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Dance Theater Workshop presents: Miguel gutierrez and the powerful people in NY premiere of "Last Meadow" (Sept 15-19, 7:30 pm)

by Sarah Hart
September 15, 2009
Dance Theatre Workshop
219 West 19th Street
New York, NY 10011
212-924-0077
Dance Theater Workshop, the preeminent U.S. based center for contemporary dance and performance, presents Miguel Gutierrez and The Powerful People in Last Meadow, Gutierrez's first new group work since 2007. Inspired by James Dean's classic films – East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, and Giant, Last Meadow exploits the iconic and seductive image of James Dean as a symbol of the ways we project unrealistic expectations onto our identity as a nation. Last Meadow is about acknowledging confusion and the state of waiting, where what you need never comes. This New York premiere features dancers Michelle Boulé, Tarek Halaby and Miguel Gutierrez, a sound design by Neal Medlyn, and lighting design by longtime collaborator Lenore Doxsee.


"There are people who are born to make art, to make us think, to make us question what we do, and Miguel is one of those people." Carley Petesch, The Brooklyn Rail

"reckless, smart and passionate… " Deborah Jowitt, The Village Voice

Performances will take place at Dance Theater Workshop in the Bessie Schönberg Theater, Sep 15 – 19 (Tuesday – Saturday) at 7:30pm. There will also be a Pre-Show Talk on Sep 15 (Tuesday) at 6:30pm, a Post-show Talk on Sep 18th (Friday), and a free wine reception following every performance (Tuesday – Saturday). Tickets are $15 and are available online at dancetheaterworkshop.org, over the phone at 212.924.0077, and in person at the box office. Dance Theater Workshop Members, Students and Seniors are eligible for a 20% discount ($12 Tickets). Box office hours are Monday – Friday from 5pm-9pm and Saturday – Sunday from 12pm – 8pm. Dance Theater Workshop is located at 219 West 19the Street between 7th and 8th Avenues.

About the Artists


Miguel Gutierrez, an active figure in the New York dance scene for the past twelve years, is a dance and music artist who creates group work with a variety of dancers, music and visual artists under the moniker Miguel Gutierrez and the Powerful People (MGPP), while also making solos. His work includes: enter the seen (2002), I succumb (2003), dAMNATION rOAD (2004), Retrospective Exhibitionist and DifficultBodies (2005), myendlesslove (2006), Everyone (2007), Nothing, No thing (2008) , and he instigated the performance/protest/meditation freedom of information. In the U.S. his work has been presented by Dance Theater Workshop, Danspace Project and The Kitchen in New York, ODC in San Francisco, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, Flynn Center in Burlington, DiverseWorks! Art Space in Houston, and the Fusebox Festival in Austin. Internationally it has toured to several venues and festivals such as Antipodes Festival in Brest, Politics of Ecstasy in Berlin, Kampnagel in Hamburg, Explore Festival in Bucharest, ImPulsTanz in Vienna, Springdance in Utrecht. He has received support from the NEA, Creative Capital, Jerome Foundation, Rockefeller MAP Fund, the National Performance Network Creative Commissioning Fund and New York Foundation for the Arts' Fellowship and BUILD programs. In 2007 he completed a commission for BalletLab in Melbourne, Australia. He is twice the winner of a New York Dance and Performance "Bessie" Award: in 2002 for dancing with John Jasperse Company and in 2006 as a choreographer for Retrospective Exhibitionist and Difficult Bodies. He has enjoyed supporting the work of other artists as a curator for The Kitchen's Dance and Process program, and the now defunct but infamous SHTUDIO SHOW at Chez Bushwick. When You Rise Up, a collection of his performance writings, will soon be available from 53rd State Press. He teaches regularly around the world and he invented DEEP AEROBICS, an absurd(ist) workout for the leftist imagination revolutionary in all of us. He has been lucky to work with a wide variety of extraordinary contemporary dance artists, such as Joe Goode, Juliette Mapp, Jennifer Lacey, Deborah Hay, and most recently, Alain Buffard. www.miguelgutierrez.org

Michelle Boulé has been happily working with MGPP since 2001. Other artists she's worked with: Deborah Hay (William Forsythe commission If I Sing to You), John Jasperse, Donna Uchizono, Neal Beasley, Beth Gill, Judith Sanchez-Ruiz, Doug Varone (Metropolitan Opera Ballet), Gabe Masson, and a slew of incredible performers. She has shown her work at the Krannert Center in Illinois, the University of Utah, and in NY at P.S. 122 and Danspace Project. In New York, she teaches regularly at Movement Research, where she is also a member of the Artists Advisory Council, and has also taught at the Trisha Brown Studio, American Dance Festival NY Intensive, and Dance New Amsterdam. Other recent teaching experiences include Hollins University in Virginia, ODC in San Francisco, Series 8:08 in Toronto, TBA Festival in Portland, and Chunky Move, Dancehouse, and VCA in Melbourne, Australia. In 2002, she was an international DanceWeb scholarship recipient at ImpulsTanz, Vienna. She's also a Certified Bodytalk Practitioner, working privately with clients in Brooklyn and Manhattan.


