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[VIDEO] “Steve Paxton — a video amble” and “PA RT (1983)”

May 7, 2025

Photo of Lisa Nelson and Steve Paxton by Gil Grossi

On Valentine's day, 2025, Danspace Project commenced Danspace @ 50: The Work Is Never Done. Sanctuary Always Needed with Steve Paxton - a video amble, a celebratory evening of remembrances of Steve Paxton (Jan 21, 1939 – Feb 20, 2024), a singular dance artist whose presence graced the sanctuary over its many decades. Danspace Project's 50th Anniversary festival is titled after an email Paxton sent to Executive Director and Chief Curator, Judy Hussie-Taylor, in 2012.

Created and hosted by Lisa Nelson and Cathy Weis, Steve Paxton - a video amble shared excerpts of rarely seen documents of performances and farm life, followed by a full screening of PA RT (1983), a dance by Paxton and Nelson at Danspace Project in 1983.

Watch both films below.

Steve Paxton - a video amble 
by Lisa Nelson and Cathy Weis
(Created in 2025)




CREDITS FOR EXCERPTS (from Videoda Archive, E. Charleston, VT)

[preshow] flypaper foot gravity. 1974. First video collaboration, SPaxton & LNelson. E. Hoosick, NY.

Material for the Spine - Steve Paxton, A Movement Study. 2008. Interactive WEB_APP produced by Contredanse, Belgium. Opening cartoon; Steve on glass; Watching himself on video.

Scenes from home videos: Kayaking the Clyde River, 2017. Video by Cathy Weis; 
At Mad Brook Farm, E. Charleston, VT. 1981, 1985. Videos by Lisa Nelson.

Goldberg in Vermont. 1993. Steve Paxton in hayfield; and tree in woods. E. Charleston, VT. Video collaboration by Cathy Weis, SPaxton, Lisa Nelson. ©Weis/Paxton.

Goldberg Variations by J.S. Bach played by Glenn Gould improvised by Steve Paxton. 1987. Dress rehearsal at The Painted Bride in Philadelphia. Video by Cathy Weis.

“...in a non-wimpy way” / Steve Paxton on Contact Improvisation and war. 2014. Film ©Bojana Cvejic & Lennart Laberenz. On Vimeo.

Beautiful Lecture / Air. Steve Paxton. 1973. With projections of porno film and Swan Lake / and live broadcast of Nixon’s “no whitewash at the White House” speech. 14th St. Gallery, NYC. Video by Steve Christiansen.

9 Evenings: Theater and Engineering—Steve Paxton: Physical Things. October 1966; interview 1993. Film produced by Billy Kluver and Julie Martin of E.A.T., and ARTPIX. DVD©2009.

Contact Improvisation: Peripheral Vision (1975). Commentaried video by Steve Paxton & Nancy Stark Smith watching a 1973 Contact Improvisation concert in San Francisco. Video by Steve Christiansen; Fall After Newton (1987) Steve & Nancy with Collin Walcott on tabla. Camera: Jim Mayer. ©Videoda. Available through contactquarterly.com. 

PA RT (1983). Lisa Nelson & Steve Paxton. 1985. Tangente, Montreal. Music: Robert Ashley, “Private Parts (the record).” Robert Ashley, voice; “Blue” Gene Tyranny, keyboards; Kris, tablas. ©1979 Lovely Music. Video by John Westinghouse.

Some English Suites. Steve Paxton. 1993. Wow Hall in Eugene, OR. Music: J.S. Bach, English Suites, played by Glenn Gould. Cameras: unknown.

[encore] Cry Dr. Chicago (1971). Steve was a featured character in the Dr. Chicago Film Trilogy by George Manupelli. Dance on stone staircase scene. ©George Manupelli Films with Pandora’s Pictures, 2008.

PA RT (1983)
A dance by Lisa Nelson and Steve Paxton.
Danspace, NYC.
Music: Robert Ashley. "Private Parts (the record)." Robert Ashley, voice; “Blue” Gene Tyranny, keyboards; Kris, tablas. ©1979 Lovely Music.
Video: Penny Ward

[The improvisational score for this dance, which Nelson and Paxton performed from 1978 to 2002, is the dance that arises within the setting/environment of the sound, the space, and the costumes. The structure is solo, duet, solo, duet. The movement and interaction of the performers is completely open.]

Steve Paxton, in his own words, “researched the fiction of cultured dance and the ‘truth’ of improvisation.” He was one of the founders of the Judson Dance Theater of the 1960s, the Grand Union of the 1970s, and Touchdown Dance (for the visually impaired, UK) in the ’80s. In 1972, he instigated Contact Improvisation which continues today as an international network of dancers who convene to practice (www.contactquarterly.com). In 1986, he began work on Material for the Spine, a technical approach to the body. His two publications: Material for the Spine-a movement study (2008 WEB-APP) and Gravity (2018, in EN/FR) were produced by Contredanse (Brussels). A film of his solo, The Goldberg Variations played by Glenn Gould improvised by Steve Paxton, was produced by Walter Verdin and KAAI Theater, Belgium, in 1992. He maintained a long-term collaboration with Lisa Nelson in PA RT (1979-2002) and Night Stand (2004-2013). His later choreography, for Quicksand, an opera by Robert Ashley, premiered in N.Y.C. in 2016. Born in Arizona in 1939, he moved to NYC in 1958, and then to a farm in Vermont in 1970, where he lays buried.

Lisa Nelson: choreographer, improvisational performer, collaborator, learner, editor-publisher of Contact Quarterly. Her practice of Tuning Scores is an approach to composition, real-time editing, and communication that is a danceway to collectively reimagine the illusions of our wobbly world. She lives on a farm in Vermont she shared with longtime creative partner, Steve Paxton. Reflections through interviews can be accessed through sarma.be’s oralsite and “Conversations in Vermont.”

Cathy Weis arrived in New York in 1984 and immersed herself in New York’s avant-garde dance community by videotaping the concerts of most downtown choreographers working in that decade. In 1993, Weis presented her first New York season with String of Lies, a meld of dance and video; she continues with these productions, redefining the boundaries of “live” performance. In 2014, Weis opened a performance space at 537 Broadway. Eleven years later Sundays on Broadway has grown into a valued performance venue for downtown artists.