In Memory

Mary Overlie 1946–2020

Blackboard — Hand — Stone On the day I met Mary Overlie in the summer of 2004, I sat enraptured (if befuddled) as she stood before her iconic blackboard and lectured on the approach to theatre that she orig- inated and developed since the 1970s: The Viewpoints. On the board, she had written the names of The Viewpoints’ six materials: Space, Shape, Time, Emotion, Movement, and Story. Below them were her chalk drawings representing The Viewpoints’ foundational principles: six squares to show “solid state theatre” and its “deconstruction”; the “vertical” tower of classicism and collapsing to the “horizontal” assemblage of postmodernism; and the circle of “­reification,” her name for the artists’ process of moving concepts, ideas, forms, and percep- tions from the unknown to the known and back again. Then, she flipped the board to reveal her drawing of “The Bridge,” with its nine supportive frames for Viewpoints study, which led from “News of a Difference” to “The Original Anarchist.” About an hour into her lecture, Mary extended her arm to gaze inquisitively at her hand. After some time, she said, “Any moment this will become art. This is The Viewpoints.” After years of talking with Mary, writing about her, teaching The Viewpoints, and creating perfor- mances through her work, I’ve come to understand the greater significance of my friend and mentor’s simple act. For me, it speaks to who Mary Overlie was, as a Bessie Award–winning ­choreographer, dancer, teacher, theorist, and comrade. What she taught with that gesture was the quiet confidence she modeled for her students through her life, art, and teaching. It embod- ied her faith that, given attention, trust, and patience, the materials of theatre — beyond the actor’s feelings, intentions, creative ideas, or body — would become art. Mary explained on that day in 2004 how training in The Viewpoints leads the performer to become an Original Anarchist. An Original Anarchist, which she most assuredly was, would be freed from preconceptions about performance. Like her, that performer would skim “a small, flat, round stone [...] across the surface of a pond,” in order to ask “What is theatre made of?” (Overlie 2016:119, 127). The Viewpoints would not provide an answer to that question, but would instead prepare the performer to pose it while waiting for theatre’s material “languages” to speak. With a mischievous smile, she would say, “Let the materials teach you. They know more and have better ideas.” Mary told us about the foundational experiences that shaped her art: growing up in Terry, Montana, where the expansive landscape awakened a life-long love of space; her unconven- tional introduction to the ballet barre through conceptual improvisations; and the community she found at the home of the visual artists Bob and Gennie DeWeese, eavesdropping for hours as the constant influx of guests debated the concept of “art” late into the night. She talked about “jumping a freight train” as a teenager with $50.00 and no specific destination, eventually arriv- ing in San Francisco, where she would discover both Cunningham technique and transcenden- tal meditation. Mary’s experiences with space, time, and artistic experimentation prepared her for the reve- latory encounter of seeing performing with the Grand Union. For all of the Grand Union’s infamously riotous spontaneity, what riveted Mary was an extended section of a site-specific performance in which Rainer simply sat on some steps and read quietly. It was at

