All World Dance: News for Lovers of Dance

LANVIN Models Dancing Beautifully & Awkwardly to Pitbull

LANVIN Fall/Winter 2011/2012 Campaign [Source: FBK1976]

This awesome little video for LANVIN's Fall/Winter 2011/2012 collection isn't new but it's new to me. I've watched it numerous times and just love the awkward yet fully committed dancing!

Bonus appearance by designer Alber Elbaz who steals the show in the closing frames.

Photography: Steven Meisel

Creative Direction: House and Holme

Music: Pitbull's I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)

Official Site: LANVIN Paris

DANCELEN(D)S Drops New Videos: Supernatural, 2011 Reel, Lulu Frost Teaser for MyHabit.com

Supernatural [Source: DANCELEN(D)S]

Looks like I timed my return to dance blogging perfectly! DANCELEN(D)S released three videos last week including:

Supernatural
Movement: Leah O'Donnell
Editor: Eleni Brousta
Producer: Jennifer Madison
Director: Ezra Peace
Track: Trentemoller's Take Me Into Your Skin

DANCELEN(D)S 2011 Reel [Source: DANCELEN(D)S]

The 2011 Reel offers a look at the range of cool stuff these people are up to. They ain't playin'!

DANCELEN(D)S has an interesting mix of artistic and commercial work though the lines are pretty blurry given the artistic nature of the commercial work.  For example, the video below is a "40 second teaser" for MyHabit.com, an Amazon luxury flash sale site that's now open to anyone with an Amazon account.

MyHabit.com/Lulu Frost Teaser

The teaser features jewelry designs by Lulu Frost.  It's directed by Erin Judd and stars Martina Heimann.  Lots more credits at YouTube.

What a great welcome back!

Official YouTube Site: DANCELEN(D)S

Related All World Dance Coverage:
DANCELEN(D)S Debuts Short Film With Valentine Norton's Project Valentine
Dance Crew

Talenthouse Competition to Design for English National Ballet's My First Sleeping Beauty

My First Ballet [Source: ENB]

English National Ballet will begin its My First Ballet series, featuring performances for kids by students from the English National Ballet School, with My First Sleeping Beauty in April 2012. ENB is offering an opportunity for visual artists to "design the visual identity" for the ballet with the possibility of providing designs for future ballets in the series.

The winner will receive $2000 and lots of exposure. Three runners up will receive $300 each and additional exposure as well.

The competition is now open and runs through August 31st. Please see the official Talenthouse site for more.

I have to say, ENB does some of the more creative initiatives for expanding their audience by reaching out beyond the traditional confines of the world of concert dance. And that goes for both the My First Ballet series as well as this competition. I'm particularly impressed to see such initiatives coming from such an established institution when many cutting edge artists seem to have confined themselves to the high art ghetto.

Official Site: English National Ballet

Related All World Dance Coverage:
English National Ballet Restages Strictly Gershwin
English National Ballet's Summer Party to Include Designer Tutu Auction
(Plus Shoes & Tiaras!)
English National Ballet Dancers Help Sufferers of Parkinson's Disease

2wice Creates Merce Cunningham Event App for iPad

Merce Cunningham Event App for iPad [Source: 2wice]

Nonprofit publishers 2wice have released a free iPad app inspired by Merce Cunninham's Events.

According to the press release, the app was created using photographs previously published by 2wice which "morph, image into image, like a dance":

"The ten Cunningham Events include seven whose images were specially choreographed for the still camera by Cunningham, plus three Events comprised of video and interviews with longtime Cunningham dancers Jonah Bokaer and Holley Farmer. The accompanying text is by dance writer and critic Nancy Dalva."

Cunningham Company Exhibits Their Range of Emotions* [Source: iTunes]

Judging from the screenshots, like the one above, the photos themselves look great and it makes me curious to see how the app works. It's too bad it's limited to the iPad. Here's more on the content:

"With the dancers in swimwear, shorts, Japanese robes, halters--and the then 82-year-old choreographer in white shirt, jeans and red sneakers, Event 1 takes place on a bright summer day on the roof of Westbeth, where the Cunningham studios have been located since the early 70's."

"Events 2, 3, 4, and 5 celebrate the enduring collaboration between Cunningham and Robert Rauschenberg, who created costumes and décor for many of Cunningham's classic dances. Event 3 offers a close look at Cunningham's witty, rarely seen 1958 'Antic Meet.' Event 4 is comprised of photographs of 'Travelogue' (1977), including a necklace of tin cans that Rauschenberg attached to the orange legs of a dancer; and Event 5, based on 'Interscape' (2000), presents photographs that invite an examination of the detail of the Rauschenberg's paintings on the deep pastel-colored costumes."

