the full schedule; a map is available at the above website.

Friday, July 12
NYC Aids Memorial, 7:00 am – 11:00 pm

The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, 8:00 am – 10:00 pm

Hudson Guild: Déflorée History Series, with panels by Valerie Hallier, 10:00 am – 5:00 pm

Hudson Guild: Triennial Children’s Art Show, 10:00 am – 6:00 pm

Poster House, free admission, 10:00 – 6:00

Little Island: Creative Break, art workshops, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm

Dia Chelsea, noon – 6:00

Whitney Museum of American Art: Open Studio for Teens, 1:00 – 3:00

IndieSpace/West Village Rehearsal Co-Op: Open Rehearsal by Divine Riot Company of Five Times in One Night, 2:00 – 5:00

Hill Art Foundation: Sound Bath, with musician Daren Ho, 5:00 – 7:00

The Joyce Theater at Chelsea Green Park: Pop-Up Dance Performances by Pilobolus and Dorrance Dance, 5:00 & 6:30

The Shed: Summer Sway, 5:00 – 8:00

White Columns: Exhibition Opening Reception, with works by Michaela Bathrick, Ali Bonfils, Joseph Brock, Eleanor Conover, and Donyel Ivy-Royal, 5:00 – 8:00

Whitney Museum of American Art: Free Friday Nights, advance RSVP required, 5:00 – 10:00

Print Center New York: Print Center After Hours, 6:00 – 8:00

Westbeth Artists Housing x the Kitchen Kickoff Celebration & Poster Sale, 6:00 – 8:00

Rubin Museum of Art: K2 Friday Night, 6:00 – 10:00

Little Island: Teen Night, 7:00 – 8:00

“Wonder City of the World: New York City Travel Posters” is on view at Poster House

Saturday, July 13
High Line: Family Art Moment: Dream Wilder with Us, ages 5–12, 10:00 am – noon

IndieSpace/West Village Rehearsal Co-Op: Open Rehearsal by Divine Riot Company of Five Times in One Night, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm

Poster House, free admission, 10:00 – 6:00

Hudson River Park: Explore & Play, 14th Street Park, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm

Little Island: Creative Break, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm

Westbeth Artists Housing: Penny’s Puppets, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm

Rubin Museum of Art, 11:00 am – 5:00 pm

Center for Art, Research, and Alliances, Javier Téllez: Amerika, 11:00 am – 6:00 pm

High Line: A Celebration of High Line Wellness, 11:30 am – 1:00 pm

The Kitchen: Tai Chi Workshop, 11:30 am – 1:00 pm

Hudson Guild: Triennial Children’s Art Show, noon – 3:00

Poster House Block Party, noon – 5:00

Dia Chelsea, noon – 6:00

Hudson Guild: Déflorée History Series, with panels by Valerie Hallier, 1:00 – 4:00

The Kitchen Poster Sale, 1:00 – 6:00

Westbeth Artists Housing: Art & Craft Market, 1:00 – 6:00

IndieSpace/West Village Rehearsal Co-Op: Open Rehearsal by Ali Keller, 2:00 – 5:00

Print Center New York: Print Activation with Demian DinéYazhi’, 2:00 – 5:00

Westbeth Artists Housing Open Studios, 2:00 – 5:00

Dia Chelsea Soil Sessions: Earth Sounds with Koyoltzintli, advance RSVP required, 2:30

Westbeth Artists Housing: You Are Never Too Old to Play, 7:00 – 9:00

The Rubin reimagines its collection in grand finale (photo byt twi-ny/mdr)

Sunday, July 14
The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, 8:00 am – 8:00 pm

Poster House, free admission, 10:00 – 6:00

Whitney Museum of American Art: Free Second Sundays, 10:30 am – 6:00 pm

Hudson River Park Community Celebration, with Ajna Dance Company, henna, and community groups, Pier 63, 11:00 am – 1:00 pm

Center for Art, Research, and Alliances, Javier Téllez: Amerika, 11:00 am – 6:00 pm

Rubin Museum of Art: Family Sunday, 1:00 – 3:00

Westbeth Artists Housing Open Studios and Art & Craft Market, 1:00 – 5:00

Westbeth Artists Housing: Art Take-Over, curated by Valérie Hallier, Claire Felonis, and Noah Trapolino, 1:00 – 6:00

Whitney Museum of American Art: STAFF ONLY, Westbeth Gallery, 1:00 – 6:00

Chelsea Factory: Ladies of Hip-Hop’s Ladies Battle!, 1:00 – 10:00

IndieSpace/West Village Rehearsal Co-Op: Open Rehearsal by Felice Lesser Dance Theater of I AM A DANCER 2.0, 2:00 – 4:00

High Line: The Death Avenue Posse, by the Motor Company, 5:30 & 7:00

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

RONALD K. BROWN/EVIDENCE WINTER SEASON AT THE JOYCE

Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE return to the Joyce with Walking Out the Dark (photo by Ernesto Mancebo)

Ronald K. Brown/EVIDENCE, a Dance Company
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at 19th St.
January 16–21, $52-$72
212-691-9740
www.joyce.org
www.evidencedance.com

One of the highlights of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s sixty-fifth anniversary season at New York City Center last month was a new production of Ronald K. Brown’s 2009 Dancing Spirit, a celebration of longtime Ailey dancer and artistic director Judith Jamison. Before and after the December 23 presentation, Brown, who suffered a stroke in April 2021 that almost cost him his life, stood in the back of the orchestra with his life partner, dancer and associate artistic director Arcell Cabuag, hugging, kissing, and shaking hands with friends, colleagues, and well-wishers. Brown still has a lot of work to do, but his progress has been awe-inspiring.

