The legendary German dance-theatre choreographer Pina Bausch passed away in June 2009. Often described as one of the most influential artists of the last fifty years, Bausch opened up new possibilities in performance through ground-breaking work created with her company, Tanztheater Wuppertal. Please join us for a tribute to Bausch, with an afternoon of films of her work, followed by a discussion on Bausch’s impact across the arts with special guests from the theatre and dance worlds, including dance critic Anna Kisselgoff and director/choreographer Annie-B Parson . Moderated by Royd Climenhaga, author of Pina Bausch (Routledge 2008). See below for schedule.

Pina Bausch
Photo courtesy of Tanztheater Wuppertal

Pina Bausch’s work has had a tremendous impact across the spectrum of late twentieth century performance practice. Starting from a base in Expressionist German Dance and emotive ballet traditions, she moved to incorporate theatre practices amidst dance structures, redefining possibility for the stage as she erased boundaries between disciplines. Bausch created large scale works that redefined performative presence through an often brutal exposure of human interaction, particularly in the expression of desire and the difficulty of communication between the sexes. Bausch established Tanztheater Wuppertal in 1973, creating a series of pieces throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s that reconfigured dramatic source material and began her developmental process of working through collage techniques to explore the connection between bodily expression and imagistic staging. The work of this period established Bausch’s reputation, creating the form and working with the themes she would explore for the next 30 years. In the second half of her career, Bausch adopted a strategy of working with foreign presenting organizations, creating a new piece nearly every year based on a period of residency in the chosen locale, while the company also kept older pieces in repertory and performed regularly throughout the world. In response to new energy entering the company in recent years, the pieces reapproached more traditional dance forms as Bausch continued to extend the ground from which dance and theatre can stem. Bausch appears in Frederico Fellini’s film E la nave va (And the Ship Sails On) and some selections of her work are featured in Pedro Almadovar’s Talk to Her. Bausch created her own film with her company in 1990, Die Klage Der Kaiserin (The Plaint of Empress), and was scheduled to begin work with Wim Wenders on a 3-D film documenting her work in the fall of 2009. Her work has had a profound impact on both Modern Dance and Ballet, in addition to physical theatre companies, and theatre and opera directors around the world, from Robert Wilson to Peter Brook, Arianne Mnouchkine and Anne Bogart.

Royd Climenhaga teaches at Eugene Lang College/The New School University in New York City. His essays on intersections between dance and theater have appeared in several journals and magazines and he has published a book on Pina Bausch through the Routledge Performance Practitioner series. He also develops and produces new physical performance as Co-Artistic Director of Human Company. www.humancompany.org

Anna Kisselgoff is a dance critic and cultural news reporter for the New York Times, beginning as a dance critic and cultural news reporter in 1968, and becoming Chief Dance Critic in 1977, a role she held until 2005. She has taught at Yale University and Barnard College and was awarded the prestigious Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog by Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, the Chevalier of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French Government, and the Order of the Falcon by the President of Iceland.

Annie-B Parson founded Big Dance Theater with Paul Lazar and Molly Hickock in 1991. She has choreographed and created 15 pieces for the company, including dance works, adaptations of plays and stories, and original works that combine disparate source materials, with both national and international tours of several pieces. She was honored with a 2007 Guggenheim Fellowship, and OBIE award in 2000 and a BESSIE award in 2002 for her body of work with the company, has taught in the Masters Directing Program at Julliard, and since 1993 has been an instructor of choreography at NYU’s Experimental Theater Wing.

10:00 am. Start of Screenings

10:00 a.m. Rite of Spring
(Pina Bausch Chor., 1979) Inter Nationes, 1983. (40 minutes)

11:00 a.m. The Search for Dance: Pina Bausch’s Theatre with a Difference

(documentary film) Inter Nationes, 1994. (30 minutes)

11:45 a.m. Pina Bausch: One Day Pina Asked . . .
(documentary film, dir. Chantal Ackerman) – Bravo International Films, 1984. (40 minutes)

1:30 p.m. Cafe Mueller
(Pina Bausch Chor., 1979) – Inter Nationes, 1986. (46 minutes)

2:30 p.m. Kontakthof with Men and Women over 65

(Pina Bausch Chor., 2000) – L’Arche Editeur, 2007 (149 minutes)

6:30 p.m. Evening event

Introduction ……………………………ROYD CLIMENHAGA

Discussion with ANNA KISSELGOFF (The New York Times) and ANNIE-B PARSON (Big Dance Theatre). Moderated by ROYD CLIMENHAGA (Eugene Lang College/The New School University)

Q & A with the audience

Reception

Monday, Dec 14, 2009
Martin E. Segal Theatre. Free!