Jeanne Moreau, 89

Jeanne Moreau, Femme Fatale of French New Wave, Is Dead at 89
by Anita Gates, The New York Times, July 31, 2017

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Sidra Bell Dance New York at The Met Breuer

Last evening, as part of its Theater of the Resist series, The Met Breuer hosted bass-baritone Davóne Tines (singing Julius Eastman's searing Prelude to The Holy Presence of Jeanne d'Arc), rapper Himanshu Suri (a.k.a. Heems) and Sidra Bell Dance New York. I don't know if the museum installed the metal bleacher and bench seating to keep us all on edge to the point of mind-alteration but, if so, the artists certainly did their part. Curated and MC'd by media/culture writer Kali Holloway--who, frankly, often seemed as stunned as her audience--the two-hour program offered various media and modes of artistic resistance to the ground, unholy and toxic, in which we currently find ourselves.

I was there, primarily, for Bell's Stella (2012), which you can see tonight at 6pm. The ensemble dances in a relatively shallow space across the gallery and gets up close to front-row folks in ways that heighten the persistent air of tension, risk and thrill. There are the crisp rhythms of street dance, the stark, deep-queer glamour of a fashion catwalk, the enigmatic drama that just does not quit. Bell calls upon a seemingly limitless supply of intricate movement ideas and shows no hesitation to share this largesse. And, from start to finish, her disciplined crew is ON IT.

Video closeups amplify the unfiltered anxiety with performers staring into the camera and repeatedly tugging or clawing at their own bare flesh for reasons that remain mysterious.

Sometimes you visit museums to see dance that addresses museum space (its design, contents, atmosphere and everyday functions) in harmonizing or questioning and possibly illuminating ways. Sometimes you go, and it's just another container for performance; the dance, not made for its surroundings, could have happened elsewhere. As for Stella, she simply blasts herself into The Met Breuer and makes her formidable presence felt.

Tonight and all Theater of the Resist programs are free with museum admission and run from 6pm to 8pm. For the best seating, make your way to the 5th Floor no later than 5:30pm. For information, click here.

Upcoming events 

in the Met Breuer's Theater of the Resist series
through August 12:

Saturday, July 29

For Living Lovers with Brandon Ross, and Stomu Takeishi, musicians, and poet Sadiq Bey

Sidra Bell Dance New York

M. Lamar, performer

Friday, August 4

Nicole Fleetwood, Associate Professor Department of American Studies, Rutgers University moderates discussion between Lifers Group members Maxwell Melvins, president, and rapper Picard "Original" Galette.

Saturday, August 5

Stew, Singer-songwriter, playwright

Gina Yashere, British comedian

Friday, August 11

Film: Strong Island (2017)

with Q&A with filmmaker Yance Ford

Saturday, August 12

Maria Usbeck, Ecuadorian musician, traveler and diarist

Aparna Nancherla, introspective and outrospective standup comedian

DJ Mojo: Music is Life, directed by Lawrence Kim

(2017 documentary short, 5 mins.)

Live set by DJ Mojo

The Met Breuer
945 Madison (at 75th Street)
(map/directions)

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BUFU presents "HERE ON OUT" in Bushwick

Curator Ali Rosa-Salas's HERE ON OUT--part of July's BUFU events*--drew an ebullient crowd to Bushwick's Secret Project Robot bar and small performance space. One night only, it was one of those events that compel your presence and, clearly, a lot of dance's smartest and coolest read the memo. The ever-loving MTA did not, however, but that problem was deftly handled, last minute, by pushing the announced start time back a half-hour.

Due to illness, I made an early exit and missed the final performer, Jonathan Gonzalez, but I was there when the little dance party gave way to a solo by FLEXN and FLEXN Evolution star Shelby Shellz Suzie Q Felton--whose uncommonly bendy body surfaces a world of enthralling characters and drama. Felton was followed by a duet by Angie Pittman and Lily Bo Shapiro. Pittman and Shapiro made good use of the dim, crowded room by commandeering space for whatever their willful bodies chose to be, for however they chose to move in ways that question the conventionally functional way we humans are socialized to regard and move our bodies. Pittman maneuvered herself like popping corn. Shapiro sloshed and buried herself in darkness and oozed through the audience. And first both and then Pittman alone repeatedly galloped between two doors accented by powerful sound and a dash of lantern light. Sitting on the floor or on the precious-few benches, we often had to scoot feet and butts out of the way of this toomuchness crashing our shoreline. And it was kind of fun.

As for Gonzalez--always a surprising and striking performer--I hope to catch up with him at The Current Sessions, coming up in mid-August at the wild project. NIC Kay is another must-see artist presenting work in this series. For information on The Current Sessions, click here.

