Velocity Dance Center

NEXT FEST NW 2015: UTOPIA

 

“A reliable source for predicting our next breakout dance stars.”
— Seattle Magazine

“If you’re wondering what’s about to come around the corner for new dance in Seattle,
this is the place to look.”
— The Stranger

 

 

NEXT DANCE CINEMA
DEC 7 / 7PM + 8:30PM
Northwest Film Forum 1515 12th Ave
TICKETS $10 (ONE SCREENING) / $15 (BOTH SCREENINGS)

NEXT FEST NW PERFORMANCES
DEC 11-13 / 8PM
Velocity Founders Theater 1621 12th Ave
TICKETS $20 / $25 at the door / $15 Students + Seniors / $17 MVP / $50 Patron

Velocity Presents Next Fest NW 2015: UTOPIA—a week of performances, screenings and special Speakeasy Series events celebrating Northwest artists as inter/national innovators in contemporary dance and dance cinema. As Seattle continues to experience rapid urban development, this year’s Next Fest NW artists respond to the changes in our city with new work centered on the idea of Utopia. Looking to the future, artists interface with utopic themes like multiculturalism, gender diversity, and technology, while responding to the nostalgia and loss that change brings.

Next Fest NW 2015 launches with Next Dance Cinema, a single night, double screening of local and inter/national dance films. Next Dance Cinema screens work by artists exploring the potential between dance and film, and offers audiences insight into the cutting-edge possibilities.

 

 

 

NEXT FEST NW PERFORMANCES

NEXT FEST NW PERFORMANCES
DEC 11-13 / 8PM
Velocity Founders Theater 1621 12th Ave
TICKETS $20 / $25 at the door / $15 Students + Seniors / $17 MVP / $50 Patron
“A NW-raised, free-range dance festival . . .
A collection of new experiments from an intriguing cross-section of the dance scene.”
— The SunBreak

 

This year’s festival unveils new work by Seattle-based innovators Daniel Costa, Elby Brosch, Imana Gunawan with AU Collective, Juila Sloane + JuJu Kusanagi, Laura Aschoff, and Randy Ford with Fausto Rivera (Spectrum Dance Theater).

Plus, experience an installation in Steward Studio before the performances and during intermission.

★ Her // Louis Hothothot and Artémise Ploegaerts (2014, Amsterdam, The Netherlands)
“Her” questions ways through which the individual can be identified, actualized, and organized. The first part focuses on the moving body, its physiology, and life as such. The second part of the installation, the archive, reveals the biographical with Ying’s personal story.

Curated by Tonya Lockyer and a peer panel including Dylan Ward, Petra Zanki and Coleman Pester.

 

 

NEXT DANCE CINEMA 2015

NEXT DANCE CINEMA // DEC 7 / 7PM + 8:30PM
Northwest Film Forum 1515 12th Ave
TICKETS $10 (ONE SCREENING) /  $15 (BOTH SCREENINGS)

 

** Purchase your tickets to Next Dance Cinema in advance and get the Northwest Film Forum member price for the screening of Paul Taylor: Creative Domain DEC 4-6!**
Plus, attend the Paul Taylor screening on FRI DEC 4, and hear an introduction by Velocity Artistic Director Tonya Lockyer! More info >>

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Velocity’s annual Next Dance Cinema offers dance lovers and film lovers alike insight into how contemporary dance cinema continues to expand the possibilities of the screen.

ONE NIGHT ONLY two unique screenings of local and inter/national dance cinema including:

★ Opposing Forces, directed by Kyle Seago, is a new short documentary offering a behind the scenes look at the process, development, and premiere of Amy O’Neal’s 2014 evening length work, Opposing Forces.

★ Waking the Green Sound, by Portland’s Wobbly Dance, is an exquisite short film challenging notions of beauty and embodiment. Using film “allowed Wobbly to direct the audience’s attention to the wheelchair-using performers’ smaller, subtler movements that might otherwise be missed by viewers seated at the typical distance in most venues.” LEARN MORE >>

+ FILMS BY // Coleman Pester, Dylan Ward, Jacob Rosen, Kate Wallich, Alice Gosti + MORE!

 

SEE THE NEXT DANCE CINEMA 2015 LINE-UP >>

 

Curated by Tonya Lockyer, Jay Kuehner, Corrie Befort, with support from Dayna Hanson and KT Neihoff.
Velocity’s Next Dance Cinema is presented in partnership with Northwest Film Forum.

