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Monday, October 30, 2017

Trisha Brown: a loving community offers thanks


Leah Morrison


A bouquet of images from

Bird/Woman/Flower/Dare Devil: 
Trisha Brown
A Community Memorial


Saturday, October 28, 2017

at Danspace Project

organized by Iréne Hultman Monti and friends


All photos 
by Ian Douglas


Ralph Lemon (above)
Tere O'Connor (below)

Trisha Brown, Lemon said, was "our feral dancing goddess."
"...shifting from a fireball to a whisper in a second," said O'Connor.


"Be your most gracious self." -- Trisha Brown
Sam Miller
Stacy Spence
Yvonne Rainer
"In rehearsal, you want to be as correct as possible.
In performance, it's a whole other ballgame."
--Trisha Brown

Stephen Petronio
Iréne Hultman

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David Vaughan, 93

David Vaughan, Chronicler of Dance History, Dies at 93
by Sam Roberts, The New York Times, November 1, 2017

Beloved Dance Historian, Writer and Archivist David Vaughan Has Passed Away
Dance Magazine, October 27, 2017
re-publication of December 2015 profile of Vaughan by Siobhan Burke

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Thursday, October 26, 2017

It's complicated: Cynthia Oliver celebrates Black masculinity

At left, Duane Cyrus with Jonathan Gonzalez
in Cynthia Oliver's Virago-Man Dem
(photo: Chris Cameron)

The Latin prefix “vir” means “man”; the suffix “-ago” indicates female. Thus, the term “virago” has, since ancient times, suggested that elusive flicker between genders we know so well and deny so violently. 
--from promotional text for Cynthia Oliver's Virago-Man Dem

Dance artist Cynthia Oliver centers the human body in her adroit Virago-Man Dem, just opened at BAM's Next Wave Festival. In fact, the four bodies centered here--Duane Cyrus, Jonathan Gonzalez, Ni’Ja Whitson and Niall Noel Jones--comprise one of the most cunning, most satisfying performance ensembles on hand this season. But Virago-Man Dem also boasts visual and sonic design of strong-enough confidence to support its movement without distracting or detracting from it. Particularly impressive is the work of Black Kirby (Afro-speculative comics artists John Jennings and Stacey Robinson) with projections and animations by John Boesche and lighting designer Amanda K. Ringger's rich imagination of place, time and mood. With costume designer Susan Becker and composer Jason Finkelman in the mix, Oliver directs a dream team of adepts at BAM Fisher.

With this piece, Oliver cracks open masculinity as a fixed idea received and upheld by Black men. Inspired by her dancers' experiences as well as her dual sensibilities as a woman of Afro-Caribbean birth living and working in the US, she draws from observation of masculinities, finding material in a deceptively easy stroll down the street, a clever dash on a basketball court, a sinuous sashay along imagined catwalks and more. What makes her resulting dance not merely a patchwork of a bunch of stuff done by three male-identified performers and one gender nonconforming performer is her taste and talent for connective flow and her eye for how being willfully or ecstatically off-center or molten or in-between uncovers the more inside the person. More self, more capacity, more joy, more supple, resilient strength. It's this more that, sadly, often threatens individuals, families, communities, religions and nations. It's this more--isn't it?--that for which we secretly yearn and which artists brilliantly model for us.

It might not necessarily take a woman to watch these things from the outside and bring them to her canvas or stage, but it takes this woman, perhaps, with  apparently endless reserve of movement ideas to bring her concepts alive and keep us interested over 75 minutes. And from the work's beginning (in physical stillness and visual murkiness) through the hoodie-covered dancers' testing of bodies and selves and their growing clarity and enlivening, with Ringger enhancing the dimensions of Oliver's sculpted movement, we're kept on the edge of our seats.

Here's a journey ready to be taken more than once, but consider yourself lucky if you get to see Virago-Man Dem even just one time.

Virago-Man Dem continues tonight through Saturday evening with performances at 7:30pm. For information and tickets, click here.

