My Bliss is Dance...what's yours?

Few things make me as happy as dance; it is after all, the love of my life, and has been since I discovered self expression and freedom of the soul through movement at the age of 6.

Since then I have had quite the tumultuous mental, emotional, and physical affair with it - much of this affair has been in the dark, in private corners, in secret spaces. Though I explored movement on stage in high school and during my acting years - it was funnily enough when I was an adult that I finally took on formal training in the art that makes my soul sing.

Living in New York avails one the constant access to the best dance companies in the world, as a student, and as a theater-goer. I have enjoyed this fact for the 10+ years that I have lived here, and have often felt blessed to have enjoyed watching some VERY good performances, and even more incomprehensibly lucky for having broken bread with, learned from, and worked for or alongside some incredible talent on wonderful stages in this city.

But with that said - there are few nights like tonight, for tonight I had a smile pasted across my face for two hours straight as I watched at the JOYCE Theater - the Nederlands Dans Theatre (NDT II). This was a limited engagement (they have not been to the United States in 10 years!!) with 2 extended performances - that all sold out FAST! Scores of heartbroken people were turned away from the theater box office. The staff at the JOYCE (with whom I've become quite familiar from my frequent visits to attend shows) were giddy from the excitement rarely seen in the theater. We were after all, gathering in sweet anticipation of one of the most innovative ballet companies on the planet - to see a group of dancers with incredibly diverse facility of movement, boasting as their resident choreographers one of the most celebrated and revered in the world - Jirí Kylián (who - as rumor has it, will be retiring next year) and the beloved Lightfoot/León!! Well - they DID NOT DISAPPOINT. I quite literally squealed in delight when I read the program - I could not have asked God or Fortune for more!!! All my favorite (straight dance) pieces from these choreographers that I've seen video of countless times I just saw LIVE!! OMG!!! Yes - I just said "OMG"!!! I leave you with YOUTUBE snippets of each of the pieces I saw tonight - and not another word...












In order of appearance:

Said and Done (2001) - Lightfoot León

Sleepless (2004) - Jirí Kylián

Shutters Shut (2003) - Lightfoot León
(poem written & read by Gertrude Stein about her friend Pablo Picasso)

Sad Case (1998) - Lightfoot León
(full piece shown in two parts)



For this video - Said and Done is the third clip in...

Driving Color

I had the pleasure of stumbling upon this art show in the Vanderbilt Hall at Grand Central Station. The BMW Art Car show - where for the past 34 years BMW racing cars have been used as canvases by some of our most celebrated artists. This is an installation of four of the actual cars painted by Andy Warhol, Frank Stella, Robert Rauschen, and Roy Lichtenstein within the last 34 years of this tradition.

In addition there is a photographic and film installation of work done by contemporary South African artist Robin Rhode - where he infused this now traditional practice with new perspective and creativity "where the car is the brush, not the canvas". If you're in New York - go check it out - plus it's FREE!

Check out these photos I took while I was there. Thank goodness I had my little point and shoot with me:

As the artist explains:

"This work is an expression of painting in action - my hope is to communicate the power and thrill inherent in the creation of art", the artist said in a press release. "For me, the use of an untraditional paintbrush like a high performance car is a great way to investigate the relationship between emotion, technology and industrial creativity."

I loved this work - not because I'm a car lover or art fanatic - but because of what this artist was trying to do; to explore new life, to create beauty using such an aggressive method, such a hard and unchanging machine in producing infinite fluidity. It's a metaphor for something that I'm trying to work out here - like a the way fine aged wines are used analogously to describe the intriguing complexities of mature beings.
Photo by Zack Newmark

To create is to express, to communicate, to search for, find, or to give love. It's also a way to scream, curse, condemn, hate, paralyze, shock, or sabotage even. No matter what the creator or beholder gets out of it, "art" has the ability explore the full emotional, cognitive, and spiritual landscape, and while on the journey may liberate or devastate.

This show did neither for me I'll admit.

But when you think about it - cars, and the speeds they can reach have come to symbolize boundlessness, freedom, escape from conformity reaching into new unknown stretches of the reality - like that meditative longing mantra we Westerners are familiar with... 'just me and the road...'

And so, watching the cars create those lines on a 200 x 100 ft canvas (see video below) certainly made me think about the boundlessness that creativity has to offer - even and maybe especially when produced by a car...




