VCU Dance NOW

VCU Dance NOW annually features new work by VCU Dance faculty and guest artists, performed by Dance majors. This year, the Department is pleased to present choreography by faculty members Martha Curtis, Christian von Howard, Robbie Kinter, Autumn I. Proctor, Melanie Richards and Judith Steel, a video film by Courtney Harris in collaboration with VCU Kinetic Imaging MFA candidate Charli Brissey as well as a new work choreographed by Fall 2013 guest artist Nathan Trice.
 
Nathan Trice’s Conversations created during a two-week residency investigates intimacy and passionate exchanges among four couples through an exploration of contemplative, reflective moments. Trice creates a uniquely intricate style of partnering that is the expressive, physical sign language underlying the confrontational, vulnerable and unresolved.  At times, Conversations imbues a contradictory intimacy that either evokes a sense of voyeurism or an inability to convey desires. Of his residency, Trice states “what made the VCU experience unique was the attitude of the students. They were not only inquisitive but absorbing and invested, and ultimately communal.  They collectively express interest and a desire to understand concepts and materializing them which speaks volumes of the faculty.”
 
Adventures Portside, a new work by Martha Curtis, follows a group of strangers as they board an airplane embarking on what is to be a routine flight that morphs into a wildly perilous journey through the sky ultimately falling into the sea. A whimsical look at the culture of air travel evolves into a kinetic expedition with passages of flight, falling, drowning, rescue, and bonding over a shared experience. Costumes by Damion Bond enhance this new work for ten VCU Dance students.
 
A new ensemble work by Christian von Howard,The Point at Which Everything Closes In, is a physically aggressive work exploring the unknown and the idea of fearlessly entering a situation full speed ahead regardless of the possible outcome. Together with the forceful soundscapes of UK artists Raime, von Howard creates a prolonged sense of anxiety.   
 
Robbie Kinter's Trouble is an action packed movement landscape.  Strong partnering and kinetic puzzles create a breathless image reminiscent of martial arts and spy movies.  The high energy and constant forward momentum of the six dancers is mirrored in the incandescent music of Rattlemouth.
 
Through unique spatial and structural design, Autumn I. Proctor's work Mind the Corners abstractly frames and explores the ideas of perception and what often becomes the hidden barrier and reason for conflict or misunderstanding within human relationships.
 
Resonating images of travel through Sicily, Italy are the inspiration for Stones to Ashes, a new work by Melanie Richards with costumes by Karl Green. The ever-changing landscape of crumbling ancient ruins engulfed by modern suburbia deeply impressed the poignancy of impermanence and the unyielding forces of change upon Richards who creates in her work a metaphor that reflects the intangible shift from substance to spirit and from life to illusion. 
 
Breath taking Shape by Judith Steel integrates four dancers and live music, an impassioned song written by noted world music artist Lhasa de Sela embedded within an original music score composed and performed by musicians Antonia and Jonathan Vassar, and guitarist Andrew Lewis. The union of accordion, guitar, and voice is embodied and shaped through weight, time, and breath by the dancers who respond to the textures and quality of the sound environment.
 
What’s What, a short film collaboration between Courtney Harris and Kinetic Imaging MFA candidate Charli Brissey, tips its hat to the tradition of cross-dressing and gender-bending entertainment in twentieth century vaudeville and early filmmaking. Inspired by the 1926 song Masculine Women, Feminine Men, Brissey and Harris make a contemporary comment on gender performance. What’s What playfully re-imagines the notion of the female dandy and references Busby Berkeley films, re-contextualizing the framing and performative embodiment of glamour, mystique, and allure. Guest artist and central Ohio’s drag king extraordinaire, Mr. Cool Ethan, escorts the film in upon his coattails with his dazzling and foppish antics, while his back-up dancers swoon across the screen with debonair gentility.
 
VCU Dance NOW is the ninth event of the 2013-2014 VCU Dance Season. The presenting program of VCU Dance is committed to building and engaging dance audiences in the University and Richmond communities while providing opportunities for artists to present and create work. The Nathan Trice residency is made possible in part by a grant from the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Foundation and by VCUarts. Recognized by professional dancers and choreographers as “a place where things are happening,” Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Dance and Choreography offers a vibrant and stimulating atmosphere where students prepare for careers in dance. VCUarts is ranked the #1 public university arts and design program in the country according to US News & World Report.

Recognized by professional dancers and choreographers as “a place where things are happening,” VCU Dance offers a vibrant and stimulating atmosphere where students prepare for careers in dance. For more information, please contact VCU Dance at 804-828-1711.