Prior to tonight's performance, Cynthia Oliver will offer a free talk, Examining Black Masculinity, at 6pm in Wendy's Subway Reading Room, downstairs at BAM Fisher.

BAM Fisher
321 Ashland Place, Brooklyn
(map/directions)

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Monday, October 23, 2017

Gather this Saturday to remember Trisha Brown

Trisha Brown (1936-2017)
(photo: Marc Ginot, courtesy Trisha Brown Dance Company)


Saturday, October 28
Noon through 5pm


Danspace Project and the dance community at large celebrate the legacy of choreographer Trisha Brown (1936-2017), who altered how we perceive, create, and understand dance since forming her company in 1970. Over five hours, Brown’s company alums, colleagues, and admirers will speak, dance, reminisce, and pay tribute to one of our history’s greatest influencers.

This event is free and open to the public and guests may come and go throughout the day. All are welcome to join in paying homage to Brown and her legacy in transforming our worldwide artistic community.

12pm-1pm:

Judy Hussie-Taylor
Iréne Hultman
Wendy Perron
Susan Rosenberg

1pm-2pm:

Denise Luccioni
Laurel Jenkins
Nancy Dalva
Liz Gerring
Stephen Petronio
Val Bourne

2pm-3pm:

Babette Mangolte
Liz Thompson
Sam Miller
Ralph Lemon
Tere O’Connor

3pm-4pm:

Hendel Teicher
Jennifer Tipton
Yvonne Rainer
Jon Kinzel

4pm-5pm:

Philip Bither
Bill T. Jones
Adam Brown



Dancing by Trisha Brown Dance Company Alums:

Kathleen Fisher, Lance Gries, Iréne Hultman, Laurel Jenkins, Eva Karczag, Tara Lorenzen, Mariah Maloney, Leah Morrison, Brandi Norton, Wendy Perron, Jaime Scott, Shelley Senter, Vicky Shick, Keith Thompson, Abby Yaeger


Excerpts of pieces:

Accumulation, Group Primary Accumulation, Glacial Decoy, Opal Loop, Son of Gone Fishing, Set and Reset, Foray Foret, Groove, If You Couldn’t See Me

Screenings of full pieces will be on view in the Parish Hall.

Danspace Project
St. Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery
131 East 10th Street (off Second Avenue), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Friday, October 20, 2017

Sharing, surviving: Black men dance at Danspace Project

Damon Green performs at Danspace Project in
Working on Better Versions of Prayers: Volume 1
by Chicago dancemaker J'Sun Howard
(photo: Ian Douglas)

Ricarrdo Valentine, above,
and below with Orlando Zane Hunter, Jr.
of Brother(hood) Dance!
in how to survive a plague
(photos: Ian Douglas)

Demonstrations, marches, sit-ins/die-ins/love-ins, rallies, prayer: are there alternatives to these forms of protest that we can employ to generate positive change? 

For his presentation at Danspace Project, Chicago's J'Sun Howard asks this question and offers a possible answer in a trio for Black queer men entitled Working On Better Versions of Prayers: Version 1. Is Howard's result actually a better version of prayer?  Of protest? That's never clear but, choreographically, this dance is easy on the eyes.

Dancers D. Banks, Damon Green and Will Harris mark off an uncluttered space in which, from the start, we can focus on the lyrical fluidity of their movement--a flowing reach and unfurling, a cursive squiggling and twirling and twining that, while accelerating or embracing flourishes of basketball or hip hop or voguing or West African movement, never loses control or its through line. Howard writes with an aesthetically conservative hand. He is a lover of beauty and of the beauty in these dancers, presenting them subtly, sympathetically and with utopian vision--the world he wants to see.

