Empty Room
To premiere at The Performance Project
@ University Settlement March, 27 – 29th, 2008.
Empty Room is a forensics magnet, collecting the emotional residue of people and things departed or not yet arrived. A three-dimensional scrapbook of place and person that combines original choreography, video and text, this new work communicates the mystery of a moment passed, assumed identity and memory. Individuals emerge, plans hang in the air, quiet descends; a room infects the dreams of its inhabitants. This piece captures resonant histories, within which psyches are re-invented and the irony of emptiness is an inevitable conclusion.
Empty Room is a multi-media experimental dance theater project. Within the staged work video is incorporated via live feed as well as pre-recorded video snippets that capture the longitudinal inaccuracies of long-term memory recall. A multiple narrative intersects the lives of presumed strangers who are haunted by the same room and inadvertently trespass on one another’s subconscious. The video draws upon what lingers after vacancy, expelled from the body into the lens.
2007 was an exciting year for the company in the evolution of our 3rd full-length work in NYC, Empty Room (Adsitt’s 5th full-length work to date). The work has been shown at The Flea - Dance Conversations, Dixon Place - Moving Men, Brooklyn Arts Exchange - First Weekends, BAAD! - Out Like That, Dance Theater Workshop in the DancenOw Festival, Danspace Project in Draftwork and in an APAP Showcase at Dixon Place. We have had two DancenOw Silo Artist Residencies, and recently received a Bossak-Heilbron grant towards the making of Empty Room. The project will be available for touring following the premiere.
“…highly intriguing with smart acting and fine dancing by all, and imaginative site-specific staging…”
-
Gus Solomons Jr., Gay City News
the new jalopy is a full-length, migrating dance/theater/media project, commissioned by Dance New Amsterdam (formerly Dance Space Center) in the opening season of their new home.the new jalopy (formerly Jalopy, originally
created for the Richard Hugo House, a cabaret, theater and literary
arts center in Seattle , Washington in
2002) begs the question, ‘ How are you functioning?'
A jalopy ( n. a rickety or battered old car) is the metaphor
in this old/new work that exposes the postponement of repair for
one's self and one's possessions. Why do we continuously delay
needed repairs? How do people and things in disrepair survive?
Attuned to architectural circumstance, a theatrical half-car navigates
the emotional landscape, audience in tow, that mutates with every
restaging. the new jalopy is explored
by a cast of oddly acquainted passengers on a labyrinthine journey,
confronted with the dilemma of ‘wholeness'.
the new jalopy runs
April 13-15, with shows at 8 & 10pm , and features performances by: Richard
Ayres, Courtney Drasner, Jonathan Greene, Robin Kurtz, Natasha
Yannacañedo and Alethea Adsitt.the new jalopy was created in collaboration with the company, including co-writing/development with Robin Kurtz and
co-direction by Gwenyth Reitz.
Blink: The
Indelible Blue Wall Coda (2005) - is a new
dance theater collaboration joining the creative forces of
Alethea Adsitt - Choreographer, George Graham - Composer, Dorian
Nuskind-Oder – Video Artist and Alisha Trimble – Costumes,
and featuring performances by Richard Ayres, Samson Baker,
Courtney Drasner, Jill Frere, Cheri Paige and Alethea Adsitt.
Blink: The Indelible Blue Wall Coda is
a dance/theater/video work that observes the human brain and body
in a hyper-urban environment, by tracking information in split-second
units and then reacting. Composed of idiosyncratic gestures that
amplify habit and character, relentless physicality, and unexpected
personal encounters, Blink grasps fleeting impressions
of a single day, where they become trapped in visual and physical
memory. Original music underscores urban cacophony, while digital
video projects corporal subjects upon the canvas of live performers
and suspended screens. Sections of vertical and horizontal white
fabric hang throughout the space creating a three-dimensional landscape
where sight and sound are a visceral experience for both performer
and viewer.
Blink premiered
on a split-bill with new work by Alexandra Beller/Dances at The
Connelly Theater. Blink also
toured to West Virginia in July, 2005 where it received presentation
by the annual Goose Route Dance Festival in Shepardstown.
To Di[n]e (2004)
- Combine the ideal image of the perfect couple, dining by candlelight in silhouette from behind drawn curtains, with another couple struggling to seek a connection on their blind date through a personals ad, and you have the juxtaposed setting for this romantic comedy dance theater short. Disintegration ensues, with arguments, a food fight, a failed pass. Social commentary and rumination on the pressures placed on relationships by romantic love, To Di[n]e underscores that which we sacrifice, and protect, when chasing after intimacy.
Performed by Richard Decker, Adam Scher, Daryl Owens and Chad Clark at The Yard. By Richard Decker, Alberto Denis, Cheri Paige and Brad Ellis at Dance Conversations at the Flea.
Three Tangos (2003) – is a tango deconstruction originally made for three
women and commissioned by On The Boards’ Northwest New Works
Festival. Exploring the enigma of human relationships, Three Tangos
extracts the saturated drama and gender roles of the tango to illuminate
the power of desire and loneliness, as three characters traverse their
personal terrain of isolation and intimacy. Minimal set features three
chrome-and-black spinning stools, and a rolling red wall. Original music by Joshua Kohl of Degenerate Art Ensemble. Original video by Megan Folsom.
