JAM - Junction Arts & Media in collaboration with the artist presents:

Novel Formats #2: The Set Up
Sunday October 6, 2024 at 6:30pm 
$5-$10 suggested donation at the door

5 S. Main St. 1st Floor, White River Junction, VT 

RSVP: uvjam.org/event/novel-formats-2-the-set-up/

 

JAM - Junction Arts & Media, Sunday October 6, 2024

Novel Formats #2: The Set Up is part of a seven performance cycle initiated by dance artist Rachel Bernsen. Each prompted by the desire to rethink the understanding of and experience with improvisation as a form of performance and explore the boundaries between real time decision making and overt theatricality.

 

The Set Up, with a cast of five performers (three dancers and two musicians) engages the full, interactive ensemble while simultaneously activating continuous, shifting subsets of trios within the group. The dynamic of three is this performance’s defining structure in an ongoing exploration of triadic synthesis, harmony, and discord within the construct of the larger interdisciplinary performing ensemble.

 

Each installment in the cycle asks the question: what happens when we come together in different social configurations, each with its own possibilities for improvisation and contact? Improvisation asks us to notice what we’re doing in the moment, to question learned and internalized value systems. We think our senses are right and true but so much is learned, habitual. Novel Formats aims to interrupt these patterns through novelty, risk, and real time human connection.

 

Instigated and directed by dance artist Rachel Bernsen with performers 

Ellen Smith Ahern, Julian Barnett, Kyoko Kitamura, and Mac Waters

Presented in collaboration with JAM - Junction Arts & Media 

Dramaturgical support: Rachel Kauder Nalebuff \ Lighting design: Alex Rapf \ Development support: Sara Juli Surala Consulting

 

Rachel Bernsen is a dancer and choreographer committed to interdisciplinary practice. She makes work in collaboration with musicians, writers, performers, and visual artists and has choreographed for theater, opera and large scale experimental performance projects. She recently worked with the director Sarah Benson and playwright César Alvarez, has done multiple projects with the composer Anthony Braxton, had an ongoing collaboration with the visual artist and scholar Megan Craig, has danced in the work of choreographer Yvonne Rainer, and many others. From 2011-2020 she was one part of the movement and music collective, Masters of Ceremony. Rachel is also a movement educator and an Alexander Technique teacher. Her projects, performing, and teaching have taken her across the US, throughout Europe, Russia, Brazil, and Mexico. She lives in Vermont. rachelbernsen.com

 

Ellen Smith Ahern is a dance artist and community organizer living with her family on Abenaki land in N’Dakinna/New Hampshire. Exploring the intersection of movement, storytelling and nature, her performance projects include a wider array of people than might otherwise feel welcomed into traditional dance spaces. With generous support from many institutions, community members and collaborators, Ellen shares her work around the world, from the National Gallery of Art and Bates Dance Festival to sidewalks in Cuba and a landfill in Georgia. ellensmithahern.com 

 

Julian Barnett is a performer, choreographer, educator, and parent. As an artist, he works collaboratively across disciplines to create performances examining social-political possibilities for transformation and empathy. His work has been presented throughout the US, Canada, Mexico, China, Japan, Turkey, and extensively across Europe. Julian has been fortunate to perform with Abigail Levine, Jeanine Durning, Steve Paxton, Wally Cardona, Doug Elkins, Kota Yamazaki, amongst others, and received a New York Bessie Award Nomination for Outstanding Performance. Born in Japan, he currently works between New York and Burlington, VT, where he teaches in the Theatre and Dance Program at UVM. julianbarnett.com

 

Kyoko Kitamura is a vocal improviser, composer and multidisciplinary artist. She co-leads the quartet Geometry with cornetist Taylor Ho Bynum, guitarist Joe Morris and cellist Tomeka Reid, and the trio Siren Xypher with violist Melanie Dyer and pianist Mara Rosenbloom. For over a decade, Kitamura performed extensively with composer Anthony Braxton and created the acclaimed documentary Introduction to Syntactical Ghost Trance Music, which DownBeat Magazine calls “an invaluable resource for Braxton-philes.” A sought-after vocalist for multidisciplinary projects, Kitamura’s credits include Matthew Barney’s Secondary and Audra Wolowiec‘s (waves). Kitamura has been teaching at Bennington College since 2022. kyokokitamura.com

 

Mac Waters is a NYC-based musician—composer, performer, improviser, producer, listener—who performs in a variety of interdisciplinary contexts. Their artistic practice defies binaries and categorization—they do not believe in genre and see no use for it. The core of their current work explores the anxiety of a digital generation coming-of-age, the theater of everyday life, humor & spontaneity, performance practice itself, and transhistorical narrative. Waters has worked in a variety of mediums, some of which include composing chamber music for contemporary ensembles such as Ars Futura (Cleveland), Fonema Consort (Chicago), Wet Ink (NYC), and Mivos Quartet (NYC). They are currently pursuing an MFA in Sonic Practice at Dartmouth College. https://macwaters.studio/index.html

 

JAM – Junction Arts & Media (formerly CATV, Community Access Television) is a 501(c)3 community-building organization that enables open public dialogue, expression, and government transparency by providing access to the expanding world of media. JAM serves the towns of Hartford, Hartland and Norwich, VT and Hanover and Lebanon, NH. JAM provides a platform to all residents where they can debate local issues, showcase artistic expression and celebrate school and community happenings. JAM also delivers independent access to local political issues through the recording of government meetings. JAM's mission is to build community through the media arts. https://uvjam.org/ 

VDA Artists
WHAT
Performance
Choreography
Experimental
Improvisation
Interdisciplinary
Jazz
Modern
WHEN
-
Event Location

JAM - Junction Arts & Media
5 S. Main Street, 1st floor
White River Junction , VT 05001
United States

COST
$5-$10 suggested donation at the door
Websites