One moment alone appears disruptive--a dancer's brief, frustrated interaction with part of the decor and his partner's intervention. This second dancer's role presents interesting questions: Is he helping his mate? Or is he restraining him? And then, near Howard's conclusion, comes the mystery figure (Green) emerging with face obscured, head enveloped in a leafy bush strung with Christmas lights--a remarkable, if cryptic, image.
In a “reverential gesture to lost ancestral artistic dreams,” Hunter and Valentine seek to venerate the Black African bodies that were exiled from the urgency of care and shunned by their communities and government [during the HIV/AIDS pandemic].
Orlando Zane Hunter, Jr and Ricarrdo Valentine--the Black gay couple who are Brother(hood) Dance!--now have built how to survive a plague, a popular feature of Danspace’s Platform 2016: Lost & Found, into a work of enhanced, operatic proportions. Their aesthetics call for so much sensory engagement--and, yes, overload--you might expect the generous sights and sounds to be joined by offerings of food and libations. No such luck. But we did get to sample the aromatherapeutic artistry by Nicole Wilkins. I thought I caught a waft of something minty at one point, and then something else, pleasant enough but unidentifiable.

Ultimately, the sexy and ecstatic ritual of how to survive a plague is, I think, an invitation to take what we need by way of self-care. In that context, what works for one, in one moment, might not work for another, and many things will compete for your attention. You will find exuberant dance (with superb technique, always) overlapped with poetry and humor and glorious singing and visuals and kooky-fun costuming and booming voiceovers and, for a precious few, a chance to get up and shake your body. Trickster Eshu and Mother Kali share and dance this Carnaval, neither exactly shy and retiring types. I thank these deities--and more--for the audacity of Hunter and Valentine and look forward to whatever they bring us next.

Vocals: Starr Busby
Costume design: Shane Ballard
Lighting Design: Carol Mullins

Shared Evening: Brother(hood) Dance! & J'Sun Howard continues tonight and tomorrow at Danspace Project with performances at 8pm. For information and tickets, click here.

SPECIAL NOTE:
Nicole Wilkins recommends arriving hydrated for the best possible experience [of the aromoatherapy]; water will also be available during the show. If you have any questions or concerns please call the Danspace Project office at (212) 674.8112.
Danspace Project
St. Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery
131 East 10th Street (at Second Avenue), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Wednesday, October 18, 2017

NEW@Graham: Celebrating a decade of "Lamentation Variations"

Lament not. Janet Eilber plans to keep dreaming up ways to revivify America's longest-running dance troupe, the Martha Graham Dance Company, and Graham's famed solo, Lamentations, continues to show the way.

Last evening, the company celebrated the 10th year of Lamentation Variations, its unusual commissioning project launched in 2007 as artistic director Eilber noticed that the season's opening night would fall on the anniversary of 9/11. Since then, Eilber has invited dancemakers, representing a diversity of aesthetic approaches, to respond to or re-imagine the Graham solo. So, Yes to Judson genius Yvonne Rainer rethinking Lamentation or tap genius Michelle Dorrance remixing it!

The commissioned artists pledge fidelity, more or less, to a set of spartan rules limiting length (no longer than Graham's four minutes), rehearsal time (10 hours tops) and sets (absolutely none allowed). Even given these restrictions, each has managed to re-envision the original in signature ways--for instance, turning the spare, tense, wrenching angularity of Graham's grieving into something eerily luxurious for soloist Katherine Crockett (Richard Move, 2007), bringing the entire company onstage (Larry Keigwin, 2007), turning the solo into an interracial male duet (Kyle Abraham, 2015) or teaching Memphis Jookin to a cluster of nine young Grahamites (Lil Buck, 2017).

"The question became 'How to put new choreography on the stage next to Graham classics," said Eilber as she opened the evening in the company's studio at Westbeth, former home of Merce Cunningham's troupe. "Would I get run out of town?" Ultimately, though, she found that introducing new work helped audiences "appreciate Martha Graham more and remember what a radical she was."

A radical, indeed. Throughout these opening remarks, an early 1940s video of Graham dancing Lamentation played behind and loomed over Eilber, proving her correct. Graham worked that solo. Her concept and vision for it, along with her fierce performance, remain unmatched. Last evening's program featured Variations by Abraham, Keigwin, Gwen Welliver (preparing for a 2018 Tallahassee premiere), Bulareyaung Pagarlava as well as Lil Buck's New York premiere. Each offered elements of interest...and yet...and yet...Graham remains queen.

