Archives

I knew that the creative process for “bend the even,” the latest project by the improviser and choreographer Jennifer Monson, involved rehearsals on a prairie at dawn. So when the work, which opened at the Chocolate Factory on Tuesday, began in silence and dim light, I settled in for a meditative experience, a slow reveal. But the first sound came as a shock: a floor-shaking rumble that felt like the start of an earthquake.

Most of New York's dancemakers struggle to secure space to develop their work. But, for Jennifer Monson's latest piece, nature has provided...provided a place for research and exploration...provided motivation, inspiration, even, in its way, partnership.

Screamers (the film) will have a preview screening at Museum of the Moving Image on March 17, 2018 as part of the Queens World Film Festival.

Wake up before sunrise, head to the prairie and start moving. No, this was not your ordinary rehearsal process. But nothing’s ordinary when it comes to the contemporary choreographer and improviser Jennifer Monson who has been creating daring works in New York’s experimental downtown dance scene since the 1980s. Ms. Monson, 56, has long been drawn to the natural world, too. In 2000, she changed her choreographic course and began exploring the relationship between movement and the environment. For her five-year “Bird Brain” project, for instance, she and her dancers — performing outside — followed the migrational path of birds and gray whales.

Sheila tells the story of The Chocolate Factory's new building, in 28 daily installments.

Ok, so: announcement time. We just launched a kickstarter campaign, to raise money for the renovation of our new building.