Locally Grown Dance: Tunneling

“Tunneling”, is about subversive transformation/transgression or directed and confined movement, a concept that can produce extensively complex and diverse critical and theoretical material for presentation. Tunnel, like, Bridge, can be understood from an abstract, mathematical, engineering perspective, as a way to use technology to link two spaces not easily traversed due to naturally occurring geographical (or political) barriers. But at the same time, tunnels or tunneling, can take on immense cultural and personal signification. When considering the many uses of tunnels, to look specifically at the example of politics, tunnels can be used as either legitimate tools of border control (such as the “Chunnel” connecting England and France), or as a way to circumvent those very same tools of political power. Tunnels, and even the suggesting of tunneling, can be used as a symbol to protest any particularly illegitimate abuses of authoritarian power, bringing to mind some of the reactions to the imaginary wall proposed between Mexico and the United States, an often metaphorical and rhetorical wall demanded by the US head-of-state. It can also be treated on a personal level, engaging with the darkness and internal depths one may go through in episodes of deep depression and the ultimate transformation into and out of that depression. Tunneling will be a deeper consideration of three dimensional object, designed by AAP alum, Matt Gagnon, morphing into different shapes in the stage space with dancers moving among and through them as well as both sculptures and dancers appearing via projected video images. Using the projection application Q Lab, anamorphic surfaces paired with anamorphic projections, once conjoined, will produce a more complex visuality than afforded by the traditional two dimensional frames parallel to that of the proscenium stage’s fourth wall. Costumes are designed by Sarah Bernstein and direction video and sound editing by Byron Suber. Additional choreography created by the performers and guest choreographers, Florian Lochner and Ayo Janeen Jackson.

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  • Byron Suber
  • March 5-7, 2020
  • Kiplinger Theatre, Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts
  • Performance & Music
  • Cornell Events, Matt Studio