Pour Your Body Out at the MoMA
January 21, 2009
photo by Richard Drew
This past weekend I visited the Museum of Modern Art to see Pipilotti Rist’s site-specific multimedia installation, “Pour Your Body Out (7354 Cubic Meters)”. The museum’s second-floor Marron Atrium has been transformed into a lush, sensual playground with 25-foot-high moving images on three walls and soothing, trance-like sound. The space is carpeted and visitors are encouraged to remove their shoes and walk around, sit on the floor, or stretch out on the iris-shaped seating area in the center of the room. For a museum, it’s an unusually comfortable, inviting space that seems to be enjoyable for both adults and young children.
In the introduction to the exhibit, Ms. Rist, who is from Switzerland, writes that she hopes visitors will absorb “spiritual vitamins” while experiencing the installation. Rather than standing still and moving quickly from one image to the next – a frequent occurrence in museums – the artist invites viewers to “pour your body out from your hips”, meditate, dance, sing, and move around.
The images themselves are ordinary: a field of tulips; a person walking through puddles of water strewn with trash; and hands digging up clumps of moist soil and a wriggly earth worm, among several others. But the use of extreme slow-motion and different camera angles transforms the viewing experience into a sensual one. I could feel the waxiness of the flowers against my skin, and the earth worm sliding between my fingers. Vibrant colors enrich the images, and with three walls to watch, viewers can take in the 10-minute loop several times in order to experience the entire project.
“Pour Your Body Out” engages the viewer in a holistic way. It is immersive visual art that activates all of the senses through light, sound, images, color, and texture. Although it would be wonderful to see this project in a setting that is free and open to the public, it is still worth experiencing at the MoMA.
“Pour Your Body Out” is on display through February 2, 2009.
Change Has Come to the White House
January 20, 2009
photo by Doug Mills
At last! And change has also come to WhiteHouse.gov with the addition of the new White House Blog. Macon Phillips, the Director of New Media for the White House, explains, “Millions of Americans have powered President Obama’s journey to the White House, many taking advantage of the internet to play a role in shaping our country’s future. WhiteHouse.gov is just the beginning of the new administration’s efforts to expand and deepen this online engagement. Just like your new government, WhiteHouse.gov and the rest of the Administration’s online programs will put citizens first.”
Gallim Dance: Blush
January 18, 2009
Gallim Dance in "Blush", photo by Christopher Duggan
Ohad Naharin’s influence is palpable in Andrea Miller’s I Can See Myself in Your Pupil, which Gallim Dance performed last week at the Joyce SoHo. But Blush, in its New York premiere, is uniquely Miller’s, and luckily for the audience, the six dancers of Gallim pour their hearts and bodies into every moment of this exhilarating 50-minute piece.
In a post-performance talk on Friday, Andrea Miller explained that Blush was inspired in part by the 1992 Japanese film Tokyo Decadence, and much of the movement that she and the dancers explored while creating the piece stemmed from three words: catch, escape, and rescue. Although these words didn’t always come to mind while watching the performance, Blush is so dense with emotion and intensely physical movement that they are surely at the root of the work. Through raw, physical power and a wide spectrum of emotions, the dancers investigate themes of intimacy, instability, fear, and tenderness.
The three women and three men, dressed in simple black costumes designed by Jose Solis, are covered in white body paint from head to toe, creating a cold, harsh, and haunted look. Set to a range of music – from Chopin to Radiohead to Wolf Parade – Blush opens with the bare-chested Moo Kim moving robotically under dim light. He crawls across the floor and arches and curls his torso, gaining momentum as the solo progresses. In the majority of the work, however, the dancers interact as they explore one another’s space, sometimes invading it or sometimes being invited in. Staring intently at the audience, the women walk slowly to the urgent sounds of Pimmon, then tilt their heads back and run their pinky finger along the length of their necks. It’s a chilling image that appears throughout the piece. Moments later, two men swing Francesca Romo by her ankles and wrists, taking turns catching her as she violently flails her limbs and stretches her mouth in a scream. Blush‘s emotional climate changes from cold to warm as the interactions build and kinder emotions fill the space. The women carefully place their shins on the men’s chests, and later this image is reversed. Troy Ogilvie appears exhausted and anguished as she dances theatrically to Chopin, but Jason Fordham is there to support her. Romo gently uses her foot to rotate Dan Walczak, who is curled up on the floor. Harsh, violent movement at the beginning of the piece has been replaced with achingly tender moments.
