Cold Dream Colour a Dance Homage to Louis Le Brocquy
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AN ARCANE COLLECTIVE PRODUCTION COLD DREAM COLOUR A DANCE HOMAGE TO LOUIS LE BROCQUY MAY 16 – 19, 2012 8:30 PM MAY 20, 2012 3:00 PM presented by REDCAT Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater California Institute of the Arts COLD DREAM COLOUR A DANCE HOMAGE TO LOUIS LE BROCQUY Artistic Director Morleigh Steinberg Choreography Oguri, Liz Roche, Morleigh Steinberg Music The Edge and Paul Chavez Dancers Boaz Barkan, Sherwood Chen, Joyce Lu, Dani Lunn, Oguri, Morleigh Steinberg, Roxanne Steinberg Understudy Eric Losoya Set Design Oguri, Moses Hacmon Lighting Design Morleigh Steinberg, Tony Mulinex Costume Design Mariad Whisker Sound Design Paul Chavez Stage Manager Moses Hacmon Producer Sarah Durcan THE DANCE Presences Being Procession The Táin A Family ...”In my own small world of painting, I myself have learned from the canvas that emergence and disappearance - twin phenomena of time - are ambivalent, that one implies the other and that the state or matrix within which they co-exisst dissolves the normal sense of time, producing a characteristic stillness, inherent to the art of painting. “... –Louis le Brocquy The program runs 80 minutes without intermission. Produced by Body Weather Laboratory and Arcane Collective DIRECTORS NOTE It seems strangely appropriate that the recent news of Louis’ death came to me while I was in south of France, not far from where he and his wife Anne Madden lived for many years. Louis loved the south of France, where the light reflects azur off the Mediterranean and bounces across the white steeps of les Alpes Maritimes. What painter has not been enthralled? Somehow, at that moment, I felt Louis flying overhead. I was introduced to the work of Louis le Brocquy many years ago when I first moved to Ireland. That moment, of experiencing his paintings the first time, remains ingrained in my being. Immediately drawn to the powerful and evocative imagery that stared back at me from the gallery walls, my response was a pure physical and emotional intrigue that stirred me beyond intellectual reasoning. I imagined the paintings, so imbued with vitality, springing from the singular plane of the canvas into multi-dimension, my body feeling their potential to translate into movement. I felt a connection, not only to his work but also to the country that would soon become my new home. After knowing Louis for some time, I asked him if he had ever seen his paintings danced. His face quietly lit up and with his emblematic graciousness he softly replied, “It would be an honour.” Since then I have taken on the endeavour to realize what had intrigued me for years: to delve deep into the essence of his work and let it actually move me. From his Early Works through to his Homage Series, I studied not only the content and context of his paintings, but the varying kinetic energy of how he painted and how he painted time. More so, I sought to investigate the spirit that exists within the intention of his work. It has been a remarkable journey. It will be a continuous journey. – Morleigh Steinberg BIOGRAPHIES Louis le Brocquy was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1916. Louis le Brocquy is a towering figure in the history of 20th century Irish painting. His work has received many accolades in a career that has spanned over seventy years of creative practice. Acknowledged by museum retrospective exhibitions worldwide, the artist’s work is represented in numerous public collections from the Guggenheim, New York to the Tate Modern, London. In Ireland, he was honored as the first and only living painter to be included in the Permanent Irish Collection of the National Gallery of Ireland, with his painting The Family which in 1956 won a major prize at the Venice Biennale. In 1958 he married Irish painter Anne Madden. Le Brocquy’s inquiry into the human condition, his preoccupation with the inward isolation of the individual, and his concerns relating to marginal lives have been seminal to his motivation as a painter. His interest in the Celtic head culture informed his widely acclaimed work of evocative Portrait Heads of literary figures and fellow artists, including William Butler Yeats, James Joyce, and his friends Samuel Beckett, Francis Bacon and Seamus Heaney. Louis passed away April 25th 2012 at the age of 96. Throughout his lifetime, le Brocquy had paid homage to the works of a select few master painters. It is with this idea, of paying respect to the greatness of those who have come before that, Cold Dream Colour was conceived. Morleigh Steinberg is a dancer, choreographer, lighting designer and filmmaker. A formative member of Momix, she went on to co-found ISO Dance, along with Daniel Ezralow, Jamey Hampton, and Ashley Roland. She toured the world extensively with both companies and with solo work. Morleigh’s choreography has earned her an Emmy award for best screen choreography in Episodes, a PBS presentation of ISO repertory and her work has been performed in the Academy