*****

HERE ON OUT has concluded.

*FUBU identifies itself as "a collaborative living archive centered around pan)Black and (pan)Asian cultural and political relationships. We, the founders of this   project, are a collective of queer, femme and non­binary, Black and East­Asian artists and organizer. Our goal is to facilitate a global conversation on the   relationship between Black & Asian diasporas, with an emphasis on building solidarity, de­centering whiteness, and resurfacing our deeply interconnected and complicated histories." FUBU asks, "In times where institutions, programs, and organizations are being de­funded and unsupported by the government, how can we learn to self­generate resources, support one another and help each other thrive?" For information on FUBU's activities, click here.

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Dr. G. Yunupingu, 46

Dr. G. Yunupingu, Australian Aboriginal Singer, Dies at 46
by Russell Goldman, The New York Times, July 26, 2017

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Lining up: Abigail Levine performs LeWitt at Fridman Gallery

Dance artist Abigail Levine
at Fridman Gallery, SoHo
(photos ©2017, Eva Yaa Asantewaa)

Abigail Levine

Re-stagings No. 1: Choreographing LeWitt

Sound design by Dave Ruder

Fridman Gallery

Abigail Levine interprets Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawing #56 (1970) as a choreographic score, taking 25 hours over the course of 5 days to complete the 3,744 lines. Sound design: Dave Ruder. Choreographing LeWitt is the first in the multi-work series Re-stagings, which reads modern and postmodern visual artworks as scores for performance.

On the scaffold, she slowly walks her line, dragging splayed left hand, hip, shoulder along demarcated whiteness, smearing traces. Right hand, high, inscribing. Imperfectly, her lines marks time. A line stops. She stops, turns, regroups at its beginning, beginning beginning. A body beginning, a body makes this, lead scraping paper, with story, a woman's body.

(photos ©2017, Eva Yaa Asantewaa)

Re-stagings No. 1: Choreographing LeWitt continues tomorrow and Thursday, from noon through 6pm. Thursday's closing reception is from 6pm to 8pm. Admission is free. There are a few seats.

Fridman Gallery
287 Spring Street (near Hudson Street), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Diane Torr, 68

Obituary: Diane Torr, artist who challenged notions of gender
by David Pollock, The Scotsman, June 27, 2017

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John Heard, 71

John Heard, the Frazzled Father in ‘Home Alone,’ Dies at 71
by Annie Correal, The New York Times, July 22, 2017

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Clancy Sigal, 90

Clancy Sigal, Novelist Whose Life Was a Tale in Itself, Dies at 90
by Sam Roberts, The New York Times, July 21, 2017

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George Romero, 77

George Romero, Father of the Zombie Movie, Dies at 77
by Maya Salam, The New York Times, July 16, 2017

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Martin Landau, 89

Martin Landau, Actor Who Won an Oscar for ‘Ed Wood,’ Dies at 89
by Anita Gates, The New York Times, July 17, 2017

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D'Lo bears witness--and gets laughs--at Dixon Place

Dixon Place presents comic performer D'Lo
in To T, or Not to T,
a highlight of the 2017 Hot! Festival,
DP's annual celebration of queer arts and culture.
(photos: Ryan Harper Gray)

Bearing witness is the only way I know to be alive. -- D'Lo

From the outset, D'Lo literally trampolines and pogo-sticks into our hearts and, if you haven't seen him perform before--and I hadn't--you figure that's cute. But where will he go after this wacky first impression?

To T, or Not to T--a Dixon Place commission for this summer's Hot! Festival--hooks in and never lets you go. Just over an hour in length, this one-trans show is, by turns, hilarious, tender and sharp. D'Lo's so talented and smooth, he makes it all look effortless, but you know a hellawork went into getting all this material to line up and flow this well.

To T, or Not to T traces D'Lo's experience being raised as a girl in a Tamil-Sri Lankan family in Lancaster, California ("aka Sri Lancaster, California") and gradually coming to terms with his true gender identity. He has now been on testosterone for two years. Right there, that's a whole lot of content. Heavy-going, you say? Oh, no. Not one bit.

What gives D'Lo and his narrative so much lift and embraceable charm is how strongly it is rooted in his observation of and complete delight in his family--a family that wrestled with challenges but ended up cheering him on in the most heartwarming way. Which makes me think: Despite the idiot in the White House and his delusional supporters, we're actually living a moment in America where D'Lo's relatives and friends could easily find themselves the subject of a quality tv sitcom. And I would watch it. Every last episode.

To T, or Not to T continues tonight and July 21-22, all performances at 7:30pm. For information and tickets, click here.

For a full Hot! Festival schedule (through August 4), click here.

