Category Archives: Productions

Making Dances

In “Making Dances”, the Dance On Ensemble invites contemporary artists – Tim Etchells, and Mathilde Monnier– to respond in their own artistic languages to iconic works of modern and postmodern dance by Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham.  In these performance works the artists reflect on classical but radical works that challenged the rules of their time.

Starting with Martha Graham’s “Deep Song” (1937) performed by long term Graham soloist and Dance On Ensemble member Miki Orihara. Danced within a neon text installation created by artist and performance maker Tim Etchells in response to Graham’s seminal work.  Merce Cunningham’s radically experimental “Story” (1963) re-imagined by the Dance On Ensemble.  Followed by the choreography of Mathilde Monnier, “never ending (Story)” who reacts to Cunningham’s “Story”, using the poetry by David Antin, a contemporary of Cunningham/Cage, as a starting point.

In presenting these works a connection is opened between dance heritage and contemporary dance creation as well as between artists of different generations and backgrounds.

Dancing Replies

In “Dancing Replies”, the Dance On Ensemble invites contemporary artists –  Ginevra Panzetti and Enrico Ticconi – to respond in their own artistic language to iconic works of postmodern dance by Lucinda Childs. In these performance works, the artists reflect on classical but radical works that challenged the rules of their time.

Starting with three early pivotal works by Lucinda Childs from the 1970’s the choreography duo Panzetti / Ticconi led by the minimalist movement language of Childs, present their response “MARMO” to these extreme examples of formalism.

In presenting these works a connection is opened between dance heritage and contemporary dance creation as well as between artists of different generations and backgrounds

never ending (Story)

Choreography: Mathilde Monnier

With: Ty Boomershine, Emma Lewis, Jone San Martin, Gesine Moog, Marco Volta

Light Design: Martin Beeretz
Sound Design: Mattef Kuhlmey
Artistic Collaboration: Stéphane Bouquet
Costume: Mathilde Monnier
Costume Assistance: Nora Stocker
Technical Direction: Martin Beeretz

“When I received this invitation to come talk about Merce Cunningham’s work, I felt it was time for me to come and do it.” (David Antin)

This is almost the way a poem by David Antin starts. This poem, improvised by Antin during a festival in honour of John Cage in May of 1989, is also how Never Ending Story starts… and, for that matter, started. Ty Boomershine and the Dance On Ensemble invited me to reply, in my own way, to Story, a work that Merce Cunningham premiered in 1963.

“So I felt it was time for me to come and do it.”

Someone comes onto the stage and tells you some stories. Stories about structure and rhythm. Stories about feelings and repetitions. The story of the feeling of the dance that’s about to appear.  The story of the gestures taking place whilst this stream of words produces it. By telling stories, dancers prepare themselves to listen to their own voices and to feel their own bodies move.  While talking, they experience the thought as it happens to a mind and, above all, to a body.   By “it happens”, one must mean everything but an abstract process: Thought is far from being a disembodied concept, indeed, thought is literally body-produced and it acts upon the body in return.

To talk and to dance, talking as you dance, dancing as you talk. To dance as an effort to get closer to what thought is, but also to the singular tone of your own voice formulating a thought.

This work is performed in the evening Making Dances” as a choreographic response to Merce
Cunningham’s “Story”, but can be presented singularly.

Production: Dance On/DIEHL+RITTER
In cooperation with: Kammerspiele München
With the support of: Montpellier Danse à l’Agora, cité internationale de la danse/ Avec le soutien de Montpellier Danse à l’Agora, cité internationale de la danse

Deep Song Everything/ Nothing

Choreography and Costume: Martha Graham

Restaging: Miki Orihara

With: Miki Orihara

Neon Installation: Tim Etchells

Music: Henry Cowell
Light design reconstruction: David Finley
Light: Martin Beeretz
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey

