Thomas Lehmen, Mårten Spångberg, and the Judson Imprint in Europe
Wednesday 07 November, 2012
7pm, $15
New Museum
235 Bowery
This is a two-part program featuring performances by Thomas Lehmen and Mårten Spångberg followed by a discussion addressing the distinctive imprint of Judson Dance Theater within European and American performance contexts. Panelists include DD Dorvillier and others.
Performances: Thomas Lehmen and Mårten Spångberg
In Scrapyard (Schrottplatz) (2010), Lehmen talks to objects, telling them insights about the world. He explains the cable to the tomato, the artwork to the ball, the newspaper to canned sardines, he explains himself as well as the audience to them, and, for all of them, illustrates his choreographic ideas. The work explores the possibilities and constraints of understanding, and the capacity and ambition of man to create concepts for the perceivable.
In Powered by Emotion, Swedish choreographer Mårten Spångberg reconstructs the Goldberg Variations—the fantastic dance improvisations by the American dance legend Steve Paxton—and several songs from the Buena Vista Social Club. Paxton himself views Spångberg’s piece as actually standing alone, more than simply being a reconstruction. Can one reconstruct an improvisation? This question is not as interesting as the result of Spångberg’s “translation process†itself.
Discussion: The Judson Imprint in European and American Contexts
In the second part of the evening, Lehmen and Spångberg will be joined by artists including DD Dorvillier, and will address the following question: How does the imprint of Judson Dance Theater function within the contexts of European and American performance respectively?
Thomas Lehmen is a German choreographer, dancer, performer, and teacher. Born in 1963, he studied at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. His productions “distanzlos†(1999), “mono subjects†(2001), “Schreibstück†(2002), “Stationen†(2003), “Funktionen†(2004), “It’s better to…†(2004), “Lehmen lernt†(2006) and “Schrottplatz†(2010) are touring worldwide. “Schreibstück†and “Funktionen†have accompanying publications. Lehmen has taught in universities, independent workshops, and festivals around the world. In his work and his teaching, he is interested in communications and creative relations of human beings and their constitutive factors.
Mårten Spångberg is a performance-related artist, choreographer, and theoretic living and working in Stockholm, Sweden. He has been active on stage as a performer and creator since 1994, and, since 1999, has created his own choreographies, from solos to larger scale works, which have toured internationally. He has collaborated with Xavier Le Roy, Christine De Smedt/Les Ballets C de la B, Jan Ritsema, and Krõõt Juurak, among others. With the architect Tor Lindstrand he initiated the International Festival, an interdisciplinary practice merging architecture and choreography/performance. From 1996 until 2005, Spångberg organized and curated festivals both in Sweden and internationally. He initiated the network organization INPEX in 2006. He has thorough experience in teaching both theory and practice. Since 2008, he has been Director of the MA program in Choreography at the University of Dance in Stockholm.
DD Dorvillier has been developing her work in New York since 1989. With Jennifer Monson she created the Matzoh Factory in 1991, a site for experimentation where choreographers and artists congregated for low-res shows, rehearsals, parties, and readings. She’s worked with Monson, Zeena Parkins, Jennifer Lacey, Yvonne Meier, Sarah Michelson, and Karen Finley, among many others. She has been a Movement Research Artist in Residence, curator of the MR Festival, and coeditor of the performance journal Release.
Performances: Thomas Lehmen and Mårten Spångberg
In Scrapyard (Schrottplatz) (2010), Lehmen talks to objects, telling them insights about the world. He explains the cable to the tomato, the artwork to the ball, the newspaper to canned sardines, he explains himself as well as the audience to them, and, for all of them, illustrates his choreographic ideas. The work explores the possibilities and constraints of understanding, and the capacity and ambition of man to create concepts for the perceivable.
In Powered by Emotion, Swedish choreographer Mårten Spångberg reconstructs the Goldberg Variations—the fantastic dance improvisations by the American dance legend Steve Paxton—and several songs from the Buena Vista Social Club. Paxton himself views Spångberg’s piece as actually standing alone, more than simply being a reconstruction. Can one reconstruct an improvisation? This question is not as interesting as the result of Spångberg’s “translation process†itself.
Discussion: The Judson Imprint in European and American Contexts
In the second part of the evening, Lehmen and Spångberg will be joined by artists including DD Dorvillier, and will address the following question: How does the imprint of Judson Dance Theater function within the contexts of European and American performance respectively?
Thomas Lehmen is a German choreographer, dancer, performer, and teacher. Born in 1963, he studied at the School for New Dance Development in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. His productions “distanzlos†(1999), “mono subjects†(2001), “Schreibstück†(2002), “Stationen†(2003), “Funktionen†(2004), “It’s better to…†(2004), “Lehmen lernt†(2006) and “Schrottplatz†(2010) are touring worldwide. “Schreibstück†and “Funktionen†have accompanying publications. Lehmen has taught in universities, independent workshops, and festivals around the world. In his work and his teaching, he is interested in communications and creative relations of human beings and their constitutive factors.
Mårten Spångberg is a performance-related artist, choreographer, and theoretic living and working in Stockholm, Sweden. He has been active on stage as a performer and creator since 1994, and, since 1999, has created his own choreographies, from solos to larger scale works, which have toured internationally. He has collaborated with Xavier Le Roy, Christine De Smedt/Les Ballets C de la B, Jan Ritsema, and Krõõt Juurak, among others. With the architect Tor Lindstrand he initiated the International Festival, an interdisciplinary practice merging architecture and choreography/performance. From 1996 until 2005, Spångberg organized and curated festivals both in Sweden and internationally. He initiated the network organization INPEX in 2006. He has thorough experience in teaching both theory and practice. Since 2008, he has been Director of the MA program in Choreography at the University of Dance in Stockholm.
DD Dorvillier has been developing her work in New York since 1989. With Jennifer Monson she created the Matzoh Factory in 1991, a site for experimentation where choreographers and artists congregated for low-res shows, rehearsals, parties, and readings. She’s worked with Monson, Zeena Parkins, Jennifer Lacey, Yvonne Meier, Sarah Michelson, and Karen Finley, among many others. She has been a Movement Research Artist in Residence, curator of the MR Festival, and coeditor of the performance journal Release.