For more on this check out:

World Car Fans

Keep an eye out for Denis Hopper's photos documenting this work in Vanity Fair! Yes Denis Hopper the actor. He's a shooter too. :)

Wow - ignorance is a bitch eh? - JAMAICA & the LGBT crisis

This post is a response I wrote to the recent YardEdge post and Jamaica Gleaner Article on the LGBT community here in the US lobbying to boycott Red Stripe Beer as a message to the world to punish Jamaica for it's known prejudice against gays:

Wow - ignorance is a bitch eh? I suspect what is probably obvious here - that Red Stripe was a logical choice for the lobbyists because it's one of the more internationally recognizable brands to come out of Jamaica and thus would resonate immediately to anyone listening to their protest. It's just unfortunate that they didn't bother to do any research on the business they are targeting. And my goodness - its so EASY to find any number of businesses, organizations, or individuals in both the public and private sectors in Jamaica to target in this boycott!! It's sick but true to say that we Jamaicans have enjoyed a local freedom of open discrimination and abuse of our gay brothers for time immemorial!

Being a Jamaican national, I worry of course about the bad press for Jamaica on the one hand, but on the other, I can't object to the idea of this protest as we yardies are undeniably known for such reprehensible views and behavior towards the LGBT community.

It of course doesn't help that we have yet to see one of our social or political leaders take a public stand in this. But back to the other hand - there's quantifiable reason for this: in Jamaica - it's literally a risk to your physical safety to support ANYTHING to do with gay men and women!!! In fact - I find myself just a tad bit nervous even commenting here on the matter. For God's sake we're taking about a nation from where members of the LGBT community seek asylum...yes...ASYLUM here in the States due to the real danger of being openly gay in Jamaica.

Should this boycott become a big international campaign, will it change anything in Jamaica truly or will it simply make it more dangerous for gay men and women due to some violent backlash; like the child being beaten for the exposed bad behavior of the parent?!?! I think the only thing that could make this boycott somewhat useful on the human/equal rights stage is for a responsible leader in our country to recognize the existing distaste that other nations hold for us regarding this issue, and thus taking the social and political risk to stand with the international community in an attempt to start creating (and I hate to use this word but we'd have to start somewhere!) TOLERANCE.

'Carpe Diem'...even in the rain...

From Chess in the Rain

The other night I was lucky enough to see what I thought was the best example of "living in the now". I had just finished dance classes and was walking across the Union Square piazza in the pouring rain towards one of the train entrances. After bidding adieu to two friends as they descended into the MTA tunnels, I continued on my wet journey. Very shortly thereafter I stumbled upon two chess players seated on crate boxes barely sheltering themselves and their chess board with one black and one bright yellow umbrella! It was startling and unreal and wonderfully amusing. They were rapt in their game and barely noticed the second and third glances they got from passersby.

As I strolled slowly past them I almost gave myself whiplash unable to resist repeatedly looking back at them and at another passerby in particular who was having the same trouble. Note though that they didn't attract a crowd or even a small gathering as spectacles are apt to do in city squares - I think because it was raining buckets. But the irony is, if it were dry outside they wouldn't have attracted any attention at all!

I have always been nerve-wracked about shooting public scenes - I guess a true photojournalist I am yet to be. :) Anyway, on this singular occasion how could I resist?!?!?! Manifest before me was the odd reality that bore resemblance to a surreal dramatic scene in a Kubric film! In recognition of this I muttered sotto voce to myself "fuck it", pivoted on my heel and approached the men, and asked them if I could take a shot. They didn't look up, but instead nodded "yes" in unfettered compliance.

As I began snapping away, that other similarly seduced passerby had apparently also decided to follow the 'now' example and came over to join me. Together we circled the men, he holding the umbrella steadily in the wind, as I did my best to capture a clear flash-free shot in the pouring rain, at night, with my little old point & shoot camera. I promised my spontaneous companion that I would email copies of this most unforgettable moment to him.

I'm glad to have these pictures (blurry as they may be)** of the 'chess game in the rain', to remind me of an age old philosophy recycled a thousand ways these days because we keep forgetting:

CAPE DIEM!!



**I took advantage of the blur by playing around with saturation and hue levels in photoshop to make certain colors pop out more. I reduced the noise as much as possible in some shots, did some slight sharpening, and added a crosshatch filter (varying strengths and stroke lengths in the images) to create a painterly effect.