Lenore Doxsee (Lighting Designer) Recent designs include Deganit Shemy's Arena at DTW, Karen Sherman's Copperhead, Ten Blocks on the Camino Real (set & lights) for Target Margin Theater, and Miguel Gutierrez' Everyone. With MGPP: enter the seen, I succumb, dAMNATION rOAD. and Retrospective Exhibitionist/Difficult Bodies (Bessie Award). Other recent designs: Cunning Little Vixen at Houston Grand Opera and Faustus, Last Night at Spoleto USA.


Tarek Halaby's formal dance training began in the Chicago area before he received his BFA in Dance Performance from The University of Iowa. In 2001 he started working with Miguel Gutierrez, and feels privileged to say that he is a founding member of the Powerful People. After 3 intensive years and 3 full productions with MGPP, Tarek moved to Brussels, Belgium to partake in the 2 year research cycle at the Performing Arts Research and Training Studios (P.A.R.T.S.) conservatory under the direction of Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker. Upon completion of the program in 2006 he became a resident artist of the Antwerp based production house/work space WP ZIMMER. Through the production of ZIMMER, he has been able to create and perform his own works throughout Europe, Scandinavia, The Middle East and now the United States and Canada this upcoming Fall 2009. Last Meadow marks Tarek's reunion with the Powerful People after 5 years as well as his return to dancing in works other than his own. In 2008 Tarek was a part of the new creation (Objects in mirror are closer than they appear) of Brussels based choreographer Salva Sanchis, with whom he continues to tour. His past credits from New York City include having worked with Chamecki-Lerner, Zvi Gotheiner, Gerald Casel, Alexandra Beller, Chris DC Ramos, Doug Elkins and behind the scenes with Susan Marshall.


Neal Medlyn (sound designer) is primarily a solo performer but he spent much of his teen years in his bedroom making house music on a Yamaha keyboard. Later, while continuing to make cassette after cassette in his apartment, he was also in some bands that played in East Texas to very little enthusiasm. His performance work has been presented at the New Museum for Contemporary Art, PS122, Dance Theater Workshop, the TBA Festival and he has danced for Adrienne Truscott and David Neumann.





Funding


Last Meadow is commissioned by Dance Theater Workshop's Commissioning and Creative Residency Program with support from the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency, the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and the Jerome Robbins Foundation. Additional support provided, in part, by the New York State Council on the Arts Dance Program. This project is made possible in part by a grant from the National Performance Network's Performance Residency Program.


Last Meadow is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation Fund Project co-commissioned by Dance Theater Workshop in partnership with Portland Institute of Contemporary Art, Flynn Center for the Performing Arts and NPN. Major contributors of NPN are the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, Nathan Cummings Foundation, MetLife Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency). For more information: www.npnweb.org. Last Meadow is a project of Creative Capital, which currently receives support from the Andy Warhol Foundation, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, The TOBY Fund, The James Irvine Foundation, The Nathan Cummings Foundation, and other individual and institutional donors. Additional support for Last Meadow has been provided by The Jerome Foundation, The MAP Fund, a program of Creative Capital supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, Lambent Fellowship, a project of Tides Foundation, New York, the Josephine Foundation, the New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Choreography and the generous support of individual donors. Last Meadow was developed through residencies at the Abrons Art Center's WorkSpace Program, Hollins University, Baryshnikov Art Center, and Texas Women's University.


Touring


Last Meadow will have its world premiere during the Portland Institute of Contemporary Arts Time Based Art Festival, September 4-7, 2009. The piece will be shown at The Flynn Center for the Performing Arts in January 15 and 16 2010 after which it will receive its European premiere March 5 and 6, 2010 at the Antipodes Festival in Brest, France.



Dance Theater Workshop's 2009-2010 Season Supporters (as of July 1, 2009)

Private support provided by: American Masterpieces: Dance Initiative of the New England Foundation for the Arts; The Carnegie Corporation of New York; The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation; The Ford Foundation; French United States Exchange in Dance of the New England Foundation for the Arts; The Howard Gilman Foundation; The Mertz Gilmore Foundation; The Greenwall Foundation; The William Randolph Hearst Foundations; The Jerome Foundation; The Lambent Foundation; The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; National Dance Project of the New England Foundation for the Arts; National Performance Network; The New York Community Trust; New York State DanceForce; The Jerome Robbins Foundation; Rockefeller Brothers Fund; The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation; The Scherman Foundation; The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation; The Shubert Foundation, Inc.; The Trust for Mutual Understanding; and The Lila Acheson Wallace Theater Fund.


Corporate support provided by: Bloomberg L.P. and Consolidated Edison Company of New York.


Public support provided by the following government agencies and elected representatives: National Endowment for the Arts; New York City Department of Cultural Affairs; Kate D. Levin, Commissioner; Speaker Christine C. Quinn; New York City Council; New York State Council on the Arts; New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation; Senator Thomas K. Duane, New York State Senate.
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