Dixon Place
161A Chrystie Street, Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Ray Phiri, 70

Ray Phiri, ‘Graceland’ Guitarist and Anti-Apartheid Bandleader, Dies at 70
by Jon Pareles, The New York Times, July 14, 2017

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The 2017 Bessie Awards nominations (and two winners)!

With Managing Director Heather Robles (left)
and Executive Director Lucy Sexton (right)
opening a press conference at Gibney Dance Center,
the Bessies organization announced two early winners
and a slate of nominees for the 2017 Bessies Awards
set for October 9 at NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts.
(photo: Eva Yaa Asantewaa)

2017 Outstanding Emerging Choreographer Award:
Will Rawls

"for creating astute, genre-eluding work that explores the relationship between movement and language and delves deeply into ideas of transmission, translation, and authorship; and for his multifaceted artistry as choreographer, writer, editor, and curator, expanding the presence of dance and performance."

2017 Juried Bessie Award:
Abby Zbikowski 

"recognized for her rigorous and utterly unique development of an authentic movement vocabulary, employed in complex and demanding structures to create dances of great energy, intensity, surprise, and danger. (2017 Jury: Kyle Abraham, Brenda Bufalino, and Beth Gill)

The 2017 Bessie Awards Nominations

Outstanding Production

Vanessa Anspaugh
The End of Men; An Ode to Ocean
Joyce Unleashed at Abrons Art Center

Kader Attou of CCN de la Rochelle/Cie Accrorap
OPUS 14
Fall for Dance at New York City Center

Bridgman / Packer
Voyeur
Sheen Center

Nora Chipaumire
portrait of myself as my father
BAM Fisher

Antony Hamilton
Meeting
La MaMa and Performance Space 122, COIL 2017

Jessica Lang
Thousand Yard Stare
The Joyce Theater

Ligia Lewis
minor matter
American Realness at Abrons Art Center

Taylor Mac
A 24-Decade History of Popular Music
St. Ann’s Warehouse/Pomegranate Arts

Crystal Pite
The Statement
Performed by Nederlands Dans Theater
New York City Center

Sébastien Ramirez and Honji Wang
Monchichi
BAM Fisher

Abdel Salaam
Healing Sevens
Featuring Forces of Nature Dance Theatre, Asase Yaa African American Dance Theatre, Ill Style & Peace Productions, and Dyane Harvey Salaam
DanceAfrica at BAM Howard Gilman Opera House

Adrienne Truscott
THIS
New York Live Arts

Outstanding Revived Work

Variations on Themes from Lost and Found: Scenes from a Life and other works by John Bernd
Conceived by Ishmael Houston-Jones. Co-directed by Ishmael Houston-Jones and Miguel Gutierrez. John Bernd's music compositions arranged and re-mixed by Nick Hallett. Consultation by Jennifer Monson.
Danspace Project Platform 2016: Lost and Found

About Kazuo Ohno
By Takao Kawaguchi
Japan Society

Stephen Petronio Company
For Trio A (1966), Chair Pillow (1969), and Diagonal (1963) by Yvonne Rainer; Goldberg  Variations (1986) by Steve Paxton; The Courtesan and the Crone (1999) by Anna Halprin
The Joyce Theater

Outstanding Performer

Yeman Brown
In Citizen by Reggie Wilson
BAM Harvey

PeiJu Chien-Pott
In Virginie Mécène’s reimagining of Martha Graham’s 1933 solo, Ekstasis
The Joyce Theater

Sean Donovan
For his body of work with The Builders Association, Faye Driscoll, Witness Relocation, Jennie MaryTai Liu, and Jane Comfort

Jonathan Gonzalez
In minor matter by Ligia Lewis
American Realness at Abrons Art Center

Julie McMillan
In KO-BU by Benjamin Kimitch
Danspace Project

Cast of Riff this, Riff that
By Ephrat Asherie Dance
River to River Festival, Atrium Plaza

Anna Schön
In Citizen by Reggie Wilson
BAM Harvey

Nicholas Sciscione
In excerpts from Steve Paxton’s Goldberg Variations
Presented by the Stephen Petronio Company
The Joyce Theater

Ensemble of the skeleton architecture, or the future of our worlds: Maria Bauman, Sidra Bell, Davalois Fearon, Marjani Forté-Saunders, Melanie Greene, Kayla Hamilton, Jasmine Hearn, Marguerite Hemmings, Nia Love, Paloma McGregor, Sydnie L. Mosley, Rakiya Orange, Leslie Parker, Angie Pittman, Samantha Speis, Charmaine Warren, Marýa Wethers, Ni’Ja Whitson, Grace Osborne and others*
Curated by Eva Yaa Asantewaa
Danspace Project Platform 2016: Lost and Found
*Edisa Weeks and Tara Aisha Willis also appeared in the cast, but are ineligible to vote on or receive awards as current Bessie Awards Committee members.