"Framed by the Cunningham studio's gloriously oversized windows, Event 6, which suggests the athletic power of dancers, is based on the 1965 'How to Pass, Kick, Fall and Run.' In Event 7, the dancers, costumed in peacock blue leotard and tights and arranged to resemble imagined creatures of nature, played hide-and-seek among the deep green foliage and sculpture at the fantastical Vizcaya estate and gardens in Miami, FL."

"Event 8 presents Jonah Bokaer on video performing a solo from 'Split Sides' and discussing the creation of the work, while Event 9 is a solo from Cunningham's 'Loosetime' performed by Holley Farmer, who also provides a revealing description of the way in which Cunningham transferred his choreographic ideas onto her body. In Event 10, Bokaer and Farmer perform the gently erotic floor duet from 'Changing Steps.'"

*Just kidding, somewhat. If you know Cunningham's work, you know what I mean!

Official Site: 2wice - Merce Cunningham iPad App

OK Go + Pilobolus: All Is Not Lost Music Video & Dance Typeface

OK Go + Pilobolus - All Is Not Lost [Source: OK Go]

I guess I didn't expect the above video from the collaboration between OK Go and Pilobolus though, given OK Go's history of inventive music videos, I should have.

The All Is Not Lost video shows, in part, a glass floor in use that also comes in handy for creating a dance-based typeface that involved additional collaboration with Google Japan.

The result is this "Chrome Experiment" or Video Dance Messenger which, though it states it "may not work properly in your current browser", doesn't really seem to give you an option to watch on any browser but Google Chrome. So I'll pass. But if you don't mind downloading software you'd rather not be forced to use, go for it!

Related All World Dance Coverage:
Pilobolus at The Joyce: Robots, Butoh, OK Go

Reebok Classics Commercial: Reethym of Lite Dance Crew ft. Swizz Beatz

Reebok Classics Presents: Reethym of Lite ft. Swizz Beatz [Source: Reebok]

I'm not truly feeling this Swizz Beatz track International Party but I appreciate seeing all these dancers getting work in a commercial for Reebok Classics Lite line of sneakers!

Step To This: Reethym of Lite Dance Crew [Source: Reebok]

The above video features interviews with the choreographer, Hi-Hat, and the dancers:

"'Collaboration is key,' is Hi-Hat's motto. Showing off their footwork in the lightest Reebok Classic collection ever are dancers Haspop, Lil' Buck, Destini Rogers, B-boy LL Flex, Kelli Divincen, Daniel Graham, Duncan Tran and B-boy Lil' Bob."

State of the Art: Reethym of Lite's Design [Source: Reebok]

This is a cool minidoc on the stage set for the commercial:

"Rob Bono [is] the production designer and creative savant behind Reebok's Reethym of Lite campaign...turning Swiss and video director Chris Robinson's ideas into pulsating, mind-blowing reality. With the help of laser technician Eliav Kadosh, their dream matrix of light and shows materializes before your eyes."

Official Site: Reebok Classics

The Dancer Films Based on Jules Feiffer's Cartoons

The Dancer Films Preview [Source: artsBrookfield]

I finally found this preview video of a series of short films based on Jules Feiffer's dancer cartoons via Della Hasselle's article at DNAinfo.com:

"'The Dancer Films' is a collection of very short films based on Jules Feiffer's beloved cartoon character, the modern Dancer. Director Judy Dennis brilliantly translates six of Feiffer's memorable cartoons - A Dance to Spring, A Dance to Art, A Dance to Summer, A Dance to the Loss of Innocence, A Dance to the New Year, and A Dance to the End of Summer - from the page to the soundstage, alchemizing drawing into dance for film."

"Brought to life by Merce Cunningham Dance Company dancer Andrea Weber...Produced by Ellen and Judy Dennis. Choreography by Susan Marshall and by Larry Keigwin, and original music by Jane Ira Bloom."

They managed to keep it hidden by not putting Jules Feiffer in the title on YouTube! If they had, I would have posted it a week ago and others probably would have as well and it might have quite a few more views than 40 at last count.

Keep this basic rule in mind if you want people to find your work online:
Put important keywords in the title!

For more on this fun project:

DNAinfo (plus lots of pics)
Audiences Find Their Inner Dancer at Downtown Jules Feiffer Exhibition

New York Times
Feiffer’s Dancer Returns to Leap Ever So Seriously

San Jose Obon Festival Dancers & the Women Who Dress Them in Kimonos

San Jose Betsuin Obon Festival 2011 [Source: San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin]

The San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin held its annual Obon Festival over the weekend in San Jose, California.