“Deep Song” premiered at the Guild Theater in New York in 1937. Set to music by Henry Cowell, the dance was composed in response to the Spanish Civil War. Deep Song was a cry of anguish, an embodiment of Martha Graham’s fears for a world torn apart by man’s inhumanity to man. “The fierce, fighting anguish of Deep Song is as direct and as objective as a shout,” wrote one critic.
According to program notes, “the forms of the dance – its swirls, crawls on the floor, contractions and falls – are kinetic experiences of the human experiences in war. . . It is the anatomy of anguish from tragic events.” The tragedy of Spain is universalized through the choreography. “It is not Spain that we see in her clean impassioned movement; it is the realization that Spain’s tragedy is ours, is the whole world’s tragedy.” The dance disappeared from the repertory in the 1940s, and it was not until 1989 that it was reconstructed by Graham with Terese Capucilli.

Long-time Graham dancer and Dance On Ensemble member Miki Orihara will dance a restaging of “Deep Song” as part of the program “Making Dances”. 

“Everything/Nothing” is neon text installation created by artist and performance maker Tim Etchells, in response to Martha Graham’s seminal work Deep Song. Designed to be hung above the stage as the choreography is danced by Miki Orihara , the full text of Etchells’ work is a quotation from Federico García Lorca’s 1931 poem ‘Ay!’ reading simply: Everything in the world is broken. Nothing but silence remains.  

Arranged as a constellation of neon words in dispersed arrangement above the stage Etchells’ work enters a porous dialogue with Graham’s choreography, the words illuminated one at a time to make a brief time-based intervention in the work, in which Lorca’s text haunts the air above and around the piece. In the gesture of bringing this particular text into dialogue with Deep Song, Etchells closes a circle of connection between the legacy of flamenco’s deep song, Graham’s powerful choreographic response to the Spanish Civil War, and Lorca himself who lost his life during the conflict. Placing fragmentary language, as individual words, in dialogue with Graham’s ambiguous choreography of a suffering female figure, Etchells’ neon directly addresses the concerns and context of the dance as well as acknowledging the limits of language when it comes to speaking of traumatic experience.

This work can also be presented singularly in the appropriate conditions.

This production of Deep Song is presented by arrangement through Martha Graham Resources, a division of the Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance, Inc

MARMO

Choreography: Ginevra Panzetti / Enrico Ticconi

With: Anna Herrmann, Emma Lewis, Gesine Moog, Omagbitse Omagbemi, Lia Witjes Poole

Light design: Annegret Schalke
Sound design: Demetrio Castellucci
Costume design: Ginevra Panzetti / Enrico Ticconi, werkstattkollektiv
Technical Direction: Annegret Schalke
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Production Assistant: Pauline Stöhr

Faced with Lucinda Childs’ early works, our attention is captured by the essentiality with which the bodies constitute a three-dimensional and concrete space, which seems to respond to the principles of architecture and solid geometry. Our gaze is enraptured by a brilliant solidity, like the consistency and mineral qualities of marble. A stone that, due to its special composition and brightness, has been considered the sculptural material par excellence, giving shape and colour to that idea of classicism that took shape during the Renaissance.

Lucinda Childs’ spatial and rhythmic design recalls the articulated and symbolic space of a marble quarry, a place where the human imprint infuses rigorous and indelible geometries into the spontaneous morphology of the landscape.

In response to the three early works by the American choreographer, MARMO investigates the mine as the place of a community engaged in a measuring project. It is a journey that follows the transformation of the stone from the initial phase of extraction to the sculptor’s workshop where it is carved. An evolutionary line that sees the transformation of the raw material up to the plastic definition of an ideal form.

In this path, the figures are the actual workers and absolute architects of the space, deciding its proportions, its size and light. While at the same time they assimilate those rules and conditions, becoming themselves malleable matter, sculpture.

This work is performed in the evening “Dancing Replies” with the three early works by Lucinda Childs, but can be presented singularly.

Production: Dance On / DIEHL+RITTER
Co-production: Kampnagel (Hamburg)

With the support of Lavanderia a Vapore, Centro di residenza per la danza
Supported by the NATIONALES PERFORMANCE NETZ Coproduction Fund for Dance, which is funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media.

