I am among friends. It is evening, and the lake is dark and still. There is a red circular life buoy floating some distance from shore. Drifting on my back, cradled by the buoy, I realize my mind is in a thousand places, so I look up at the sky. At first I see only blackness. Soon enough shades of pale amber light reveal layers of shifting and billowing clouds. They force my breath to rise. Then I begin to wonder how far I have drifted. Trying to twist around to see land, I fear capsizing. I take a moment to decide not to worry, and turn back to the sky.
FEBRUARY 20, 2013
A dream
acknowledgments
I am indebted to the following dancers, each one an extraordinary test site for my choreography since 2000. The full cast for each ensemble work is listed here, so a few dancers are acknowledged more than once because they appeared in several works. These artists have had a particularly strong impact on the development of my choreography, and I would not be where I am now without their sensitivity and passion.
Whizz (2001): Raquel Aedo, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Emily Coates, Rosalynde LeBlanc, Michael Lomeka, Emanuele Phuon, Keith Sabado
Single Duet (2001): Mikhail Baryshnikov
The Match (2004): Wally Cardona, Mark Lorimer, Chrysa Parkinson, Ros Warby
“O, O” (2005 and 2006) (the New York and French adaptations): Jeanine Durning, Neil Greenberg, Miguel Gutierrez, Juliette Mapp, Vicky Schick, and, in France, Nuno Bizarro, Corinne Garcia, Emmanuelle Huynh, Jennifer Lacey, Catherine Legrand, Laurent Pichaud, Sylvain Prunenec
Mountain (2007): Gaelen Hanson, Peggy Piacenza, Amelia Reeber
Grope and Find It and Pull It Out (2008): Andrea Buckley, Rachel Krische, Jane Mason, Fiona Millward
If I Sing to You (2008): Michelle Boulé, Jeanine Durning, Catherine Legrand, Juliette Mapp, Vera Nevanlinna, Amelia Reeber
Up Until Now (2009): Alana Elmer, Mairi Greig, Syreeta Hector, David Houle, Yuichiro Inoue, Pulga Muchochoma, Simon Renaud, Kaitlin Standeven, Brodie Stevenson, Naishi Wang, Sarah Wasik, Linnea Wong
Breaking the Chord (2010): Clara Amaral, Koldo Arostegui, Esther Arribas, Fernando Belfiore, Marlene Bunge, William Collins, Marina Colomina, Nina Djekic, Florentina Holzinger, Setareh Fatehi Irani, Tomislav Feller, Adriano Jensen, Marzena Krzenimska, Lilach Livne, Andriana Lubina, Thibault Maillard, Adrius Mulokas, Magdalena Ptasznik, Alice Pons, Noha Ramadan, Olivia Reschofsky, Vincent Riebeek, Michele Rizzo, Karina Sarkissova, Agata Siniarska, Rodrigo Sobarzo, Alma Soderberg, Eva Susova, Simon Tanguy, Olga Tsvetkova, Lisa Vereertbrugghen, Marta Ziolek, Alexander Gershberg, Sara Ostertag
Lightening (2010): Joona Halonen, Satu Halttunen, Anne Hiekkaranta, Jyrki Karttunen, Jenni-Elina Lehto, Vera Nevanlinna
A Lost Opera (2011): Ella Clarke, Julie Lockett, Cindy Cumming
As Holy Sites Go (2011): Jeanine Durning, Juliette Mapp, Ros Warby
Blues (2012): Rashaun Mitchell, Omagbitse Omagbemi, Samantha Speis, Simone Sobers, April Matthis, Judith Sanchez Ruiz, Malcolm Low, Paul Hamilton, Stacy Spence, Niv Acosta, Marya Wethers, Maggie Jones, Abby Block, Meredith Fages, Kathy Wasik, Margaret Paek, Jocelyn Tobias, Laurie Berg, Emily Moore, Stephanie Miracle, Hana van der Kolk, Rebecca Davis
Richmond Hall (2012): Joanna Friesen, Neil Ellis Orts, Angeles Romero, Leslie Scates, Paul Smith, Toni Valle
As Holy Sites Go/duet (2012): Jeanine Durning and Ros Warby
Not included are the names of more than three hundred dancers/choreographers who participated in my annual Solo Performance Commissioning Project (SPCP) from 1998 through 2012. The experience of working with these individuals was way more than one person deserves. I salute them, and that book will come.
Since 2000 the consistent administration, production, and/or presentation of my work by several presenters, producers, and educators have been gifts of a lifetime:
Jennifer Tipton
Mikhail Baryshnikov
Bill Forsythe and The Forsythe Company
Michèle Steinwald
Laurie Uprichard and Judy Hussie-Taylor and Danspace Project, in New York City
Movement Research, New York City
Gill Clarke and Fiona Millward of Independent Dance, London, England, Karl Jay-Lewin, Dance North, SCT
Kirsi Monni and Raija Ojala of the Theater Academy and Zodiak in Helsinki, Finland
Festival d’Automne, Paris
Dancehouse, and Jane Refshauge, Melbourne, Australia
Christopher House and Toronto Dance Theatre, Canada
Gabriel Smeets and the School for New Dance Development, Amsterdam
L’Atelier de Paris Carolyn Carlson, Vincennes, France
P.A.R.T.S, Brussels, Belgium
Josette Pisani, Danse Objectif, Marseille, France
I am proud of and grateful for the insight, encouragement, and support I have received from Scott deLahunta. Along with the input and creativity from Amin Webber and Florian Jenett throughout the Motion Bank project, we were able to take the ball, run with it, and manage to score together. Using the Sky is also the name of my score as it appears on the Motion Bank website.
I am deeply appreciative to Laurent Pichaud, who began working with me as a dancer/choreographer and translator in 2006. He has since assisted in several of my commissioned works and other projects. We have grown into real buddies.
I thank my Vermont-based families, Barry and Lorrie Goldensohn, my brother and sister-in-law, for their early editing support, and the folks at Mad Brook Farm, where I spent three summer months finishing this manuscript and returning to my solo practice in the living room and on the porch of the main house.
Thank you, Alva Nöe, for the phrase “reorganizing ourselves,” which I use in this book.
In Austin, Texas, the Deborah Hay Dance Company board of directors stands by me in ways that I believe none of us yet realize. They are Beverly Bajema, Claudia Boles, Anna Carroll, Will Dibrell, Emily Little, Sherry Smith, and Sydney Yeager. My friend Rino Pizzi has been there in friendship, photography, website management, and help, fixing things I don’t understand. My gratitude also goes to Diana Prechter and Kent Cole, who have helped enhance the DHDC in many logistical ways.
Recent grants/awards have helped free me from the struggle for survival that once shaped the course of every day. I owe profound gratitude to the USA Artists grant in 2010, the 2011 Foundation for Contemporary Arts grant, the Robert Rauschenberg artist’s residency program 2014, and most especially the 2012 inaugural Doris Duke Artist’s Award Program.
I am indebted to Dana Frank for coming on board with little advance notice. She provided valuable input on the book’s much-needed structural changes.
And finally and without limits is my gratitude to Suzanna Tamminen, editor at Wesleyan University Press. Her constancy remains thorough.
NOTES ON THE TEXT
The essay “My Body, the Archive” was first commissioned by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, Philadelphia. © 2014 The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage. All rights reserved.
“A Lecture on the Performance of Beauty” was published in Choreographic Practices 5, no. (2014).
No Time to Fly was self-published in 2010 in Austin, Texas, and in 2013 it was republished as is by CasCo, Office for Art, Design and Theory, Utrecht, the Netherlands.
The letter to Gill Clarke was first published by Routledge