Lamentation Variations concludes this evening with another informal toast and studio showing at 7pm, featuring Variations by Aszure Barton, Doug Varone, Richard Move, Larry Keigwin and Lil Buck. Click here for information and ticketing.

Martha Graham Studio Theater
Westbeth, 55 Bethune Street (11th Floor), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Monday, October 16, 2017

Saturday, October 14, 2017

Tap artist Kazu Kumagai and friends rock 92Y



92Y's Dig Dance series hit big last night with Kazu Kumagai: HEAR/HEAR, an intimate yet full-on performance by the 2016 Bessie-winning Kumagai and friends in the Y's Buttenweiser Hall. The show featured Kumagai's talents in tap, music and poetry, and he was accompanied by bass player Alex Blake, guitarist Masa Shimizu and singer, Sabrina Clery, whose heartbreaking voice always leaves me wanting to hear more of it. Special guest Ted Louis Levy--multiple award winner and nominee for work on Broadway and television--turned up the heat with his amusing stories, unique jazz vocals and smooth dancing.

Kumagai is anything but smooth in intent or execution, but even his tuning up on the wood platforms sounded good. Brushing the wood, pecking at it with one knee locked, going quieter, he's a man always in search of the right sounds to channel his concerns. He'll find it with the inside edge of a foot, or drop his heels with thwacks you feel like repeated jolts to the chest, or fire off a steady fusillade of beats while Shimizu weaves around him. While he might pivot to one or another direction once in a long while, maybe facing the musician with whom he's dialoguing, he tends to root himself somewhere on the wood and drill it...earnestly. The relative stationary nature of his dancing underscores his role as musician playing the instrument of tap against surface. We can appreciate, even more, what he's doing to create sound. A lot of power in his game, but his technical control can also takes us to quiet, thoughtful places.

So much of his poetry is about searching--for the authentic self, for someone who can be there for one's search for the self, for authentic expression that sometimes takes an artist to the edge. ("I want to know if you'll stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.") He's a man on a mission and one with much on his mind.

Levy's sunnier, funnier, Mr. Show Biz approach stands in contrast, but the two guys together? They can take it from delicate trading of tiny gestures on the wood all the way to thunder, Levy bringing out the spark and charm and, yes, the aggression in Kumagai.

"I'm not an improvisationalist," the not-even-nearly-winded Levy said afterwards, "But you made me look good!" Yes. He did.

It was nice to hear Levy invoke tap icons like Chuck Green, Buster Brown and Dianne Walker in his solo as he danced away as if it were the most natural thing in the world to teach an audience while beguiling them. I loved his unconventional vocalizing of "Nature Boy," the classic song first recorded and most associated with Nat King Cole, and Marvin Gaye's "Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)" which offered the two men--one Black, the other forever revering the Black mentors in his life--the perfect opportunity to take a knee.

If you were not in the house last night, I hope you already have your ticket for tonight. For this evening's show, Kumagai will be joined by acclaimed tap artist, educator and mentor Brenda Bufalino.

Kazu Kumagai: HEAR/HEAR concludes with an 8pm show tonight.  For information and tickets, click here.

92Y (Buttenweiser Hall)
Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street
, Manhattan
(map/directions)

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New video series on Black Philadelphians in ballet

Portraits of Black ballerinas
From top:
Judith Jamison, Delores Browne and Joan Myers Brown
(photos: Eva Mueller)

We are still like unicorns, and I wanted to make the invisible visible.
Theresa Ruth Howard, keynote address, Dutch National Ballet's Positioning Ballet Conference 2017

Theresa Ruth Howard--founder of MoBBallet, dedicated to the reinstatement and preservation of the history of Black artists in ballet--announces the launching of a video documentary series on its website. Funded by a $50,000 grant from the Knight Foundation, And Still They Rose: The Legacy of Black Philadelphians in Ballet will feature legendary Judith Jamison, Joan Myers Brown (Philadanco) and Delores Browne (Ballet Americana/New York Negro Ballet) discussing their early training and barrier-breaking experiences in the field. To view the series, starting October 22, click here.