Works In Silence

Choreography: Lucinda Childs

Staging: Ty Boomershine

Cast: Ty Boomershine, Anna Herrmann, Emma Lewis, Gesine Moog, Omagbitse Omagbemi, Lia Witjes Poole
Light Design: Martin Beeretz
Sound Design: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Alexandra Sebbag

Online-Premiere: 18 – 20 December 2020, Radialsystem Berlin und STUK – House for Dance, Image and Sound 

The WORKS IN SILENCE offer insights into a decisive development phase of one of the most important choreographers of the 20th century.

This collection of early works from the extensive repertory of Lucinda Childs is exciting both because of its rarity and its importance in the dance field. Most of these works have not been seen since they were first shown in the 1970s. In these dances, Childs has left behind props, objects, the spoken word, symbolic movement – all hallmarks of the era of the Judson Dance Theater – and chosen to focus on the passage of the body through space. To zero in on the essence of initial movement, which, for Childs, is the act of walking. From walking to running, to changing direction, to skipping, to leaping: the WORKS IN SILENCE illustrate the evolution of movement into dance through the choreographic vision of Lucinda Childs.

“I think it’s very musical for dancers to share a pulse,” she says. “They have to listen to each other. That’s what a musical ensemble does. They tune in to each other in a very precise way.” The pieces are a rare entrance into a crucial period of transformation of a choreographer and director whose impact on both the world of the visual arts and influence on a generation of choreographers cannot be overstated. The works express a fragility and a humanity that is a perfect example of the value of experience, and ideally suited to a group of dancers that bring with them their own abundant histories and knowledge. In the act of stripping away all artifice and theatricality, the beauty and truth of wisdom is confronted, shared, and exposed.

Production: Dance On/DIEHL+RITTER
Co-production: STUK. House for Dance, Image and Sound /Münchner Kammerspiele
Funded by the Doppelpass Fund of the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (German Federal Cultural Foundation)

You should have seen me dancing waltz

Concept/Direction: Rabih Mroué

In Collaboration with the Dance On Ensemble

Cast: Anna Herrmann, Emma Lewis, Christine Kono, Marco Volta

Text: Rabih Mroué in collaboration with Ty Boomershine
Voices: Ty Boomershine, Christine Kono

Lighting Design: Arno Truschinski
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Sophia Piepenbrock-Saitz
Assistant to the director: Clarissa Omiecienski

Premiere: 08 November 2019, ONASSIS STEGI, Athens (additional performances on 9th+10th November 2019)

Rabih Mroué’s new work You should have seen me dancing Waltz confronts the dancers Anna Herrmann, Emma Lewis, Marco Volta and Christine Kono with the news of our daily violence, natural disasters and politics. How do current events affect – and infect – the dancers’ bodies? What is their impact on a physical level? Do they change how we move? These questions will be negotiated in very personal ways, dealing with the impact of words describing their movements.

Production: Dance On /DIEHL+RITTER
Co-Production: ONASSIS STEGI, Kampnagel Hamburg

Supported by the NATIONALES PERFORMANCE NETZ Coproduction Fund for Dance, which is funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media.

Story

A re-imagining of Story
Choreography:  Merce Cunningham

Additional choreographic directions and material developed by the Dance On Ensemble under the direction of Daniel Squire.

Based on the 1963 dance Story, choreographed by Merce Cunningham. An indeterminate work reconfigured for each show using both chance operations and in-performance decision making.

Composer: Toshi Ichinayagi
Set, Costumes, Lighting
after the concepts of Robert Rauschenberg
Cast: Ty Boomershine, Emma Lewis, Gesine Moog, Miki Orihara, Tim Persent, Marco Volta 
Live-Music: Rabih Mroué, Mattef Kuhlmey, Tobias Weber
Artist: John Bock

Stager: Daniel Squire
Light: Patrick Lauckner/Falk Dittrich
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Sophia Piepenbrock-Saitz 
Assistent to the director: Clarissa Omiecienski

Story was first performed by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company on July 24, 1963 at the University of California, Los Angeles.  During the sixteen months it remained in the company’s repertory, it was performed forty-eight times in forty-one different venues. The structure of Story was indeterminate: the overall duration, the sections used, and the order of the sections all changed from one performance to the next. The dancers could make choices about the space, time and order of their movements.  Toshi Ichiyanagi’s music also gave the musicians options about instrumentation and duration of sound. Robert Rauschenberg constructed a new set for each performance, using material he found in or near the theater. His costume design involved a basic outfit of leotards and tights over which the dancers could wear an assortment of garments, changing as often as they wished.