Daaimah Taalib-Din
In Eclipse: Visions of the Crescent and the Cross by Abdel Salaam
Aaron Davis Hall

Diana Vishneva
For Sustained Achievement with American Ballet Theatre

Cast of we free: DJ BLKWYNTR, Arielle Rosales, and Solo Woods, as well as Courtney Cook, Marguerite Hemmings, Jessica Phoenix and Italy Welton
By Marguerite Hemmings
Gibney Dance: Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center

Outstanding Emerging Choreographer

(* indicates award recipient)

Lela Aisha Jones

Niall Jones

Will Rawls*

Katarzyna Skarpetowska

Outstanding Music Composition/Sound Design

ICTUS ensemble/ROSAS
For Vortex Temporum
By Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker
BAM Next Wave Festival, Howard Gilman Opera House

Chris Kuklis and Will Rawls
For The Planet-Eaters: Seconds
By Will Rawls
River to River Festival, National Museum of the American Indian

Ryan MacDonald
For The End of Men, Again
By Vanessa Anspaugh
Danspace Project

Alisdair Macindoe
For Meeting
By Antony Hamilton
La MaMa and Performance Space 122, COIL 2017

Outstanding Visual Design

Nora Chipaumire
For portrait of myself as my father
By Nora Chipaumire
BAM Fisher

Taylor Mac, Niegel Smith, Machine Dazzle, Mimi Lien, John Torres, Eric Avery, Jawole Willa Jo Zollar
For A 24-Decade History of Popular Music
By Taylor Mac
St. Ann’s Warehouse/Pomegranate Arts

Paulina Olowska
For Slavic Goddesses–A Wreath of Ceremonies
By Paulina Olowska
The Kitchen

Mark Ryden and Brad Fields
For Whipped Cream
By Alexei Ratmansky
Performed by American Ballet Theatre
Metropolitan Opera House

*****

Come to the 33rd annual Bessie Awards on Monday, October 9, at NYU’s Skirball Center for the Performing Arts. Tickets will go on sale August 1.

For more information, click here.

Follow the Bessies on Facebook / #theBessies / @bessieawards

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José Luis Cuevas, 83

José Luis Cuevas, a Dark Master of Mexican Art, Dies at 83
by William Grimes, The New York Times, July 7, 2017

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Pierre Henry, 89

Pierre Henry, Composer Who Found the Music in Sounds, Dies at 89
by William Grimes, The New York Times, July 7, 2017

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Go backstage with the haunted "GHOST LIGHT"

Every exit is an entrance somewhere.

--Elizabeth Carena in GHOST LIGHT

Tumbling down Third Rail Projects' rabbit hole and through their looking glass in the Bessie-winning Then She Fell has long been my most cherished experience of this magical company. But now comes GHOST LIGHT, a worthy challenger, with the immersive dance/theater troupe smoothly roaming the innards of Lincoln Center's Claire Tow Theater, the hidden workings of a show and the psyches of some theater folk who remain unaware that they left their mortal bodies quite some time ago.

Well, the show must go on!

Yes, this work really puts the ghosts in "ghost light," that convention of leaving one light--a single bulb in a wire cage--burning on an unused, darkened stage. As we follow various players through stairwells and a warren of backstage spaces, we eye characters from multiple, imaginative viewpoints--gazing down at them from balcony or stair railings, glancing sideways from the wings at a rehearsal, tucked at the end of a corridor as actors and stagehands dramatically, distractedly and hectically dash in and out of doors with minutes to showtime. That last bit, by the way, is a brilliant farce of fluid, split-second coordination of people and props--a signature for co-directors/choreographers Zach Morris and Jennine Willett. Supported by an excellent collaborative cast and creative team, these two have outdone themselves.

For fans who love the fascinating thingy-ness of TRP's productions--the busy, often quaint decor that colors and flavors their unusual sites--the wonderful set designer Brett J. Banakis has got you covered. But don't expect to have much time to linger and study these intricate visual details. Except for some props you might be handed from time to time, you will mostly be focused elsewhere or hustled past stuff. You will be distracted by noises and voices and music from unseen sources. Two intermission-less hours will fly by as fast as some of this theater's specters.

One character--I think it was the wistful, elegantly-coiffed actress played by Jessy Smith--pondered the possibility that people who have died are truly gone only when no one's left who remembers them. Insight into characters is the least original or interesting aspect of this work; Morris's writing isn't nearly as dreamily graceful or as daring as his and Willett's movement ideas can be. But I did take note of this particular statement and its broader implications.