Watch an excerpt:




On Saturday, October 28, join Howard for a panel with Joan Myers Brown, Delores Browne and current Black ballet performers at Philadelphia's The Painted Bride Center (3-5pm). There will also be an exhibition of Eva Mueller's portraits of Black ballet dancers. This event is free or by donation with an RSVP here. To visit the Facebook event page, click here. For directions to The Painted Bride Center, click here.

Watch Theresa Ruth Howard's excellent keynote address on diversity issues in ballet at the Dutch National Ballet's Positioning Ballet Conference (Amsterdam, February 2017).  Click here.

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Friday, October 13, 2017

Shared Evening: Jasmine Hearn and Mariana Valencia

This weekend, Danspace Project presents shared evenings of work
by dance artists Jasmine Hearn (above) and Mariana Valencia (below).
(photos: Ian Douglas)


Maybe this Earth is a bed where each of us rests on the threshold of a dream or all of us can dream collectively. Sitting down to take in this spell by Jasmine Hearn (shook at Danspace Project) means drawing near a fire to hear old, passed-down stories, but the fire is invisible, the stories and songs muffled, the images shadowy, blurry. It might not matter if you can't pick up distinct words, follow sentences; if a song is made up of one word that trails off in the air or is simple sounds intoned in a flutey voice. It calls you to take part in the making.

The costumes are equally indistinct, cobbled together as if by a child who had leafed through pages of history, falling asleep atop them, dreaming and dreaming. The fabric--how unruly, voluminous, billowing, ennobling...or thrown together with function if not sense. The movements--how softly fluid, swirly, simple, repetitive, shifting, un-insistent, graceful, agile (Hearn, Angie Pittman, Dominica Greene...these three and also the traces of all who made this, continue to make this, one spectre floating into the other....) You see what you will see. You dream what you will dream, unfolding a chiffon dream engulfing altar steps like sea foam slipping over a shoreline.
"This is the answer to my 7 year old self who casted spells in her bathtub...spells that dripped honey, affirmation, and the belief that magic lives in the marrow of our bones."

"I am looking to evoke a realm, a place, a time, a memory when/where black women are not doubted."
-- Jasmine Hearn
Concept and direction: Jasmine Hearn
Choreography and performance: Maria Bauman, Kayla Farrish, Dominica Greene, Jasmine Hearn, Catherine Kirk and Angie Pittman
Costumes made in collaboration with Athena Kokoronis of Domestic Performance Agency
Sound: Jasmine Hearn (includes a rework of Sylvan Esso's Die Young)
Video: Alisha B. Wormsley
Lighting: Kathy Kaufmann


Scene from shook
Angie Pittman (at left) and Dominica Greene (center)
with Hearn
(photo: Ian Douglas)
Mariana Valencia performs Yugoslavia
(photo: Ian Douglas)

"What are we if we are together but not related?"

In her solo, YugoslaviaMariana Valencia asks this question, specifically referring to her relationship to her Polish stepfather (and, I guess, in a way, her Polish stepfather's relationship to her Guatemalan mom).

One word that recurs in the work is blend. Spoken with Valencia's characteristic clarity and evenness, the word blend has its own physical pose. She hits it, and you watch it...for a few seconds. You might not understand it, but you can see it and recognize it when it comes around again. You learn a piece of movement language by immersive process.

Yugoslavia finds Valencia blending a lengthy monologue into movement in a way that seals any divide between verbal language and dance. That seems to work, although at least one person I spoke with afterwards found the piece to be not very dance-y. To me, it was a poetic marathon, a work of impressive endurance and grace under the pressure to tell a story with a lot of unexpected and seemingly unrelated moving parts and somehow make them hold together. Or not. I think, mostly, not.

