EMBARGOED UNTIL:
May 19, 2015
CONTACT: Jill Chukerman 773-392-1409/jchuk@rcn.com
DANCE CENTER ANNOUNCES 2015–16 SEASON
Stephen Petronio, Michael Sakamoto-Rennie Harris Duet, Urban Bush Women,
Joe Goode, Camille A. Brown and More During 42nd Season
CHICAGO—The Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago announces its 42nd season of presenting diverse
international, national and regional contemporary dance. All performances take place at The Dance Center, 1306
S. Michigan Ave., Chicago. Subscriptions and single tickets go on sale July 7 at The Dance Center, 312-3698330 and online at colum.edu/dancecenterpresents.
Showcasing American artists with international reputations, the season opens in October 2015 with Stephen
Petronio Company paying homage to American postmodern masters and concludes in April 2016 with a butohhip hop duet by Michael Sakamoto and Rennie Harris. In between, performance series include Camille A. Brown
& Dancers and Urban Bush Women, both New York-based, the San Francisco Bay Area’s Joe Goode
Performance Group and Chicago’s Natya Dance Theatre and Giordano Dance Chicago.
Audience and Community Engagement
Discussions with the artists will follow most Thursday performances, and some programs will feature preperformance talks with artists and Dance Center personnel or guest lecturers. All out-of-town artists will provide
learning opportunities for Dance Center students and conduct community-based residency and educational
activities, which might include master classes, lecture/demonstrations, in-school and community-based
workshops, professional development workshops for educators and service providers and panel discussions.
Stephen Petronio Company
October 1–3
Petronio’s most recent project is BLOODLINES, “an initiative to honor an incomparable lineage of American
postmodern masters.” During the next five years, SPC will perform iconic choreography from a family tree that
straddles the 20th and 21st centuries alongside new creations by Petronio. In each case, SPC will be the first
contemporary American company to perform these works outside the original choreographers’ companies. For its
Chicago performances, SPC performs the post-New York City premiere of a program including Glacial Decoy by
Trisha Brown, with visual design by Robert Rauschenberg; Rainforest by Merce Cunningham, with music by
David Tudor and visual design by Andy Warhol; and Petronio’s Nonlocomotor with music by Clams Casino and
the Young People’s Chorus of New York City.
Natya Dance Theatre
October 22–24
Rooted in the Indian dance-theatre technique of Bharatanatyam, Natya returns to The Dance Center to celebrate
40 years of performing and creating dance art with the world premiere of Varna – Colors of White, an exploration
of universal emotions with its diverse colors of moods and sentiments that find expression through words, music,
dance and drama. Conceived by Founder and Artistic Director Hema Rajagopalan, the narratives bring together
the secular and the divine, the manifest and the unmanifest as part of the integrated whole. Eminent musicians
from India accompany principal dancer Krithika Rajagopalan and the Natya dancers. Based on ancient texts and
poems of Sage poets and set to original musical scores, Varna – Colors of White brings to life feelings of love,
desire, compassion, sorrow, greed and jealousy along with humor.
Camille A. Brown & Dancers
November 5–7
BLACK GIRL: Linguistic Play reveals the complexity of carving out a self-defined identity as a black female in
urban American culture. In a society that often portrays black women only in terms of their strength, resiliency or
trauma, this work seeks to interrogate these narratives by representing a nuanced spectrum of black womanhood
in a racially and politically charged world. With original music compositions, performed live by pianist Scott
Patterson and electric bassist Tracy Wormworth, Brown uses the rhythmic play of African-American dance
vernacular, including social dancing, double dutch, steppin’, tap, Juba, ring shout and gesture, as the black
woman’s domain to evoke childhood memories of self-discovery. From play to protest, the performers come into
their identities, from childhood innocence to girlhood awareness to maturity—all the while shaped by their
environments, the bonds of sisterhood and society at large.
Giordano Dance Chicago
February 4–6
FamilyDance February 6
Returning to The Dance Center for the first time in 37 years, Giordano Dance Chicago, which will celebrate its
53rd season, offers an intimate program filled with its trademark passion, artistry and athleticism. The program
includes the aggressive Exit4 choreographed by internationally renowned Roni Koresh and the whirlwind Shirt
Off My Back from Broadway performer Ray Mercer. The company also offers a FamilyDance performance,
featuring a free workshop for parents and children with the artists followed by a family-oriented performance.
Urban Bush Women
February 18–20
Under the direction of African-American choreographer Jawole Zollar, Urban Bush Women returns, following its
30th season performances at The Dance Center in spring 2015, with Walking with ’Trane, a suite of works based
on the life and artistic imprint of jazz pioneer John Coltrane. Grammy Award-winning pianist George Caldwell
provides live accompaniment with a reinterpretation of John Coltrane’s album A Love Supreme.
Joe Goode Performance Group
March 10–12
Joe Goode’s evening-length Hush, which dance writer Carla Escoda describes as “an electrifying new
work,” pushes the boundaries of dance theater, with narrative, drama, music and dance playing equally
strong roles. The dancers’ voices, a driving musical score and the unique presence of a Foley (sound
effects) artist create a provocative soundscape for the story of six interlocking characters in a rundown
bar troubled by their hushed secrets.
Michael Sakamoto and Rennie Harris
March 31–April 2
A dance-theater duet written, choreographed and performed by Rennie Harris and Michael Sakamoto, Flash
combines their dual approaches to manifesting a body in crisis. The work is conceived as a “conversation”
between the artists’ respective aesthetics (butoh and hip hop), cultural backgrounds (Japanese-American and
African-American) and personalities. Hip hop and butoh were born from marginalized, postwar urban
subcultures, and each embodies a philosophical approach to the creation of cultural identity through dance. Flash
is an interdisciplinary performance project combining butoh and hip-hop dance, multimedia and other theatrical
elements to address the intersection of urban and environmental crisis, social resistance and corporeal identity.
THE DANCE CENTER
The Dance Center of Columbia College Chicago is the city’s leading presenter of contemporary dance,
showcasing artists of regional, national and international significance. The Dance Center has been named
“Chicago’s Best Dance Theatre” by Chicago magazine, “Best Dance Venue” by the Chicago Reader and
Chicago’s top dance venue in 2014 by Newcity, and Time Out Chicago cited it as “…consistently offering one of
Chicago’s strongest lineups of contemporary and experimental touring dance companies.” Programs of The
Dance Center are supported, in part, by Alphawood Foundation, Dance/USA’s Engaging Dance Audiences with
funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The MacArthur Fund for Arts and Culture at Prince, The
Richard H. Driehaus Foundation, The Irving Harris Foundation and the Arts Midwest Touring Fund. Additional
funding is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Illinois Arts Council Agency and the City of
Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events. Special thanks to Friends of The Dance Center. For
information, call 312-369-8330 or visit colum.edu/dancecenterpresents
Subscriptions and single tickets go on sale July 7 at The Dance Center, 1306 S. Michigan Avenue, 312-3698330 and online at colum.edu/dancecenterpresents. All performances take place at The Dance Center. All
programming is subject to change. The theatre is accessible to people with disabilities.
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