Performed by Carla Barragan, Michelle de la Vega-Burgess, Alethea Adsitt and live accordionist Marchette Dubois.
Televised
(2003) - A choreographic commission by Velocity Dance Center – The Bridge Project. Televised began as an overt response/protest to the pending invasion of Iraq, and developed into an investigation about how war and media hijacks and terrorizes our lives. With an installation of 12 televisions and music that includes the politically vibrant drum corps Infernal Noise Brigade, the viewer is privy to the visual and aural onslaught of violence, fear and psychological separation from one’s own self. Original music by Inphaseprod (G. Filastine), Infernal Noise Brigade with sound design by Rob Kunz, live soprano Lucia Neare, video installation by Max Keene and set design by Alethea Adsitt. Televised premiered in January, 2003 in Seattle, Washington.
Performed by Tessa Burchardt, Solange Fermin, Christina Johnson, Megan Reilly, Jen Rice, Naomi Russel, Stephanie Smith and Amy Wilson.
Jalopy (2002 ) – is
a full-length, site-specific performance project originally created
for the Richard Hugo House (a cabaret, theater and literary arts
center) in Seattle, Washington ).
A jalopy ( n. a rickety or battered old car) is the
metaphor used in this dance theater work that exposes the postponment
of repair for one's self and one's possessions. Jalopy begs
the question, ‘ How are you functioning?' If quick fixes
and cheap tips are temporary, then how do people and things in
disrepair somehow carry on? Denial, nostalgia and time are explored by a cast of unfamiliar passengers/castaways on a labyrinthine journey, confronted with the dilemma of ‘wholeness'.
Designed for installment in a particular location, Jalopy travels through the space, culling the personality of the architecture to evoke a resonant emotional landscape. Jalopy journeys, audience in tow, with a whimsically misplaced guide, from a cabaret to oversized stairs leading to nowhere, a cavernous basement to a theater in the reverse. Life-sized settings in the form of digital stills/motions projected upon wall surfaces, in conjunction with interactive sculptures (a rickshaw-like bicycle and a dilapidated shopping cart of abandoned artifacts with lighting and recorded audio) complete the environment.
Original collaborators: Robin Kurtz, Kristen Tsiatsios, Marc de la
Cruz, Monica Mata-Gilliam, Aiko Kinoshita, Jim Patneaude, Alissa
Wehrman, Megan Folsom (video), Noah Illinsky (sculpture) and Meg
Fox (lighting design). Jalopy received support from the
King County Arts Commission, the Bossak/Heilbron Charitable Foundation,
and private donors, and ran for two weekends with sold-out shows.
Just Before Vanishing
(2000) - Premiered in Intimate Works at Dance on Capitol Hill, Just Before Vanishing is a farewell. A piece for two dancers, with live soprano and classical guitarist performing a John Dowland lute song and the famous Bachianas Brasileiras by Villa-Lobos, the piece follows an inverted choreographic structure set to haunting melodies that strip away a something that is unraveling. A spare set suggests a mysterious disappearance/disturbance with furniture toppled, clothing removed and suspended windows that frame a space with no exit and no entrance.
Performed by Corinna Befort, Alethea Adsitt, Karen Downing and Marc Wilson.
Double Line
(2000) - observes the machine. A horizontal pipe with 100 hanging spoons, and piles of 200 more beneath (scattered across the stage at the end like breaking ice) provide the metaphorical machine that governs purpose in Double Line. (Set design and installation by Alethea Adsitt). With original music composed by Christopher Overstreet, being played live on toy piano, suspended above the audience on a platform, this work is a surrounding experience. Neither commentary about, nor an abstraction of that which is mechanical, it is an action played out, gathering speed and force until it has no option but to break. Premiered at On The Boards in Seattle.
Performed by Kate Kerschbaum, Alex Martin, Kristen Tsiatsios, Freya Wormus and Alethea Adsitt.
Salamander Sickness
(1999) - Salamander Sickness is a dance theater duet emphasizing
the discrepancy of memory between two people immediately following
a dramatic event and how it fragments through time. Between
two childhood friends, inexplicably compelled into friendship yet
also repulsed by one another, a rift occurs due to the
distention in the re-telling of a story. The disagreement returns
to a full boil when they happen into each other many years later,
in a most unexpected way. This ‘play within a play’ includes
as much movement as text, and flirts with the audience’s expectations
as it careens forwards and backwards through time in an effort to
understand the mystery of misunderstandings and reconcile the past.
Written and Performed by Robin Kurtz and Alethea Adsitt.
Linger
(1999) - First presented at Dance on Capitol Hill in Choreofest, Linger was the result of first international travels. A solo performance project, Linger jumps from character to character, inspired by impressions that continue to resurface. From French riddles directly addressed to the audience, to an apologetic Groucho Marx disguise, to full-throttle dancing including a glow-in-the-dark skeleton bit, Linger is a tribute to the people you can’t put out of your mind.
French text by Jenny Sapora-Demaine. Performed by Alethea Adsitt.