TDR 65:1 (T249) 2021 https://doi.org/10.1017/S1054204320000052 12 © The Author(s) 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press for Tisch School of the Arts/NYU In Memory 13 Dressed Like an Egg an Like Dressed History group provided the History group (1976), (1976), the first of many works at the Kitchen. — when invited Mary to perform in Dilley invited Mary when Barbara (1972), commissioned by the by the commissioned Species (1972), Lesser Known — — Figure 1. With her ubiquitous chalkboard, Mary Overlie waits for her hand to to hand her for waits Mary Overlie chalkboard, ubiquitous her With 1. Figure North of University the at workshop Viewpoints artbecome a teaching while Maness) Alex by (Photo 2017. February in Hill Chapel at Carolina to York to New — [1976], Glassed on football fields at Connecticut College (1975) and Players The Saint and the Football The diversity of SoHo’s performance venues yielded collaborations with other downtown The diversity of SoHo’s The world in which she was situated as she developed The Viewpoints was central to its con- was central to Viewpoints The she was situated as she developed The world in which work in the window Mary’s The As she developed artists: with the Grand Union at 112 Greene St.; with Natural History at Artists Space and artists: with the Grand Union at 112 Greene St.; with Natural History at for whom she choreographed Lee Artists House; and with , Ornette Coleman’s Breuer’s Cascando Award–winning Obie Akalaitis’s Pratt (1976) and JoAnne American Dancer History of the The Natural of the collaborative became an improvisational from that work The dancers Whitney Museum. “inventing referred to as work Mary always to developing whose unique approach same name, the Natural performing with Rehearsing and backwards.” the wheel basic vocabulary for performance that in articulating a new “obsession” seeds for her emerging it was situated (in but on the material world in which body, on the dancer’s not would be based, Sommer 1980:58). and interdisci- conceptual, and its downtown community of minimalist, ception: 1970s SoHo from space as a material language the space of SoHo was inextricable For Mary, plinary artists. major choreographic works, a central aesthetic concern for her first It was of performance. windows of the × 5' street-facing 3' performed in SoHo in the shallow, “window pieces,” her (Glassed Holly Solomon Gallery Imaginations and II [1977], Imaginations Pieces [1977]). Window Argelander spaces inspired Ron to invite her to serve as the first faculty member of the Experimental Theatre Wing at Arts/NYU, School of the Tisch where she taught for nearly And it was with four decades. who danced Beavers, Wendell that she with her in those spaces, formed the Mary Overlie Dance Company (1978–85) with Paul and Nina Martin. Langland, teaching through her Viewpoints Mary was instrumen- at NYU, tal in providing spaces and com- munities for postmodern dance She cofounded both Danspace Project (at and performance. investigation, exchange, training, for Movement Research & Construction The School in-the-Bowery) and Church Mark’s St. That same year Mary inaugurated the Summergarden (now Movement Research) in 1978. of Modern Museum York’s (1978) in the sculpture garden at New dance series with The Figure curated Kitchen became a space for dance performance, It was also the first year that the Art. invited her to be a part of who was taking dance classes from Mary, Bogosian, by Eric Bogosian. Langland, with Beavers, , Dream Painters where she debuted initial dance season, the Kitchen’s Warrilow and Mabou Mines actor David Martin, and Dead End Kids (1980). (1977), that moment, Mary said, that she knew she would “follow this woman to the end of the earth.” earth.” to the end of the “follow this woman she knew she would that Mary said, that moment, Rainer She did follow 14 In Memory Sommer, SallyR. 1980. “Mary Overlie:I Was a Wild Indian Who HappenedtoDance.” TDR24, 4(T88): Overlie, Mary. 2016. StandinginSpace: The Six Viewpoints &PracticeTheory . Billings, MT: FallonPress. Overlie, Mary. 1980. “Mary Overlie: A Letter.” DanceScope14, 4:30–34. References gation love art!Iart!” And itisherloveofartists, herlove ofart, andherloveofartasaninvesti- text ofherfirstpublishedwriting: performance area. As theperformersplacedsinglestonesonstage, Ispokefromthe1980 was toobservetheperformanceandtakenotesfromadeskatfarup-rightcornerof A Celebration oftheLifeand Work Overlie ofMary . Forthemajorityofthatperformance, mytask her inperson. We wereonstagetogetheratDanspaceProjectinherfinalwork, Brain toBrain: that sameweekin2004, andthesecondwason23September2019, oneofthelasttimesIsaw board in2004, skippingstonesandwaitingforherhandtobecomeart. The firstwasduring will thisbecomeart?” sheasked. “What istheatremadeof?” stove anddeliveredanhour-long lectureon The Viewpoints toalocalchoreographer. “When to moveabout. The followingafternoon, sheproppedalargeblackboardontopofherwood to makethemmoreapproachableforcontemporaryactors. announced herplantoput The Viewpoints in “the carwash” to “scrub the1970soffthem” cussed myownbookonMaryand The Viewpoints inherfinalmonths, sheemphatically she continuedtoresearch, reassess, andrethink The Viewpoints anditsteaching. As wedis- series ofweek-long, orevenmonth-longteachingresidenciesaroundtheworld. Throughout, the Shanghai Theatre Academy. With eachnewdireprognosis, shewouldembarkonanother tions toteacharoundtheworld, including Toneelacademie inMaastricht, theNetherlands, and Despite that, shefeltfreedfromwhatcalledthe “book jail” ofwriting, andacceptedinvita- Six Viewpoints &PracticeTheory (2016), nearlysimultaneouslywithherfirstcancerdiagnosis. Viewpoints andMoisésKaufman/Tectonic Theater Project’s Moment Work. approaches toperformance-makingandtraining, mostnotably Anne Bogart/SITICompany’s ceptual artproject, onethatalsoinspiredotherartistsandensemblestocreatetheirown theorizing, teaching, andwritingabout The Viewpoints. Marytalkedaboutthisworkasacon- tival. While shecontinuedtochoreographandperform, shebecameincreasinglyfocusedon Paris studioandestablishedtheProSeries(nowImPulsTanz) atthe Vienna Tanzwochen fes- The lasttimewespokeonthephone, Marysaid, quitesimply andemphatically, “I loveart!I my constantproject. (Overlie1980:33– that Ihaveinvestigatedandidentifiedalltheelementspresentinperformance, butthatis tures inaline. All ofthismayhappeninanatmospherechargedstillness. Idonotfeel gestures whichdissolveintohugesweepsacrossthespaceandthenoccuragainasges- nameable eventthattranspired. [...] There are, however, someveryengrossingsmall, odd The experienceiswitnessed, understood, followed, rememberedandyetthereisno I onlyeversawMaryperformlivetwicesinceseeingherstandinginfrontoftheblack- On thedayIarrivedformylastvisittoherhomeinBozeman, Montana, shewasbarelyable After decadesofabandoneddrafts, Maryself-publishedherbook, StandinginSpace: The Mary spentmuchofthelate1980sand1990sinEurope, whereshestartedNYU’s ETW 45–58. — this “constant project”

— that isherlastingandunfinishedlegacy. 34)

oy Perucci — Tony