Event Listing - Theater, Dance

Fri May 23 - Sat May 24

San Francisco International Arts Festival presents

the beauty that was mine, through the middle, without stopping & Oust

shared program

Tel. 415-399-9554
Website

Location	Date and Time
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA) 701 Mission Street San Francisco, CA 94103 map cross street: 3rd St. district: SoMa	Fri May 23 (7pm) Sat May 24 (4pm)

Description

Shared Program: Oust & the beauty that was mine, through the middle, without stopping

Oust
We are living in a culture of displacement. As the world's population grows with tremendous speed and technological advances allow us to communicate instantly throughout the globe, boundaries that once defined our lives are melting away. It is often assumed that we need security and a solid sense of place to thrive — what happens when humans allow disorientation to exist unhindered?

Oust is a collaboration between choreographer Eric Kupers/Dandelion Dancetheater, choreographer Nadia Adame/Compañía Y of Madrid, and composer Jacques Poulin-Denis of Montreal. All of these artists are working at the leading edge of physically integrated dance. They met while performing together in AXIS Dance Company in 2002 and have since partnered on many projects involving people with and without disabilities that have sought to turn conventional ideas about performance upside down.

Oust begins with the Buddhist concept that there exists no solid lasting self and pulls from examples such as illegal immigration, refugee crises, and wars that divide countries and ethnic groups. Dandelion Dancetheater and Compañía Y will each create a piece responding to this theme of displacement. In March, the companies will come together to find and develop overlaps and links that blend the distinct styles of each company and subvert audience expectations about the progression of ideas. Composer Jacques Poulin-Denis will work closely with both companies to create a multi-dimensional, widely textured score including electronic, sampled, and live music compositions.

Company Background
Dandelion Dancetheater has in a relatively short time grown into a powerful and provocative presence in the San Francisco arts community with repertory performed throughout California, across the U.S., and abroad. We are one of the Bay Area's most active small dance companies, with annual presentations at established venues, festivals and collaborative events. Our strength lies in a passionate commitment to dance/theater as a form for reaching diverse cultures and facilitating empowerment. Dandelion is widely known for The Undressed Project, developed by Eric Kupers while in-residence at Jon Sims Center for the Arts from 2001-05. This project, which explores body politics in dance, has forged a powerful network of support and participation with populations interested in the intersections between art, social activism, and healing. Due to heightened recognition from The Undressed Project, Dandelion has been rapidly gaining performance, collaboration, touring, and teaching opportunities and has taken important steps toward its goal of paying performers regular wages. The second piece from The Undressed Project, ANICCA, premiered in July 2006 and is Dandelion's second work to enjoy an extended run and touring, having traveled to Hawaii, Los Angeles, Humboldt County, New York, and Montreal.

Dandelion's other long term project premiered this past August at CELLspace in San Francisco with DROP, the debut of a collaborative ensemble of dancers, actors, musicians, and designers — performers dedicated to continually subverting mainstream artistic culture and expanding the boundaries of the forms by integrating their various disciplines. The ensemble for DROP cross-trained each other for over a year, experimenting with using each other's strengths to pull themselves outside of their familiar artistic territory and inject instability into the creative process.

the beauty that was mine, through the middle, without stopping (2007)
Conceived, choreographed and written by Joe Goode in collaboration with the dancers
Assistant Director: Jessica Swanson
Dancers: Rodney Bell, Lisa Bufano, Margaret Cromwell, Sonsherée Giles, Judith Smith
Music: A Hawk and a Hacksaw, Waltz for Strings and Tuba; Paul Cantelon from the "Everything is Illuminated" soundtrack, Little Jonathan/The Wall & Prologue/Babushka
Costume Design: Sonsherée Giles
Set Design: Chris Hammer
Lighting Design: Heather Basarab

The Bay Area premiere of Joe Goode's latest creation for AXIS Dance Company will take place at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Goode says of the work, "What do we see? Is the actuality of the "seen" entity ever close to what we presume it to be? Is "seeing" somehow limited? Does it imply an unnecessary separation between viewer and viewed? It has been my delight to explore these questions with my AXIS collaborators. I am indebted to them for their willingness to reveal themselves and to take this journey with me." Presented by AXIS Dance Company.

the beauty that was mine, through the middle, without stopping was made possible by the National Endowment for the Arts, Doris Duke Fund for the National Dance Project, a program of the New England Foundation for the Arts with additional funding provided by the Ford Foundation, the Zellerbach Family Foundation, the East Bay Fund for Artists and by the following commissioners; Gloria E. Aguila, Shelley Bergum, Jopseph & Anna dos Ramos, Bruce Dugstad, Patricia Dunne & Dunne Painting, Susan Foster, Marilynn Hall & Alan Baskin, Elliot & Linda Halpern, Mishana Hosseinioun, Jon C. Houde, Dougal MacKinnon, Chuck & Thoebe McAvoy, Charles & Gerry McAvoy, Bernadette Mendoza, Tom Metz & David Brightman, Parker Monroe and Teresa Darragh, Edward Ortiz, John Steinberg & Lauren Steinberg, and Marilyn Straka.

AXIS Dance Company
Since 1987, AXIS Dance Company has been a pioneer in the world of dance, creating and presenting cutting-edge, contemporary works by dancers with and without disabilities. More than any other company in the United States, AXIS has been a bridge between contemporary dance and physically integrated dance. Under the direction of Judith Smith, the company has collaborated with and commissioned works by such movement innovators as Stephen Petronio, Bill T. Jones, Joe Goode, Joanna Haigood, Sonya Delwaide, Victoria Marks, Ann Carlson and Margaret Jenkins. In addition, AXIS' own choreographers have created over forty repertory works, two evening length works and two works for young audiences. These have been performed throughout the United States and Europe, earning international praise for the company's high artistic and educational standards and groundbreaking movement vocabulary. AXIS has received numerous Isadora Duncan Dance Awards for both artistic creation and production values. Oakland's Mayor Jerry Brown awarded AXIS a 'Key to Creativity' in 2002 in honor of their artistic achievements. In 2000, AXIS was honored with a Goldie for Dance from the San Francisco Bay Guardian's Outstanding Local Discovery Awards. The Company has created over thirty repertory works, two evening length works and two works for young audiences. AXIS has been commissioned to create works for Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Bates Dance Festival, San Francisco Exploratorium and the CAL Performances and UAM/PFA's Off the Wall series. They were featured in KQED's SPARK Program, WNET's nationally-broadcast production of "People In Motion" and a documentary video, "Dancing From the Inside Out," which won over a dozen awards including Dance On Camera in New York and the National Educational Film and Video Festival. AXIS dancers have also served as consultants and models for the creation of Life Forms choreography software used to introduce disabled students to dance and choreography. AXIS' extensive community education/outreach program, Dance Access and its youth component Dance Access/KIDS! offers classes and workshops for adults and youth of all abilities, school assemblies, presentations, lecture demonstrations, and residencies locally and abroad.