At least, not for me. For me, they stayed demarcated, and that seemed okay. Or more than okay. That seemed the right thing.
In Yugoslavia, I intersect the First World, the Second World, the countryside, the imaginary plane and vampires. Factual, humorous, and grave observations depict my herstorical frame,” writes Valencia. With Yugoslavia, “I’m in search of the spiritual, in observation of the physical, and in awe of the artificial.” 
See, those commas and "ands" work well, and the way Valencia speaks shows you one thing after another. And that seems the right thing. More juxtaposition than blend. Blend might be an aspiration. Or not.

Writing about her inspiration for the piece, Valencia says, "visiting the Balkans (Serbia and Macedonia) has awakened my lineage through Slavic languages. I'll be tuning into identities that are landless, homeless, nameless, wandering, and exiled." In other words, not so blended.

Mention of the Balkans also brings me to that word derived from their situation--Balkanization, fragmentation often with tense and hostile juxtaposition of the separate entities. And then there's the discomfort of a young girl, Valencia, trying to sing Leonard Cohen lyrics with her dad without revealing her pleasure in the racy verses. Blending by omission? There's a single painting--just one--by her dad on a tripod in all of St. Mark's roomy space. And something about vampires because, we're told, the word vampire originates in the Serbian language. A lot of thingy things.

I watched Valencia take sheets of raspberry red construction paper and cut them into letters that she then arranged on the floor. I'm not particularly good with cutting paper with any degree of accuracy. But, apparently, she is. She went right to it, and the letters turned out well-shaped. They looked like themselves and like nothing else.

Choreography, script, costume, set and performance: Mariana Valencia
Original score: Mariana Valencia
Lighting design: Kathy Kaufmann

Shared Evening: Jasmine Hearn & Mariana Valencia continues tonight and tomorrow with performances at 8pm. No late seating. For information and tickets, click here.

Danspace Project
St. Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery
131 East 10th Street (at Second Avenue), Manhattan
(map/directions)

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Thursday, October 12, 2017

Francesca Harper named new Artistic Director of MIP®

Francesca Harper, the new Artistic Director
of Movement Invention Project®
(photo: Bale da Cidade)

Francesca Harper--an acclaimed multidisciplinary artist with extensive credentials in ballet, theater, film and arts education--has been named Artistic Director of Movement Invention Project® (MIP®), an immersive, contemporary dance summer program for dancers ages 18-23. Now in its tenth year, the three-week program was founded by New Jersey Dance Theater Ensemble's artistic director, Nancy Turano, to support dancers in developing creative voice as well as skills in improvisation, collaboration and cutting-edge technology. Based in New York City, MIP® provides dancers with opportunities to work with a wide range of teachers, choreographers and mentors and take advantage of the resources of venues like Baryshnikov Arts Center and New York Live Arts.


(photo: Veranika Antanavich)


“I have known Francesca for 25 years, and watched her phenomenal career as a brilliant dancer, choreographer, director and mentor to countless dance artists," says Turano. "We are thrilled to welcome her as Artistic Director of MIP® 2018. She has a wealth of information to contribute, and creates a very positive and encouraging atmosphere that enables dancers to develop their own creative vision."

(photo: David Flores)

ABOUT FRANCESCA HARPER

Francesca Harper is an internationally acclaimed multi-disciplinary artist. After being named Presidential Scholar in the Arts and performing at the White House, Francesca attended Columbia University studying philosophy and computer programming.  She soon after joined the Dance Theater of Harlem’s Second Company and the main Company the following year.  Francesca performed soloist roles with the company including the Hostess in Bronislova Nijinska’s Les Biches and as a Soloist in Swan Lake.  She then began working with William Forsythe’s Ballet Frankfurt, where she was promoted to Principal. Performances included leading roles and pas de deux in Herman Schmerman, In the Middle Somewhat Elevated, and Loss of Small Detail, amongst others.  While a member of Ballet Frankfurt, Francesca was chosen to perform with designers Issey Miyake and Gianni Versace in shows in Paris and Milan, and in Miyake’s film Dancing Pleats. As a member of Ballet Frankfurt, she choreographed her first full evening of work, Dark Violet Light Stone, commissioned by The Holland Dance Festival. A vocalist as well, Francesca was invited to record her first single, "Slow Groove," and self-produced her own album, Modo Fusion.

