Food for Thought curated by Alexis Convento

For the health and safety of our community, this performance has been cancelled. We will seek to reschedule suspended performances and events when reasonably possible.

This installment of Danspace Project’s Food for Thought series presents an evening of performance selected by guest curator, Alexis Convento. Admission is just $5 + 2 cans of food or $10. Canned goods are donated to the Momentum Project, which provides support to any person in need in NYC, especially those living with HIV/AIDS or other chronic illness.

Alexis Convento is a Pilipinx-American producer, project manager, and curator working between New York City and Berlin. Alexis collaborates with brands and artists alike to ideate, develop, and execute work with intention and scale. After graduating with a BFA in Dance from Fordham University, Alexis founded the CURRENT SESSIONS, an experimental dance and performance series which showed 214 emerging artists. She has since curated shows for Gibney, La MaMa Experimental Theatre, Center for Performance Research, and SPRING/BREAK Art Show.

On this evening, she has invited artists Oluwadamilare (Dare) Ayorinde, Kristel Baldoz, and Taeyoon Choi to share work.

Food for Thought: migrantes que migran la migra, curated by Martita Abril

For the health and safety of our community, this performance has been cancelled. We will seek to reschedule suspended performances and events when reasonably possible.

This installment of Danspace Project’s Food for Thought series presents an evening of performance selected by guest curator, Martita Abril. Admission is just $5 + 2 cans of food or $10. Canned goods are donated to the Momentum Project, which provides support to any person in need in NYC, especially those living with HIV/AIDS or other chronic illness.

This evening will feature work by immigrant artists from México: Arantxa Araujo, Evelyn Lilian Sanchez Narvaez, and colectivodoszeta / carlos a. cruz velázquez. The curator’s fee will be donated to  Immigrant Families Together a non-profit dedicated to reuniting and supporting immigrant families. We need a movement with a quickness, You are the witness of change, And to counteract, We gotta take the power back – Zack de la Rocha.

Gala 2020 Honoring Bebe Miller, Annie-B Parson, and Pat Steir

It is with a heavy heart that we announce that Danspace Project has officially postponed our 45th Anniversary Gala. The health and well-being of our community of supporters, honorees, artists, and staff is of the utmost importance to us all.

This year we were to honor Rebel Angels Bebe Miller, Annie-B Parson, and Pat Steir on May 5th for their transformative impact across artistic disciplines. Please stay tuned for more information about an in-person celebration honoring these amazing artists.

Danspace Project’s Rebel Angels Annual Gala is our largest single fundraising event of the year. As we envision the future it is clear that we need your support. Please help Danspace Project by giving a gift towards our fundraising goal of $100,000 by the end of our fiscal year on June 30, 2020.

*Please note that Danspace Project staff is abiding by social distancing protocols and is currently working remotely. We are unable to process gifts by check at this time and would greatly appreciate any gift made through our online donation form. Thank you for your continued generosity and support.

Questions: Peggy Cheng – peggy@danspaceproject.org or call (212) 674-3838.

JOURNAL: Cecilia Vicuña

WATCH ON OUR JOURNAL

On the opening day of PLATFORM 2020: Utterances From The Chorus, Chilean born interdisciplinary artist, author, and poet Cecilia Vicuña offered a poetic performance that called on every person in the room to participate.

She ended her offering with these words in response to the themes introduced in the opening panel discussion between the Platform curatorial team.

Curators Okwui Okpokwasili and Judy Hussie-Taylor, and the full team at Danspace Project thank Cecilia for her poetic wisdom and generous spirit.

Watch here

iele paloumpis: In place of catastrophe, a clear night sky (canceled)

For the health and safety of our community, this performance has been cancelled. We will seek to reschedule suspended performances and events when reasonably possible.

Thursday, May 21, 8pm
Friday, May 22, 8pm
Saturday, May 23, 8pm

Please note: blind and visually impaired audience members are invited to arrive early for a pre-show at 7pm. The box office for blind and visually impaired audience members will open at 6:30pm. 

iele paloumpis is a dance artist, death doula, and intuitive space-holder. Their practice integrates kinesthetic awareness and ancestral healing within a trauma-informed framework that centers social justice. What vitality allowed our ancestors to survive generations of trauma, and what wisdoms have been passed down to us? What embodied magics are all our own? In place of catastrophe, a clear night sky traverses these questions through voice and movement, exploring transgenerational resilience within a disability justice framework. 