Sharon Noguchi talked to the dressers, women who help dancers dress in their kimonos. Apparently this event takes place at many Buddhist temples in California, perhaps at Buddhist temples all over the world, and many of the temples have dressers available because dressing in a kimono poses a unique set of challenges.

The dressers Noguchi interviewed were getting up in years and were having problems recruiting younger women to help. Perhaps they will follow a previous generation in finding a solution:

"A similar scenario played out about 20 years ago in San Jose, where the issei, the immigrant generation, had been running the dressing room. 'Every year they had been telling people, you've got to learn to dress yourself,' Iwasaki said. 'Then one year, they didn't show up. People were shocked.'"

"Tanabe, who had come to the room to be dressed, and others ran to look for help. All the older ladies said they were busy. So she and other younger women pitched in, drawing on what they had observed over the years. Iwasaki ended up taking over the dressing room from her mother-in-law, Tsuruko Iwasaki, one of the women 'on strike'. And she's overseen it ever since."

Obon Dances 2007 [Source: jkktube]

The above video of the 2007 festival gives one a good sense of the dancing and the wide ranging mix of participants.

The video page has more information including a list of the 15 dances performed that year:

"On Sunday, the San Jose community danced Obon Odori to celebrate a Japanese festival called Obon Matsuri (odori=dance, matsuri=festival). Obon is a Japanese Buddhist festival to honor one's ancestors. The colorful clothing are mostly yukatas and happi coats (different from kimonos)."

Apparently only a small number of the women wear actual kimonos which may, in part, have to do with things like needing a dresser!

The article by Noguchi also has a nice slideshow of the dancers being dressed.

Excerpt from On The Block Restaged by Nanette Bearden Contemporary Dance Theatre

Romare Bearden - The Block [Source: Met]

The Nanette Bearden Contemporary Dance Theatre was founded by Romare Bearden's wife in 1976. The company was disbanded in 1996 when Nanette Bearden passed but was revived in 2004 by her sister Sheila Rohan who soon staged a work in progress, On The Block (after Bearden), choreographed by Walter Rutledge. This choreographic work was inspired by Romare Bearden's collage, The Block, a 4 ft. by 18 ft. piece composed of six panels.

A 15 minute excerpt of On The Block was recently performed at the Oberia D. Dempsey Multi-Service Center in Harlem, NY. Walter Rutledge was scheduled to attend and he had this to say about the dance:

"It's only been performed four times in its life...Basically, it's an unknown piece. It tells five different stories, almost simultaneously. We want to bring back an interest in Bearden and an interest in story ballet, which no one does anymore because it's hard and expensive."

Sounds like a revival with full documentation is in order!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art:
Romare Bearden: Let's Walk The Block

Official Site: The Nanette Bearden Contemporary Dance Theatre

Australian Dance Theatre's Worldhood Debut Features Live Drawing by Thom Buchanan

Worldhood Dancers with Thom Buchanan [Source: Adelaide Festival Centre]

Dancers from the Australian Dance Theatre (ADT) and the Adelaide College of the Arts will dance together in Worldhood, a work choreographed by ADT Artistic Director Garry Stewart that also features visual artist Thom Buchanan drawing live during the actual performance. Worldhood debuts August 10 to 13 at Her Majesty's Theatre in Adelaide.

In an announcement from the Adelaide Festival Centre, Garry Stewart discusses his work with visual artist Thom Buchanan:

" This is the first time I've worked with a live visual artist in any of my works. What struck me immediately was the inherent connection between dance and mark making. Like drawing, dance comfortably occupies an abstracted space but can also evoke representations of the world around us."

"Thom Buchanan's images are made through a vigorous physicality and performativity that permits them to be framed within the context of dance. As part of his performance he also employs the erasure of images which mirrors the impermanence and ephemeral nature of dance."

Detour - Thom Buchanan in Action [Source: DelaideFilms]

Apparently Buchanan has also drawn live with bands and DJs in Australia. He states:

"Both dance and drawing involve movement, driven by energy and emotion. Garry and I have found we even use similar language to talk about dance and drawing. But while dancers are trained to replicate the same movement time and time again, drawing is usually done at the artist's own pace and the result is a once off experience. This is an interesting part of the collaboration for me – dynamic and subject to change, the drawing allows the audience to experience, moment by moment, the thousands of visual decisions that are distilled in the drawing."

Not only is Worldhood an interesting experiment in bringing dancers and a visual artist together onstage, it also will be a great experience for students at Adelaide College of the Arts including both dancers and technical theater personnel.

Show & Ticket Info: Worldhood

Official Sites: Australian Dance Theatre ~ Adelaide College of the Arts