The vastness of her artistry and hunger soon led her to theater and film, working with Anna Deavere Smith on many projects, and to Broadway for productions including Fosse, The Producers, All Shook Up, The Frogs and the Tony nominated treasure The Color Purple.  She was a featured performer in Zinnias – The Life of Clementine Hunter, directed by Robert Wilson, and toured Internationally with the production. Her TV appearances include Boardwalk Empire, David Letterman, and The Oprah Winfrey Show, and Francesca served as ballet consultant for the feature film Black Swan by Darren Aronofsky. Harper has choreographed works for Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Ailey II, Tanz Graz, Hubbard Street II, Dallas Black Dance Theater, and founded her own company The Francesca Harper Project in 2005.

Continuing to pursue her interest of technology and dance, Francesca received a Living History Award in 2013 during Black History Month from Long Island University, and the Innovation and Technology Award for her choreography for Fashion Week with designer Louis Vuitton. She also conceived, directed, choreographed, and produced the dance film M(y)ourstory: Chapter One that premiered at the Triskelion Dance Film Festival in 2017.  Francesca was awarded a Fellowship at The Center for the Ballet and the Arts in 2017, as well as a Choreographic Fellowship from Urban Bush Women in 2017, supported by the Mellon Foundation.  Her latest creations en pointe in 2017 for The Dance Theatre of Harlem in NYC and Bale da Cidade in Sao Paulo has received critical acclaim, being cited as “...revolutionary” by The Chicago Tribune, and possessing “...sensual beauty,” by The New York Times.

Francesca’s mother Denise Jefferson, director of The Alvin Ailey School for over 26 years and creator of the Ailey B.F.A program, served as an inspiration and mentor for Francesca’s teaching work and giving back to the community.  Francesca’s one woman show based on the life of her mother, The Look of Feeling, premiered Off- Broadway in 2014 and was later performed at Impulstanze Festival, The Holland Dance Festival, and Germany’s The Colors Festival.

Harper enjoys her appointment as an adjunct professor at New York University, was an Associate Professor at Barnard College, and continues the vital role of teacher and choreographer for The Ailey School, Fordham University’s BFA Program, and the Susan Batson Studio.  Francesca is a featured actress and singer in Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More each week at The McKittrick Hotel in New York City. She is grateful for the daily opportunity to do what she loves and is passionate about inspiring others to live their dreams.

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Tuesday, October 10, 2017

The Bessies in pictures!

The 2017 Bessie Awards
in Pictures

All photos by AK47 Division

Jawole Willa Jo Zollar (left) with presenter Dianne McIntyre
Lela Aisha Jones (far left) greets Eva Yaa Asantewaa at pre-show tribute to nominees.
To right of Eva, Nia Love and Kayla Hamilton of Skeleton Architecture collective.
In far background, another Skeleton Architecture member, Leslie Parker
Members of Skeleton Architecture take a knee
after receiving one of the four Outstanding Performer awards.
Fearless leader Lucy Sexton,
Executive Director of The Bessies,
welcomes the crowd.
Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer
Bridgman
with presenter Reid Bartelme
Jawole Willa Jo Zollar
dances Bitter Tongue (1987)
The evening's hosts:
left, James Whiteside of American Ballet Theatre
with performance artist Shernita Anderson
Below: backstage with James and Shernita
Daaimah Taalib-Din of Abdel Salaam's Forces of Nature
Will Rawls and Ishmael Houston-Jones
Above and below: Thomas F. DeFrantz
presented an award to Eva Yaa Asantewaa

Anna Schön
Bedazzled audience at the 2017 Bessies

Now, do you want to see Bessies 2017 in action? Check out the livestream video on The Bessies' Facebook page here!

List of award winners

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