How often do we encounter a work of art and wish we could make that experience stay with us forever? Keep it fresh, maybe share it--just as we received it--with others? (Why I write....) GHOST LIGHT, in its way, pays tribute to the art and artists passing through our lives, people whom we only think we know and whom we can't hold onto--except in memory. Yes, a wealth of technology can document these artists and the work they do. But, really, human-to-human, heart-to-heart, all of it filtered through your senses and sensibilities, embraced by memory, passed down to others--that is how culture has always been preserved and lovingly transmitted, even if imperfectly.

Cast: Donna Ahmadi, Cameron Michael Burns, Elizabeth Carena, Alberto Denis, Joshua Dutton-Reaver, Julia Kelly, Roxanne Kidd, Josh Matthews, Rebekah Morin, Marissa Nielsen-Pincus, Tara O'Con, Edward Rice, Jessy Smith, Niko Tsocanos, Carlton Cyrus Ward and Ryan Wuestewald

Original music and sound: Sean Hagerty

Co-composer: Isaiah Singer

Collaborating musicians: Craig Akin, Nick Auer, Johnny Butler, Mike Lunoe, Ben Magnuson, Alicia Rau, Isaiah Singer

Sets: Brett J. Banakis

Illusion design: Vinny DiPonto

Costumes: Montana Levi Blanco

Lighting: Eric Southern

GHOST LIGHT's stated end date is August 6. However, if this show is anything like previous TRP productions, it will have extended life by demand--and it should. Come out of the New York summer heat; the A/C's fine! For general information on GHOST LIGHT, click here. For important audience guidelines, click here. For tickets, click here. Don't be late!


Claire Tow Theater
Lincoln Center Theater
150 West 65th Street, Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Invisible made visible: Okpokwasili, Rossi present "Bronx Gothic"

"Bronx Gothic is about inhabiting the body of a brown girl
in a world that privileges whiteness."

"I am asking you to see the brown body."

"Maybe Bronx Gothic creates visibility for the invisible."

--Okwui Okpokwasili,
from the film Bronx Gothic, directed by Andrew Rossi

Photos courtesy of Grasshopper Film

Now ask yourself: Are you awake?

--Okwui Okpokwasili, Bronx Gothic

Christians have a gospel story about Jesus, aware of his fate, praying in the garden of Gethsemane on the night before his crucifixion. All around him, his disciples--whom he had asked to merely keep watch with him--sleep deeply, leaving him alone with his agony.

I thought of this scene as I watched Okwui Okpokwasili in the documentary Bronx Gothic (2017, 91 min.), a film with superb direction by Andrew Rossi and killer editing by Andrew Coffman of Bryan Sarkinen and Rossi's daring cinematography. Launching its world premiere theatrical engagement on July 12 at Film Forum, the film provides deep insight into the motivation and process that guided Okpokwasili's magnificent solo performance piece of the same name. It delves into her experiences, thoughts and feelings as she takes the show on its final tour and holds discussions with members of her audience.

As the film opens, Okpokwasili is in mid-performance, dressed in the color of congealed blood, tears pooling and dripping from her luminous eyes as the persona she inhabits recalls life-changing incidents from a Bronx childhood. I was reminded of the frequent, insistent sobbing in Kyle Abraham's ensemble dance, Dearest Home, and also how, like disciples at Gethsemane, not every viewer will necessarily have the will to stay awake--available, vulnerable, connected, "woke"--when Black artists ask for empathetic witness.

Both Dearest Home and Bronx Gothic--denying any demand for performance to stay within narrow, acceptable confines--make messy vulnerability and intense pain visible, in particular Black pain. Both works reach into as well as beyond their makers' personal history of being Black in America to suggest characters and narrative that should move anyone of heart and conscience.

Okpokwasili was raised within a large, middle-class Nigerian-immigrant family in the comfortable Parkchester section of the Bronx in the 1980s. (Her charming parents, whom we meet late in the film, make an indelible impression.) Describing her solo as "semi-autobiographical" allows it to partake of her extraordinary imagination and her empathy for the pre-teen girls she observed in her youth. She remembers them, remembers their pleasures and their struggles, channels them and serves them with intensely committed soul and physicality. The film's audience is spared little of how violently this haunted performance has wrenched its performer's psyche and body.

Having seen two iterations of Bronx Gothic live (Danspace Project, 2012 and 2014), I can tell you that the film, generously sampling the live performance, only slightly misses the electrifying force of Okpokwasili live. There's nothing quite like being in a close, tent-like enclosure with her as she quakes head to toe, shares sexual secrets, scrapes her bare feet and smacks her bones against a punishing floor.

"Black flesh has deep meaning in this culture," Okpokwasili remarks at one point as she discusses her intentions for Bronx Gothic. All the vivid imagery--the dark and the light, the glistening sweat, the luxurious undulations and seizure-like trembling--serves to underscore this uncomfortable, complicated truth.