Brown, a Bed-Stuy native, now brings his Evidence company — named after the 1948 Thelonius Monk composition — to the Joyce for its annual winter season. Running January 16–21, the show features two of Brown’s masterworks, 2001’s Walking Out the Dark and 2012’s Torch.

The former, a fifty-five-minute choreographed conversation among mother, brother, sister, lover, and friend dealing with self-examination, ritual, and healing, has an original score by Philip Hamilton (“Freedom”), with text from letters by Brown in addition to songs by Sweet Honey in the Rock (“Oh Death”), Ballet Folklorico Cutumba de Santiago de Cuba, and Toumani Diabate and live drumming by Abou Camara. The cast alternates between Demetrius Burns, Joyce Edwards, Gregory Hamilton, Isaiah K. Harvey, and Cabuag, who is celebrating his twenty-fifth year with the troupe and will take on the “Gratitude” solo four times, and Stephanie Chronopoulos, Austin Warren Coats, Valériane Louisy, Shaylin D. Watson, and Burns (“Gratitude”); the movement is inspired by dance from Benin, Cuba, and Côte d’lvoire.

The latter is a touching tribute to the life and memory of former Brown student and dance enthusiast Beth Young, who passed away in January 2012. The half-hour piece, which focuses on perseverance and self-determination, will be performed by Burns, Chronopoulos, Coats, Edwards, Hamilton, Harvey, Louisy, and Watson, with music by Teddy Douglas and DJ Zinhle featuring Busiswa Gqulu, remixed by Brown.

There will be a Curtain Chat on January 17 and a family matinee on January 20 at 2:00.

In addition, in conjunction with APAP, Brown and Cabuag are presenting an excerpt from Percussion Bitter Sweet, which they are creating for “Max Roach 100”; the sneak peek takes place at the Joyce on January 13 at 4:00 and at Alvin Ailey Studios on January 14 at 5:30.

No company has the kind of dancing spirit Brown and Evidence display, and it should be on full view in this winter program at the Joyce.

COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET: DREAM ON

Dwight Rhoden’s Ballad Unto . . . is part of Complexions two-week season at the Joyce

COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave. at 19th St.
November 14-26, $62-92
212-691-9740
www.joyce.org
www.complexionsdance.org

Complexions Contemporary Ballet returns to the Joyce this week, kicking off its two-week fall season displaying the diversity that has been its trademark since its founding by Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson in 1994. The company will present three programs plus a sold-out gala, offering work from a wide range of choreographers.

The gala, honoring artistic advisor and Ailey instructor Sarita Allen, will be held on November 14, with Dream On, set to a poem by CCB inaugural poet-journalist-in-residence Aaron Dworkin; Rhoden’s Black Is Beautiful, a 2022 pandemic film making its live debut, with the Pre-Professional Students of Howard University; Justin Peck’s The Dreamers, a 2016 duet set to music by Bohuslav Martinů; Rhoden’s 2015 Ballad Unto . . . , set to music by Bach; and excerpts from Ricardo Amarante’s Love Fear Loss (inspired by the life of Édith Piaf) and the world premieres of Jenn Freeman’s Regardless and Rhoden’s For Crying Out Loud (with music from the U2 album Songs of Surrender).

Program A consists of Ballad Unto . . . , For Crying Out Loud, Love Fear Loss (with pianist Brian Wong), and Regardless (with drummer Price McGuffey). Program B comprises The Dreamers and Rhoden’s 2020 solo Elegy, 2023 Blood Calls Blood, 2020 eight-movement Endgame / Love One, and Ballad Unto. . . . Program C features The Dreamers, Elegy, Blood Calls Blood, For Crying Out Loud, and Ballad Unto. . . .

The November 15 performance will be followed by a Curtain Chat, and there will be a family matinee on November 18. The CCD dancers include Alberto Andrade, Christian Burse, Jacopo Calvo, Kobe Atwood Courtney, Jasmine Heart Cruz, Jillian Davis, Vincenzo Di Primo, Angelo De Serra, Chloe Duryea, Joe Gonzalez, Alexander Haquia, Aristotle Luna, Marissa Mattingly, Laura Perich, Miguel Solano, Lucy Stewart, Candy Tong, Manuel Vaccaro, and April Watson.

“We are thrilled to be headed back to the Joyce with ‘Dream On,’ a dynamic program that showcases the talent and incredible range and diversity that has always been the bedrock of our company,” Rhoden said in a statement. “‘Dream On’ is an affirmation of the dream Desmond and I had twenty-nine years ago, and the passion, pride, and possibility that have brought us this far and encourage us to keep going.”

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]