The archival record of Story is limited.  There is only one recording of the dance, a kinescope of a 1964 live telecast in Helsinki, Finland.  This recording represents one possible outcome of the indeterminate structure, but it does not capture the full spectrum of material and options.  Merce Cunningham’s choreographic notes provide additional information, as do anecdotal accounts.  But certain aspects of the dance remain unknown. 

Given these circumstances, a typical reconstruction of Story is not possible.  Dance On Ensemble has, instead, undertaken a re-imagination of the piece.  Drawing on archival resources, Daniel Squire, an experienced stager of Merce Cunningham’s work, has taught the movement and options that are known, and guided the dancers to invent new material to be integrated into the indeterminate structure.  Similarly, Patrick Lauckner will create lighting designs in keeping with the original concepts and spirit of Story, while Berlin artist John Bock has taken on the role of Robert Rauschenberg offering ready-made constructions along with other variable and changing art works to engage with. Toshi Ichiyanagi’s Sapporo performed by Rabih Mroué, Mattef Kuhlmey and Tobias Weber completes the work.  The result, Berlin Story, reexamines and reanimates a dance last presented 55 years ago.

Premiere: 23 August 2019, Tanz im August, Volksbühne Berlin

This work is performed in the evening “Making Dances” with the choreographic response “never ending (Story)” by Mathilde Monnier, but can be presented singularly.

This program is presented as part of the Cunningham Centennial celebration.

Production: Dance On/DIEHL+RITTER

Katema

Choreography: Lucinda Childs 
Re-staging: Ty Boomershine

Lighting Design: Martin Beeretz
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Sophia Piepenbrock-Saitz
Cast: Ty Boomershine

“I felt that I needed to step outside of the world of objects and materials. I wanted to get back to movement, to simple movement ideas, without depending so much on the manipulation of objects and materials.” (Lucinda Childs).

In establishing the foundations for her mature and original style in the dances from the 1970s, Childs focused on developing choreography that stood on its own terms: movement in time and space devised within mathematically derived structures, with no other elements to distract, embellish, overwhelm, or otherwise demand attention. Hypnotic in the insistence of its repetition along the linear path of a long diagonal, Katema encompasses simple walking patterns, interwoven with turns and half-turns of remarkable precision. 40 years after its premiere in Amsterdam, the piece is now re-staged by Ty Boomershine who has been the Artistic Assistant for Lucinda Childs since 2007 and is a member of the Dance On Ensemble.

Premiere 12th March 1978, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam

Premiere Re-staging  1st March 2018, HAU Hebbel am Ufer Berlin

Produced for the DANCE ON Festival with support from Hauptstadtkulturfonds.

 

Elephant

Concept/Direction: Rabih Mroué
In artistic collaboration with Ty Boomershine and Jone San Martin

Cast: Ty Boomershine, Jone San Martin, Marco Volta
Lighting Design 2019: Patrick Lauckner, Tanja Rühl
Lighting Desing: Arno Truschinski
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Sophia Piepenbrock-Saitz

Elephant oscillates between a sense of isolation and a yearning for human connection. Two bodies move in labyrinth patterns, trying to reach each other in vain. Jumping backwards and forwards in time, they find themselves searching for moments of togetherness while at the same time experiencing the inevitability of loneliness.

Premiere: 28 February 2018, HAU Hebbel am Ufer (HAU2)

Production: Dance On/DIEHL+RITTER
Co-Production: HAU Hebbel am Ufer

Produced for the DANCE ON Festival with support from Hauptstadtkulturfonds.