photo by Christopher Duggan
Much of Miller’s movement initiates from the chest (the dancers fluidly arch and hunch their sternums), quite literally revealing emotions from the heart. This is most evident in the riveting finale. While stomping, swinging their arms, and throwing their heads back, the dancers sing along to Wolf Parade’s “I’ll Believe in Anything”. They occasionally burst into powerful runs or leaps. But as the piece closes, they charge toward the back corner while ripping up the white floor tape, their faces and skin blushed with energy and feeling. The emotional impact of Blush leaves the audience as breathless and elated as the dancers.
Secretary of Arts? Sign the Petition.
January 15, 2009
An article in yesterday’s Washington Post discusses the momentum building around an online petition in support of a Cabinet-level arts czar. The petition was inspired by music producer and composer Quincy Jones’s call to President-elect Obama to establish a secretary of arts and culture. Many arts leaders in Washington, such as Michael Kaiser, are in favor of this. Here’s an excerpt from the article:
“Whether you call it a minister of culture or not, it would be wonderful to have someone with a policy role to coordinate arts education, cultural diplomacy and support for arts organizations. Those activities are not coordinated but divided among many offices,” said Michael Kaiser, president of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Kaiser argues that the crumbling economy, as well as the advent of a new administration, has added some urgency to coordinating all these efforts. “Right now, we have an ecology of the arts that is very scary. We need a proactive person, or agency, that is going to talk to foundations, the state agencies, the organizations about this situation. Right now, we are leaving the arts organizations to themselves,” he said.
Want to make this a reality? Sign the petition! There are currently more than 114,000 signatures.
Gallim Dance: I Can See Myself in Your Pupil
January 13, 2009
Gallim Dance in I Can See Myself in Your Pupil, photo by Christopher Duggan
Gallim is a fitting name for the dance company that Andrea Miller formed in 2006. It means “waves” in Hebrew, and Gallim Dance is making lots of them in the dance world. Their performance of I Can See Myself in Your Pupil on Sunday evening, as part of their current season at the Joyce SoHo, displayed Miller’s immense choreographic talent and the company’s ability to explore the beautiful and grotesque through extreme physicality and raw emotion.
I Can See Myself in Your Pupil is a collection of excerpts from Miller’s previous works that have been reworked and seamlessly woven together to create a one-hour piece. Ohad Naharin, with whom Miller studied while she danced in the Batsheva Ensemble, used the dance-compilation format in his evening-length Decadance to great effect. For Miller to make such a piece, considering that Gallim was only founded in 2006, is ambitious. Naharin’s influence is certainly felt in Pupil, but Miller has a unique voice and style that is clearly her own. Her movement is fierce and brutally honest in a way that is rarely seen, especially in an intimate theater where the audience is just feet away from the performers.
photo by Christopher Duggan
Several clustered dancers jump rhythmically to the “ooh!” and “aah!” of a Chris Clark song, creating a simple and humorous opening. The piece continues with a silent, meditative duet involving synchronized floor work followed by individual movement for two women. As Pupil progresses, it grows increasingly powerful and explosive but is always balanced by controlled, introspective moments. Perhaps the most intense and anguished excerpt is from Snow: four women (Miller, Jessica Lee Keller, Troy Ogilvie, and Francesca Romo) urgently leap and fall to the floor to the sounds of Tony Gatlif’s menacing score, which screams “It’s an emergency….an emergency, emergency!” After intermission, the piece immediately picks up right where it left off to the sounds of Balkan Beat Box. Several dancers form a line and shake uncontrollably, and in a quirky duet, Romo crazily throws herself at Jason Fordham while he struts about looking very pleased with himself. The entire cast is superb, but Romo stands out for her ability to completely immerse herself in the movement – whether it’s dangerously athletic, graceful, or eccentric – while captivating the audience and making them a part of her journey.
Francesca Romo and Jason Fordham, photo by Christopher Duggan
Gallim Dance at the Joyce SoHo will continue through Sunday, January 18th with performances of Miller’s Blush. Order tickets online or call 212-242-0800.
