Photo & Video: Jubal Battisti
Choreography: Lucinda Childs
Staging: Ty Boomershine
Cast: Ty Boomershine, Anna Herrmann, Emma Lewis, Gesine Moog, Omagbitse Omagbemi, Lia Witjes-Poole
Light: Martin Beeretz
Sound: Mattef Kuhlmey
Costume: Alexandra Sebbag
Online-Premiere: 18 – 20 December 2020, 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 German Federal Cultural Foundation