A dazzling array of boundary-pushing contemporary dance performances, dance films and artist/audience interactions.

With live performances from legendary choreographer Bebe Miller with long-time collaborators Angie Hauser and Darrell Jones, all New York Dance & Performance “Bessie” Award winners; Aretha Aoki and Ryan MacDonald weaving dance/punk/glam/goth/synthwave with Kabuki; and “Bessie” Award nominee Doron Perk.

Schedule:

Thursday, March 9, 2023

7:30PM

Motion State Dance Film Series

The festival kicks off with a screening of short dance films and an opening night party!

Now in its fifth year, the Motion State Dance Film Series is only year-long, traveling short film festival in New England devoted to showcasing the diversity of contemporary creative voices exploring choreography for the camera.

Films include:

- 2Faced Dance Company (UK), Bert the Turtle's DOA

- Anabella Lenzu (USA), heart beats

- Ariel Scott (USA), All a Blur

- Jennifer Scully-Thurston (USA), un-fixed still life of Dolly S. Dalí... a mini epic

- McKay House & Utam Moses (USA), Overandover

- Nattie Trogdon & Hollis Bartlett (USA), Unconventional Dance: Big Kmart

- Simone Rosset (Italy), MA CIGNO (The almost dead swan)

- Verena Billinger & Sebastian Schulz (Germany), Picknick

- Zac James Nicholson & Doron Perk (USA), Pedestrian

Learn more about the films and filmmakers here.

Stay after for an opening night party!

Get Tickets For Thursday

Friday & Saturday, March 10 & 11, 2023

7:30PM

Live Performances

Bebe Miller, Darrell Jones & Angie Hauser, Tether (2022)
Commissioned by Baryshnikov Arts Center, where it premiered in October 2022, Tether is an improvised dance, sparked by curiosity about choreographer Merce Cunningham and composer John Cage’s manner of exchange with each other and their collaborators, and the evidence of the tethers they have left behind. The performers share a 20-plus-year creative scrutiny via dance-making together-Tether welcomes Cunningham as a fourth partner. The work asks: Could Cunningham’s notion of coexisting and predetermined materials serve as a trigger, a tether, for their own artistic interests?

Aretha Aoki & Ryan MacDonald, IzumonookunI (work-in-progress)
A dance/punk/glam-goth/synthwave show weaving together the lost (her)story of Kabuki and its real and imagined influences and offshoots. MacDonald provides a live soundscape of synth loops, beats, and covered and original songs.

Doron Perk: Grandfather Visit (2021)
Nominated for a 2022 New York Dance & Performance “Bessie” Award for Outstanding Performer, this dance solo exploring themes of grief and heritage. Inspired by many visits to his grandfather in the last few years of his life, Perk created this performance to both deal with personal loss as well as his identity as a grandchild of a Holocaust survivor. The dance language ranges from contemporary ballet to free-form improvisation and uses Israeli folk dance to reach emotional climaxes. Through the framing narrative of a visit, Perk dances out embodied memories, using the movements to evoke forgotten sensations.

Interspersed with dance films from:

- Baye and Asa: **** It Up (2021)

Stay for post-show talks.

Learn more about the artists.

Get Tickets For Friday & Saturday

Saturday, March 11, 2023

Daytime

Classes & Dance Community Conversation

11:30am-1pm Class: Gaga/Dancers
Taught by Doron Perk

1:30-3pm Class: Solo/Duo Dancing-A Choreographic Practice
This class offers an opportunity to further your own practice under the direction of Bebe Miller, Angie Hauser and Darrell Jones, who have been collaborative dance-makers for over 20 years. At the core of our work is the expressive, articulate dancing body; we are honing our choreographic intention through the clarity of our physicality. We will explore how danc­ing is am­plified in both solo and duet work, develop­ing chore­ographic and improvisation scores through a range of composi­tional strategies. Beginning with a guided dance warm-up to prepare the body and imagination, we’ll expand into dancing, noting the rhythm and heft of action, arrival and intention.

3:30-5pm: Dance Community Conversation
Join fellow audiences, artists, and arts supporters to discuss the desires and realities of building and sustaining a strong dance community for both doers and watchers. This is the second in a series of Dance Community Conversations organized by Motion State Arts and supported by Providence Art, Culture + Tourism.

Reserve Your Place in Class

Date:

March 9-11, 2023

Location:

The WaterFire Arts Center,
Wilbury Theatre Group,
475 Valley Street,
Providence, RI 02908

Click here for More Information