As she thinks about how her performance confronts and nearly overwhelms her audience, the artist is also both overwhelmed and intrigued. Recalling her experiences in the role, she asks an imaginary watcher, "Is my Blackness getting on you? Am I getting on you? Can you take on the pain?"

Not for nothing is the genre-spanning Okpokwasili one of our most respected artists, a Bessie-winner to boot. I hope Rossi's portrait of her will be seen widely. I rank Bronx Gothic up there with Raoul Peck's I Am Not Your Negro as another urgent, earthshaking documentary that must be seen and must be discussed.

Showings at 12:30, 2:30, 4:40, 7:00 and 9:10
Wednesday, July 12 through Tuesday, July 25

Q&As with Okpokwasili and Rossi at the 7pm shows
Wednesday, July 12, Friday, July 14 and Saturday, July 15

For information and tickets, click here.

Film Forum
209 West Houston Street (west of Sixth Avenue), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Denys Johnson-Davies, 94

Denys Johnson-Davies, Translator of Arab Writers, Is Dead at 94
by William Grimes, The New York Times, July 5, 2017

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Heathcote Williams, 75

Heathcote Williams, Radical British Poet Who Helped Form Anarchist Nation, Dies at 75
by William Grimes, The New York Times, July 5, 2017

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Kelan Philip Cohran, 90

Kelan Philip Cohran, a Musician Who Invigorated Chicago With Education and Activism, Dies at 90
by Giovanni Russonello, The New York Times, July 4, 2017

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That upcoming APAP theme is what again?

Have you heard? The theme of the 2018 Association of Performing Arts Professionals (APAP) Conference in New York City (January 12-16) is...

trans.ACT.

Kind of makes your heart beat faster, doesn't it?

But hold on!

Not surprisingly, APAP's call for proposals for trans.ACT. caught the attention of trans dance and performance artist Ashley R.T. Yergens who noticed a curious absence of any mention of trans artists and their work.

Yergens took his questions about all this to Facebook:

The Association of Performing Arts Professionals, formerly known as the Association of Performing Arts Presenters, or more commonly known as APAP is calling for Professional Development Program proposals using the theme "trans.ACT."

They define the theme as the following:

"This year’s theme, trans.ACT, focuses on the transformative power of the arts and the multiple ways - 'trans' meaning across, beyond, and through – in which we 'act' upon our commitment to bring the full meaning, impact and experience of the arts to communities across the country and around the world."

While I understand the etymology of the prefix "trans," I can't help but notice that the theme reads as transact as in transaction. Also, it reads as Trans Act like an act that serves to protect trans people like me. This particular reading of the theme leaves me completely baffled.

There's zero mention of trans people - trans dance and performance artists - like me, which seems like a hugely missed opportunity and evidence of who was in the room to finalize this year's APAP theme for Professional Development Program proposals.

Again, I understand the etymology of the prefix "trans." I'm not here to police language. Words evolve. However, I question and I hold APAP accountable to how they're using the word at this point in the evolution of "trans." The word has finally entered the mainstream to describe people like me who don't identify with their assigned genders at birth. It's a word that empowers me and allows me to find other people who share similar experiences and hardships.

Honestly, this is like APAP naming the theme "Gay.ACT" and defining "gay" simply as happy and distancing the term from its loaded history pertaining to gay people.

Perhaps this theme wouldn't be so unsettling if it weren't for the fact that dance and live performance lacks history, documentation, and consistent opportunities for dancing and performing bodies of trans experiences. If you want proof of what this field is lacking, then 1) send money to my Venmo account, and I'll do the labor of sharing my research and personal experiences with you or 2) Google.

So, I'm holding APAP accountable to answering the following questions: 

1.) Did you consult any trans people when you selected this theme?

2.) Are there any trans people on your staff or board?

3.) How have you supported trans dance artists and performers in the past? How do you plan on supporting trans dance artists and performers in the future?

4.) While I understand the etymology of "trans," I find it odd that you chose to use a word that is currently used to describe identities that I and so many other people fight for on a daily basis. Why don't you mention trans people in your description? Was any of this discussed when selecting "trans.ACT" as a theme?

I look forward to APAP's thorough responses, and I am eager to see how they will transcend their faux pas with action.

I encourage you to contact APAP as well: https://www.apap365.org/About/Staff

Ashley R.T. Yergens

YERGEN'S QUERY

Yergens also sent the following email to APAP:

Hello,

My name is Ashley R.T. Yergens. I'm a trans dance artist and performer based in Brooklyn, NY.

I was reading your description about this year's PDP theme for proposals.