Awards. Her most recent performances include productions of Cold Dream Colour and Oguri’s Caddy! Caddy! Caddy!, William Faulkner Dance Project. She has directed, choreographed and performed in numerous music videos and feature films. Traveling Light, her first short film as director, was presented by Francis Ford Coppola, featuring Roxanne Steinberg and Oguri. Since then, it has been a passion to capture dance on film. She was chosen to participate in the UCLA Dance/Media Fellowship Project, where she shot and directed XING and Naizou. Other films include Stir and Too Close for Conversation for NY choreographer Nina Winthrop and Unsung with Irish choreographer Liz Roche. Her feature length documentary Height of Sky followed Oguri’s 3 year dance journey in the deserts of California and aired on The Sundance Channel. Working as both dancer and choreographer, Morleigh toured with U2 on their ZOO TV Tour, and their recent U2 360 Tour. As lighting designer she has lit productions for companies such as The Corn Exchange, Rex Levitates, Bodyvox, and Oguri. Since 1998, Morleigh has conducted Body Weather Laboratory, an investigative movement forum in Dublin, Ireland. In the Spring of 2011, Morleigh and Oguri founded Arcane Collective as an international dance co-op and platform to present their work independently and together. Oguri, a resident of Southern California, since 1990 produces full-evening solo and ensemble work in the theater, improvises with musicians, works site-specifically in natural and urban landscapes, develops multi-media works, and collaborates with sculptors, painters, poets, literature, daily life imagery and simple materials to transform space and time with dance. He is an artist in residence at the Electric Lodge in Venice, California where he conducts Body Weather Laboratory training workshop, a forum for investigating the body and dance (founded in Japan in 1978 by Min Tanaka). Oguri teaches and performs worldwide. His 4-year project supported by the Irvine Fellowship in Dance, an exploration of the California deserts, inspired the 2005 documentary Height of Sky by director Morleigh Steinberg. Oguri has received support from the California Arts Council, Metabolic Studio, the New England Foundation for the Arts National Dance Project, the Rockefeller Foundation, the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, The Lila Wallace Reader’s Digest Arts Partners Program, The Getty Center, the Irvine Fellowship in Dance and the 2005 Irvine ‘Dance: Creation to Performance’ grant for his evening length work Caddy! Caddy! Caddy!, William Faulkner Dance Project which toured in November 2009 with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to the Indianapolis Museum of Art. He has also received an ARC grant from the Center for Cultural Innovation and the Durfee Foundation. Liz Roche is artistic director of Dublin based Liz Roche Company, (formerly known as Rex Levitates Dance Company.) The company tours extensively creating theatre based and site specific performances that have been performed through-out Ireland, the UK, USA, and Asia, including The Irish Arts Festival Beijing, Capital Nights Festival Liverpool 08, DanceBase for the Edinburgh Fringe, Judson Memorial Church, New York with Movement Research 09. Most recent performances include the Baryshnikov Arts Center, Judson Memorial Church, New York, and The South Bank Centre London. She has been commissioned to make choreographies for companies including the National Ballet of China, Scottish Dance Theatre and CoisCéim and has danced for choreographers such as John Jasperse, Jodi Melnick, Rosemary Butcher, Christine Gaigg, Les Carnets Bagouets, Cathala & Ramalingom, David Bolger and Robert Connor & Loretta Yurick. She has choreographed many operas including Opera de Nice, Rossini Opera Festival, National Opera of Korea, and Liceu Barcelona and also in theatre at The Abbey Theatre, The Gate and Landmark Productions. Roxanne Steinberg has danced with composers and musicians Yas Kaz, Paul Chavez, Kenta Nagai, Tatsuya Nakatani, Leon Mobley, Motoko Honda, Myra Melford & Alex Cline and for dancers Min Tanaka and Amagatsu of Sankai Juku. A graduate of Bennington College and a founder of Body Weather Laboratory in L.A. (1987), she has performed and taught with Oguri since 1990 and was presented in Flower of the Season, a performance series she now co-directs. She has choreographed for Body Vox in Portland and has been presented annually at Dance Conversations at the Flea in New York. She is Special Projects Coordinator at artist Lauren Bon’s Metabolic Studio in Los Angeles. She has received grants from Department of Cultural Affairs Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Arts Commission, Metabolic Studio, Durfee Foundation, and she is artist-in-residence Electric Lodge, Venice. Boaz Barkan is a performer and creator living in Denmark, with a contemporary and experimental dance and performance background. Originally studying at CalArts, he then worked and performed for many years with both the dance artist Oguri and dance innovator Anna Halprin.