Dance
New York dancers tend to get the hell out of town during the summer. If you're lucky enough to be in one of the big-ticket companies, you're likely to be booked at Jacob's Pillow to the north or the American Dance Festival to the south. But there's still plenty to do and see for city-bound dance makers and watchers, much of it outdoors and/or free.
The summer gets off to a nostalgic start on June 2 and 3 with an ambulatory event that revisits the Art on the Beach series from the 1980s. Part of the River to River Festival, three choreographers-Yoshiko Chuma, Jane Comfort and Marta Renzi-and two composers create site-specific works at five riverside sites along the Hudson, ending at sunset.
The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council's Sitelines project presents a series of free events in unknown and out-of-the-way spaces throughout downtown. Tom Pearson's Reel (July 7-16) uses its site at the rotunda of the Old U.S. Customs House to interrupt the city's daily travel grid. In an open rehearsal in May, Pearson's casual, organic movement seemed dwarfed by the marble and gilt interior of the rotunda as a portrait of Christopher Columbus looked down on the proceedings. Other promising Sitelines events include Monica Bill Barnes' Limelight (June 27-July 1), which will be danced in the fountain in Bowling Green Park, and Red Dive's Peripheral City (July 7-August 18), a walking tour full of haphazard time-arts.
Danspace Project at St. Mark's Church finishes its season with Donna Uchizono's Approaching Green June 9-12, a piece inspired by watching an Indian spiritual guide named Ammachi hug more than 5000 people. Butoh-inflected Eiko & Koma unveil their new site-specific Death Poem among the tombstones in the churchyard June 23-26.
Barbara Mahler's evening of new and repertory works, once i wrote down a poem, plays June 2-4 at Joyce Soho. Her solo performance Fragments last November pierced what seemed a very private world, acutely observed. Mahler has quietly built a body of work that gets better over time; she's at the top of her game.
One of the most frightening and biting works from last fall, Tere O'Connor's Frozen Mommy, will be reprised by Dance Theater Workshop July 13-16. O'Connor has reduced his alternately lyrical and harsh movement vocabulary to stutters and fidgets that abrade the falsity of social convention in a way not quite seen before.
WAXworks, a non-curated, multidisciplinary showcase of finished and in-progress dances and other spectacles presented by the now homeless Williamsburg Arts Nexus, comes to University Settlement June 12 and July 17.
For the dance egghead, there's a discussion of three popular body/mind approaches to dance training and performance, the Alexander Technique, Klein Technique, and Body-Mind Centering, June 15 at the Trisha Brown Studio.
Traditional concert-dance venues don't go away in the summer. The Joyce presents a full schedule; this year's highlight is the 20th-anniversary season of Jawole Willa Jo Zollar's Urban Bush Women (June 21-26).
The big free outdoor festivals stick to crowd pleasers: Celebrate Brooklyn goes with Philadanco on June 18; Central Park's Summerstage trots out Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane on July 22 and Trisha Brown on August 11; Lincoln Center's Out of Doors presents three nights (August 18-20) of Paul Taylor in Damrosch Park and the Limon Company on August 27.
Other Lincoln Center productions promise to have a bit more meat on their bones. A revival of 1996's fabulous Ocean, the last collaboration between Merce Cunningham and John Cage, fills the Rose Theater July 12-16. Played in the round, this epic modernist landmark employs 14 dancers and 112 musicians. Britain's Random Dance brings AtaXia to the State Theater July 21 and 23. Shen Wei also plays the State July 19-24.
Lincoln Center Out of Doors (August 13-September 4) offers a global abbondanza, including Souloworks/Andrea E. Woods & Dancers, Women of the Calabash, Arthur Aviles Typical Theater and KanKouran West African Dance Company, among others.
In August, the 2005 New York International Fringe Festival ushers in the foul heat of summer's end with more than 200 hybrid and ridiculous performance events (August 12-28).
River to River Festival 212-835-2789
Sitelines (Lower Manhattan Cultural Council) 212-219-9401
Reel 212-514-3888
Danspace at St. Mark's Church 212-674-8194
Joyce Soho 212-334-7477
Dance Theater Workshop 212-924-0077
WAXworks 718-599-7997
Trisha Brown Studio 212-977-5365 x29
The Joyce 212-242-0800
Celebrate Brooklyn 718-855-7882 x45
Central Park Summerstage Hotline 212-360-CPSS
Lincoln Center Performance Hotline 212-875-5766
New York International Fringe Festival 212-279-4488