A few questions come to mind:

1.) Did you consult any trans people when you selected this theme?
2.) Are there any trans people on your staff or board?
3.) How have you supported trans dance artists and performers in the past? How do you plan on supporting trans dance artists and performers in the future?
4.) While I understand the etymology of "trans," I find it odd that you chose to use a word that is currently used to describe identities that I and so many other people fight for on a daily basis. Why don't you mention trans people in your description? Was any of this discussed when selecting "trans.ACT" as a theme?

I look forward to reading your responses and discussing this further.

Best,

Ash

APAP'S REPLY

Minutes later, Yergens received the following reply:

Dear Ash,

Thank you for reaching out with your questions about this year's APAP|NYC conference theme.  Given that we are heading into a holiday weekend, I wanted to be sure to reach out to you.

Our conference committee of artists, agents, presenters and producers spent a considerable amount of time discussing the multiple meanings of "trans" in creating the theme.  We hope to bring together a wide range of professionals, including transgender artists, next January to explore how we can collectively advance the role and value of the performing arts in today’s complicated world.
 
We invite you to submit a conference proposal or otherwise happy to touch base following the upcoming holiday.

Best regards,

Scott

Scott D. Stoner
Vice President, Programs and Resources
Association of Performing Arts Professionals
1211 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 200
Washington, DC 20036
202-331-1890 | APAP365.org

YERGEN'S REPLY

Dear Scott,

Thank you for touching base. I look forward to hearing your responses to my questions, learning more about the considerable time spent discussing the multiple meanings of "trans," how you arrived at the copy on the proposal form, and learning more about how you will include transgender artists at this year's conference.

Best,

Ash

Yes, I think it will be good to hear some direct, meaningful responses to Yergen's reasonable questions, and I welcome him to keep InfiniteBody's readers posted.

*****

Ashley R.T. Yergens is a 2016 boo-koo artist-in-residence at Gibney Dance, and a 2016-17 Fresh Tracks Artist at New York Live Arts. He's a former project coordinator for DanceMotion USA, a program of the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs of the US Department of State, produced by BAM. Currently, he works at New York Live Arts as a development associate.

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Kyle Abraham's "Dearest Home" at The Kitchen

Tamisha Guy and Marcella Lewis
in Kyle Abraham's Dearest Home
(photo: Paula Court)

In Dearest Home, choreographer Kyle Abraham (Abraham.In.Motion) has made space for tears (quiet, copious, frequent), hands that shake from illness, incomprehension or desperation, and so many moments of vulnerable physical and emotional intimacy that we do not or rarely see in contemporary dance. Presented in the round at The Kitchen for Lumberyard in the City festival, this extraordinary ensemble piece speaks on so many levels. You can read in it Abraham's personal experiences of love and loss--as well as your own--and you can also trace the longings and sorrows we face as members of the broader human family in a time of crisis.

With this work, Abraham has stepped to a new level of focus and maturity, and his dancers--Matthew Baker, Tamisha Guy, Catherine Ellis Kirk, Marcella Lewis, Jeremy "Jae" Neal and Connie Shiau--are exemplary in their searching, open expressiveness and overall commitment.

If you're lucky to have tickets for this afternoon's matinee--which, sadly, concludes the run--you might do as I was advised to do and forego using headphones to hear the music. The music, composed by Jerome Begin, is an optional ingredient. You do have that choice, and I am now curious about it but still glad that nothing came between me and this heartbreaking, unforgettable work.

For information and tickets, click here.

The Kitchen
512 West 19th Street (between 10th and 11th Avenues), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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It's a milestone: Nierenberg films on tap at Quad Cinema

The late tap dance great Chuck Green in Harlem
At right, Harold "Sandman" Sims and Bunny Briggs
(still from No Maps on My Taps, 1979,
by George T. Nierenberg, courtesy of Milestone Films)

Two more giants of the art:
Gregory Hines embraces his mentor Jimmy Slyde.
(photo: George T. Nierenberg, courtesy of Milestone Films)

Time has taken from us all of the beloved master innovators and mentors shown in the photos above. But contemporary tap lives and shines in exemplars like Savion Glover, Michelle Dorrance, Jason Samuels-Smith, Chloe Arnold, Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards, Derick Grant, Ayodele Casel, Max Pollak, Roxane Butterfly, Caleb Teicher and a slew of eager youngsters coming up behind them. That torch keeps getting passed and won't go out as long as there are places where people can see and appreciate the riches tap has to offer.

Filmmaker George T. Nierenberg was an early hero in tap's recovery from the rise of television and rock 'n' roll, changes in the nature of choreography for Broadway musicals, and the subsequent loss of tap venues and gigs. His two intimate and beautiful films, No Maps on My Taps (1979) and About Tap (1984), featuring chats and performances by Chuck Green, Bunny Briggs, Harold "Sandman" Sims, Steve Condos and Jimmy Slyde, helped revive interest in the art and turned on new generations of dancers and dance educators. In 2014, American Tap Dance Foundation presented Nierenberg with its American Tap Dance Preservation Award.

