Spring 2017
JAN 27–28, 2017 — Tesseract
Following several years of development at the Curtis R. Priem Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center (EMPAC) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, artist Charles Atlas and choreographers Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener will premiere their new two-part 3D video and live dance work, Tesseract, at EMPAC on January 27 and 28 at 8PM. Buy tickets now. The work’s first part, Tesseract ▢, is a stereoscopic 3D video. A six-chapter work of science fiction, it is Atlas’s first “dance video” in over a decade. Filmed with a mobile camera rig that moves with the choreography, Tesseract ▢ traverses a series of hybrid and imagined worlds staged and filmed over a series of EMPAC production residencies. Each chapter combines a specific set, choreography, and camera motion to encompass pas de deux and ensemble pieces, choreographed and performed by former Merce Cunningham dancers Mitchell and Riener. Manipulating the 3D footage to combine live dance with animation, Atlas’s distinctive video effects reach into otherworldly dimensions beyond the stage. For the second part of the evening, Tesseract ◯ expands the view from film frame to proscenium stage. A performance for six dancers and multiple mobile cameras—the footage of which Atlas will manipulate in real-time and project back onto the stage—Tesseract ◯ superimposes the space of dance with live cinematic production, rendering a choreographic analogue to the four-dimensional cube from which the piece takes its title.
SPRING / 2017 — Rundown
- FEB 10 — Okwui Okpokwasili’s Poor People’s TV Room
- FEB 23 — A discussion with Gerard & Kelly
- MAR 03 — Iranian hand drummer Mohammad Reza Mortazavi
- MAR 30 — Andrew Schneider’s multimedia theatrical performance FIELD
- APR 18 — A performance of repertoire and new works by violin virtuoso Anne Akiko Meyers
- APR 25 — Trajal Harrell’s hybrid vogue/butoh performance, The Return of La Argentina
- The season features three installments of the Watering the Flowers film series, with evenings programmed by Isabelle Pauwels, Mariam Ghani, and Boudry/Lorenz
- A series of talks delivered by Anna Everett, Sarah Juliet Lauro, Susan Kozel, Mary Armentrout, EMPAC director Johannes Goebel, and Grimshaw Architects