2010 Kennedy Center Honors recipient and Tony Award winner Bill T. Jones and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company will return to the University of Virginia for a weeklong residency April 18-22.
Jones and his company will conduct research for a new work, tentatively titled "Story/Time," in which Jones's inventive choreography will accompany a selection of short stories drawn from his life. U.Va. is a development site of the project and Ted Coffey, a music professor in U.Va.'s College of Arts and Sciences will participate in the research conducted on Grounds. The work is inspired by avant-garde artist John Cage's "Indeterminacy," a performance work wherein Cage read 90 short stories over 90 minutes while an accompanying musical score was performed at chance intervals.
During its visit, the company also will seek to reconstruct the classic Jones work, "D-Man in the Waters," a celebration of life and the resiliency of the human spirit, which the company will perform when they return to Charlottesville in November.
Throughout the residency, Jones will share his creative process with the U.Va. and Charlottesville communities. Small groups of invited students, faculty and community members will attend company rehearsals of both "Story/Time" and "D-Man in the Waters," and a rehearsal of "Story/Time" will be available for all to view online on April 20, from 4 to 5 p.m. It will be video-streamed on the University's HooVision monitors across Grounds and online.
Janet Wong, associate artistic director of the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company, will lead a master class in modern dance technique – open to U.Va. students and community members – on April 20, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., in Memorial Gym. The event is first-come, first-served and is free to U.Va. students. There is a $7 fee for community members.
The company will also teach four classes in the Drama Department's dance program and company dancers will interact with U.Va. dance students in informal settings throughout the residency. Jones will participate in studio design reviews in the School of Architecture and the fifth- and fourth-year Distinguished Majors Program thesis reviews in the McIntire Department of Art. Jones will also participate in drama associate professor Marianne Kubick's movement class and architecture lecturer George Sampson's arts administration class.
The April visit is the second of a three-part extended residency this year. Earlier this year, Jones participated in "Design Thinking Mashup," a multi-disciplinary event at the School of Architecture. The visit provided time for Jones and his collaborators to explore the Grounds for inspiration and ideas for the new piece in development. They will return in November for another week's residency prior to the Charlottesville performance of "D-Man in the Waters."
The Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company events are sponsored by the Office of the Vice Provost for the Arts, U.Va. Arts Council and the Office of the Vice President for Research.
"Story/Time" is co-commissioned by Peak Performances at Montclair State University, Walker Art Center and Arizona State University's Gammage Auditorium. The work will be developed in residence at those locations, and at Bard College and U.Va.
Click here to view the complete residency schedule.
For information about the residency, contact Lindsey Turner at BTJatUVA@gmail.com
November 3-7, 2010
www.virginiafilmfestival.org
Created in the late 1980s, the Virginia Festival of American Film (renamed The Virginia Film Festival) was endorsed by the state’s Department of Economic Development and adopted by the University of Virginia. The intent was twofold: to stimulate economic development by encouraging film production in Virginia and increasing tourism, and to meld the creative interests and crafts of the American film industry with the intellectual resources of a nationally ranked university. In 1996, the University decided to make the Virginia Film Festival a more integral part of its academic program under the umbrella of the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences. The focus was expanded to encompass a broader range of international films. The Festival also expanded its year-round programs, including a very active Film Society that presents films and guest speakers at the downtown Vinegar Hill Theatre.
In 2009 director Jody Kielbasa assumed control of the Virginia Film Festival. His tenure has ushered in a new era of the Virginia Film Festival, with an increased focus on best serving the people of Charlottesville and the greater Central Virginia region. Today’s Virginia Film Festival aims to bring the best in national and international cinema to its audiences, and provide enriching and entertaining activities for children, families, college students, and every other segment of the community. (Taken from: http://www.virginiafilmfestival.org/about-us/our-history)
October 13, 2010
www.virginia.edu/uvatoday
www.charlottesvillearts.org
The Piedmont Council for the Arts and UVa Arts Administration presents Joan Jeffri, Director of the Graduate Program in Arts Administration at Columbia University.
"Arts Administration Research: Aging Artists"
Professor Jeffri’s Remarks will address the following topics:
Joan Jeffri is the Director of the Program in Arts Administration at Teachers College, and Director of the Research Center for Arts and Culture. She is the past president of the Association of Art Administration Educators. From 1981-1990, she served as an executive director of The Journal of Arts Management and Law. She is author of Arts Money: Raising It, Saving It, Earning It (1989); The Emerging Arts: Management, Survival and Growth (1990), and editor of Artisthelp: The Artist’s Guide to Work-Related Human and Social Services (1990); and The Actor Speaks, The Painter Speaks, and The Craftsperson Speaks (Greenwood Press, 1994, 1993, 1992), as well as numerous studies on artists, including "Information on Artists I and II" and "The Artists Training and Career Project." Her first careers were as a poet, with Louis Untermeyer as her mentor, and an actress, appearing in the national tour of The Homecoming, in the Boston Company of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds and with the Lincoln Center Repertory Company in New York City.