Incorporating vocalization, audio  description, and tactile set design, iele paloumpis creates an immersive, multi-sensory  landscape that de-centers sight as a primary mode of experiencing dance, and invites audience members to inhabit nuanced forms of perception. A multi-disciplinary cast of artists moves through the work with varied relationships to disability, race, class, gender and sexuality, each embodying a unique history. 

Challenging both what is perceptible in dance, and what can be known of our own histories, the piece invites visually impaired audience members into the poetics of movement and encourages all of us to expand our understanding of what it means to be “witnessed.”

Directed by iele paloumpis, in co-creation with the cast.
Collaborators: Marielys Burgos-Meléndez, Seta Morton, Alejandra Ospina, iele paloumpis, Monica Rodriguez, Ogemdi Ude, Krishna Washburn, Adrien Weibgen, and Marýa Wethers.
Set Designers: Nora Chavooshian, Lily Gold, and Marisa Prefer
Guest Vocalists: Rachel Kara Pérez and Samita Sinha
Make-up Design: Wo Chan

Accessibility Danspace Project’s main entrance is fully wheelchair accessible via ramp. A same-level restroom is available near Danspace Project’s main performance space in the church sanctuary.

JOURNAL: Samita Sinha

WATCH ON OUR JOURNAL

On March 7th, after a morning of conversation between award-winning scholars and artists Saidiya Hartman, Simone Leigh, and Okwui Okpokwasili, the Voice & Body research fellows led the public in an afternoon of shared practice.

Artist/Composer Samita Sinha led a vocal practice using sounds derived from North Indian classical and Bengali folk music, taken apart and put back together through each of our bodies, and our collective body.

Curators Okwui Okpokwasili and Judy Hussie-Taylor, and the full team at Danspace Project thank Samita for her vibrant presence throughout the Platform, for all the work that she holds with deep care, for opening up portals and leading us through.

Watch here

Food for Thought: The Root & The Divine, curated by Oxana Chi & Dr. Layla Zami (canceled)

The International Human Rights Art Festival Comes to Danspace Project

FRIDAY, MAY 29
Oxana Chi & Ensemble Xinren, Anthony Carrera, Kalamandir Dance Company

SATURDAY, MAY 30
LAVA, Thomas Block, Oxana Chi & Ensemble Xinren

This installment of Danspace Project’s Food for Thought series presents two unique evenings of performance selected by guest curators. Admission each night is just $5 + 2 cans of food or $10. Canned goods are donated to the Momentum Project, which provides support to any person in need in NYC, especially those living with HIV/AIDS or other chronic illness.

Oxana Chi & Dr. Layla Zami curate two evenings inspired by earthly and celestial energies, dancing beings and human deities, and everyone in between! Theses evenings are presented in partnership with The International Human Rights Art Festival. Write the curators, “the performances are gripping, glamorous, grounded and godly, sometimes all at once. This Food For Thought comes from the Root of our current realities and opens Divine realms of possibilities.”

Oxana Chi is a German dancer, choreographer, curator, filmmaker, mentor, and trendsetter. Layla Zami is a French interdisciplinary artist-scholar-teacher. The internationally praised multicultural duo, based in Brooklyn since 2015, is much appreciated for their inspiring performances, uplifting curation and magnetic energies.

The International Human Rights Art Festival, founded by Thomas Block, is an ongoing series of art-activist events, festivals, workshops, and community programs at the intersection of art, advocacy, and society. IHRAF was founded on the belief that art can open hearts and minds, and heal the wounds becoming more evident in our society. ihraf.org

DraftWork: Martita Abril / Julie Mayo (canceled)

For the health and safety of our community, this performance has been cancelled. We will seek to reschedule suspended performances and events when reasonably possible.

Saturday, May 30, 3pm
DraftWork is free and open to all! No advance reservations.

Curated by Ishmael Houston-Jones, the DraftWork series hosts informal Saturday afternoon performances that offer choreographers an opportunity to show their work in various stages of development.

Performances are followed by discussion and a reception with the artists and curator.

DraftWork is presented, in part, with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.

Accessibility Danspace Project’s main entrance is fully wheelchair accessible via ramp. A same-level restroom is available near Danspace Project’s main performance space in the church sanctuary.