 

 

SPECIAL EVENTS

SPEAKEASY SERIES: COLLECTIVES, CO-OPS, COLLABORATIONS
DEC 6 / 6:30PM
Velocity Dance Center 1621 12th Ave
FREE + open to all

A look at the alternative ways artists engage in collaboration and resource sharing, present and past, with Vanessa Dewolf (founder of Studio Current and PROJECT: Space Available), members of the new AU Collective + MORE. Join the FB event >>

 

 

SPECIAL SH*T GOLD: TOGETHER
The Utopian Edition
DEC 7 / 10PM
Velocity Founders Theater 1621 12th Ave
FREE + open to all

After Next Dance Cinema, join a special Next Fest NW Utopia edition of SH*T GOLD. Come show a sketch, a task, a situation, a work in-the-works with the aspiration of a utopian ideal of Togetherness. No electronic devices or use of technology. No imprints or digital recordings. A focus on the communication that happens in the room. Hosted by Petra Zanki, Campbell Thibo + Crystaline Brown. Join the FB event >>

 

SPEAKEASY SERIES: CITIZEN
DEC 13 / 5PM
Velocity Founders Theater 1621 12th Ave
FREE + open to all

Hosted by Drew Santoro + Laura Aschoff. Next Fest NW artists share their processes + responses to Utopia, and ask the question: What does it mean to be a socially engaged artist in 2015? Join the FB event >>

 

 

INSIGHTS

 

★ In his solo work The Next 100, Seattle newcomer DANIEL COSTA asks whether utopia is made manifest in our bodies, especially as we become a society that retreats from physical connection in favor of the digital. Movement and posture, something that is changing for every human—helps express our emotional condition via a physical outline. The work uses this outline to address where we are now and where we could be in the next 100 years.
 

 

★ With a sound score slipping from silence into Patsy Cline, back to silence and onto Dolly Parton, ELBY BROSCH takes us to cliffs of nostalgic sadness then swoops in with hope and shows us that utopia lies in moments that we share. This work plays with athletic technical dancing, subtle and strong emotions, and stillness and speed. Living in the constant pursuit of personal utopia, Brosch sees this solo as a gift of generosity.
 

 

 

★ Drawing from Javanese culture and storytelling, IMANA GUNAWAN reflects on her upbringing in Jakarta, Indonesia, and her return to the US where she was born. This piece is a culmination of mythology, nostalgia, memories, and home, created in collaboration with Seattle’s new AU COLLECTIVE. Proud to be people of color, women, and queer artists, the collective creates dance in celebration of community, family, and alternative artistic upbringings.

 

 

 

★ With a thirst for exploration and play, JULIA SLOANE + JUJU KUSANAGI quest for the ultimate utopic creation. Through the lens of improvisation, they attempt to capture and store utopian moments, if and when they find them. Kusanagi is an interdisciplinary artist with a multi-national upbringing–born in Syndey Australia and based between Tokyo and Seattle.
 

 

 

★ Before it Gets Worse is LAURA ASCHOFF’S evolving investigation of personal and collective grief, and how we deal with it publicly and privately. Based deeply in the search for empathy surrounding social injustices, Aschoff plays with harvested sounds, popular music, eating chicken wings and dealing with personal demons. She collaborates with celebrated Seattle choreographer Markeith Wiley, taking on a new role of lighting designer and sound engineer.

 

 

 

 

 

★ RANDY FORD reflects on “gender policing,” or the enforcement of gender norms based on an individual’s perceived sex, and questions if there is a utopia for people who are gender queer. Ford collaborates with FAUSTO RIVERA, a Chicano dance artist from the Pacific Northwest who dances with Spectrum Dance Theater and AU Collective, and hosted Next Fest NW 2014 event El Norte.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Velocity’s presentation of Next Fest NW 2015: UTOPIA + Next Dance Cinema are made possible thanks to the generous support of 4 Culture, ArtsFund, The Seattle Office of Arts & Culture, The Seattle Foundation, NEA Art Works, The Pruzan Foundation, The Glenn H Kawasaki Foundation, Pacific Continental Bank, and The Patricia and Marcus Meier Charitable Foundation.