Film producer/director George T. Nierenberg
(photo: George T. Nierenberg, courtesy of Milestone Films)

At Manhattan's Quad Cinema, Milestone Films will now present the first theatrical release of No Maps on My Taps (58 min) and About Tap (28 min), digitally restored from the original camera negatives, for a week-long run coinciding with ATDF's popular Tap City: The New York City Tap Festival.

I can only say, GO! You cannot fail to enjoy these films and be moved by these artists. If you can, please take some young folks who might think tap has nothing to do with them. It has everything to do with musicality, mad skills, collaboration, imagination, feeling and excellence. So, yes, it has everything to do with them.

No Maps on My Taps and About Tap open at Quad Cinema on Friday, July 7 and run through Thursday, July 13. Schedule information and ticketing will be available onsite tomorrow, Monday, July 3.

For Tap City 2017--which, once again, includes everything from shows and screenings to a ride on the Circle Line--click here to see some of what's up with tap today and what's coming tomorrow.

Quad Cinema
34 West 13th Street (between 5th and 6th Avenues), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Closing tonight: solos for and by Chelsea Bonosky at Gibney

Dance artist Chelsea Bonosky
(photos: Justin Ervin)

Tonight, Chelsea Bonosky wraps up LUNA, her show of dance solos at Gibney Dance: Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center. She performs three poetic, sometimes enigmatic works made for her by colleagues Adam Barruch, Pavel Zustiak and Gabrielle Lamb plus one, named LUNA, that she made in collaboration with vocalist Mary Carter.

Barruch (Testimony) brings out something of the Martha Graham in Bonosky. Zustiak, as is his wont, leads her into dark places (Aphar) and throws her way off-kilter and shakes her to her core. In the evening's most visually-satisfying piece (v²=2gh), Lamb deploys Bonosky in a spare but fanciful arrangement of science lab beakers with a suspended globe dripping water--a metaphor for artistic experimentation or, perhaps, something more. Each of the four works engages Bonosky--a fine, disciplined technician and expressive performer--in a process that reaches into and beyond herself, never shrinking from the discordance that she might find on her way to clarity.

LUNA's final performance takes place tonight at 8pm. For information and ticketing, click here.

Gibney Dance: Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center

280 Broadway (enter at 53A Chambers Street), Manhattan

(map/directions)

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Branfman and Strimpel of B.S. Movement duet at Tisch

Shaina Branfman and Bryan Strimpel,
co-directors of B.S. Movement
(photo: epfalck|effyography)

Remember when you were young, you shone like the sun.

Shine on you crazy diamond.

--Pink Floyd, "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Pts. 1-7)"

In 2013, I named dancer Bryan Strimpel--then performing with Nicholas Leichter Dance--as one of Dance Magazine's 25 to Watch for that year. I noted his "sizzling" duet with Leichter in Twenty Twenty and how he matched the two-decades-older choreographer, himself a sensation, in "the all-important slink and sass." Several years later, Strimpel is still one to watch, but now he's moving in concert with Shaina Branfman, his personal and artistic partner in B.S. Movement, and you need to keep both in sight.

I had my chance, on Thursday, at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, and almost missed it. One of those one-night only gigs.

The pair presented an intense duet called FLOYD (as in Pink Floyd, their musical touchstone, along with a little Radiohead), and they made Tisch's Jack Crystal Theater their own domestic space. They filled it with signs of mundane homelife (the morning ablutions, the cheerful sharing of a bath towel), the occasional blow-up and reconciliation and, for most of the time, a sense of venturing, together or separately, into the swift currents of life and self. Watching much of this felt voyeuristic, but the couple doesn't mind having a few witnesses to what clearly sparks their creativity.

FLOYD, indeed, serves as a way to keep an eye on these two. Not only does it look like the kinetic, theatrical version of a personal journal; it is a dual portrait. And these two might have their moments of conflict, but they're definitely attuned. They both move through air like oil droplets in shaken water and flow like summer sweat. Molten creatures. Slouchy. Sloshing. Undulating. Woozy. Adaptable, like cats, to any size or shape of space, any potential obstruction. Smacking together only to rotate and glide over each other, slithering skin to skin. Collapsing and tumbling. Driving and diving bluesily into the bluesiest bluesiness those Brits could play. I don't know the story of how Branfman and Strimpel found each other, but I'm glad they did.

Now, let's hope next time we'll have more to see from B.S. Movement and a longer window of opportunity.

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