Archive: Performances and Events

Off-Leash Area presents Minotaur, in which we behead the patriarchy and delve into the world of the violent and labyrinth-bound creature, half-bull half-man, with dance, mask performance, live music, and live animated projection.

With Minotaur, OLA Co-Artistic Director and Choreographer Jennifer Ilse leads a gender diverse, multi-generational, and fiery cast to take audiences on a thoroughly interdisciplinary and utterly imaginative journey exploring the possibilities laid bare by the metaphorical beheading of the patriarchy. With this production, the artists ask: Once the patriarchy is laid asunder, and after knowing nothing other than a labyrinthine system of oppression, how do we know when we are free of a hierarchical system’s seductive power?

Dancers Nieya Amezquita, Gabby Garcia, Jennifer Ilse, Jesse Schmitz-Boyd, and Joseph Wurm will perform Minotaur with contemporary dance and mask performance. Accompanying the performers and immersing the entire audience will be a live music and sound score by Dameun Strange, and a live animated projection design by OLA Co-Artistic Director Paul Herwig. All together, Off-Leash Area will take the audience to an otherworldly space where ancient myth, dreams of a future, and our urgent present collide.

Thursday-Sunday, July 14-17, 2022
All performances 7:30pm

Tickets: Admission is $10-30, sliding scale.

COVID-19 Precautions: Masks required; N95, KN95, or other high-filtration masks encouraged. Audience will be required to show proof of vaccination or a negative Covid test within 72 hours at the door.

Acknowledgements: This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

Back for the third consecutive summer, Live @ The Shed, produced by Hatch Dance and HoneyWorks, returns to the Lab Taproom, July 30-31, 2022.

Twenty-seven of the Twin Cities most vibrant dancers come together for an outdoor dance event choreographed by members of the cast along with artistic directors Berit Ahlgren (HoneyWorks) and Helen Hatch (Hatch Dance). Through analyzing each artist’s means of finding strength in the face of adversity, and considering the necessity for all forms of coping mechanisms, Ahlgren, Hatch and the ensemble contemplate how these behaviors shape who we are and how we show up for ourselves and others in trying times. A multi-talented and multi-generational cast bring their energies and experiences together in the creation of this new work. Program begins with works-in-progress presentations from members of the cast.

Featuring Berit Ahlgren, Helen Hatch, Hannah Benditt, Jeremy Bensussan, Alexandra Bodnarchuk, Nicole Brown, Morgan Cogley, Non Edwards, Elissa Fonseca, Kaitlyn Hawkins, Elena Hollenhorst, Alejandra Iannone, Gemma Isaacson, Juliana Johnson, Sarah Jordan, Kendall Kramer, Isaiah Langowski, Da’Rius Malone, Sarah McCullough, Kelli Miles, Jacob Nehrbass, Solana Temple Nelson, Sally Rousse, Tessa Russ, Hettie Stern, Darrius Strong, and Yuki Tokuda.

The Kalpulli KetzalCoatlicue (“Precious Mother Earth”) is a Kalpulli (“learning community”) of Indigenous people who perform traditional Aztec and Indigenous dances from Mexico. KetzalCoatlicue pursues this spiritual, mental, and physical vocation with music from the sacred drum, conch shells, seeds, and other instruments. KetzalCoatlicue’s cultural learning center is located in South Minneapolis.

The dancers are rooted in cultural understandings of the environment weaving together the Nahuatl cosmovision and creation stories of Mexican ancestors. These presentations by Kalpulli KetzalCoatlicue provide a basic understanding of the Nahuatl/Aztec representations of life through dance.

A cornerstone of the Twin Cities performance landscape, the long-running New Works 4 Weeks Festival returns to live formats for the first edition in Red Eye’s new performance space in the Seward neighborhood. This process-driven, cohort-based incubator of new works culminates in a showcase of the freshest experiments from Minnesota’s most risk-taking performing artists.

June 2-4, 7:00pm: Lelis K. Brito; Ricardo Beaird

June 9-11, 7:00pm: A.P. Looze; José A. Luis

June 16-18, 7:00pm: Kate Sutton-Johnson; Ritika Ganguly

$20-30, pay what you wish. More information and tickets at www.redeyetheater.org.

Join us for this celebratory event supporting Northrop Centennial Commissions for the creation of new dance works, elevating artists, and bringing extraordinary presentations to our stage. Featuring exquisite performances by Limón Dance Company and GALLIM, your evening will also include delicious food and drinks, live music by the Bluewater Kings Band, dancing, and special guests. Plan to attend with friends—you can help ensure that artists’ creative works are seen by audiences and youth in our community for years to come.

Learn More:

Limón Dance Company’s Frances Lorraine Samson will perform José Limón’s Chaconne, a solo from 1942 set to music by Bach. The Chaconne as a dance form originated in Mexico during the Spanish occupation. Bach employed the strict musical form of the Chaconne but enriched it with powerful emotional implications. Limón has tried to capture in his dance both the formal austerity and the profound feeling of the music.

At once textural and psychological, Andrea Miller’s Island—danced by Haley Sung and Nouhoum Koita—harnesses the uncompromising virtuosity and raw vulnerability in a provocative study of the human body and its instinct to survive.

$75 general admission ticket – includes a tax-deductible donation.
$125 VIP ticket – includes a tax-deductible donation, plus VIPs have access to an exclusive backstage meet and greet Artist Reception with the artistic directors and dancers from Limón Dance Company and GALLIM. Space is limited.

Brownbody is excited to announce that tickets are now on sale for our newest production, Tracing Sacred Steps!

Performance Dates:

June 3, 7:30 pm
June 4, 2:00 pm
June 4, 7:30 pm

About Tracing Sacred Steps

Brownbody’s newest evening length work Tracing Sacred Steps blends modern dance, social justice practice, figure skating, and Ring Shout. In her essay, “Hoodoo Religion and American Dance Traditions: Rethinking the Ring Shout” Katrina Hazzard-Donald states:

“It was from the African sacred circle, that the first truly African American dance was born: the ‘Ring Shout.’ The Ring Shout was a counterclockwise, sacred circle dance that appears to have been done universally among [enslaved Africans] and later among freedmen. […] In the sacred circle, the center was a vortex of spiritual energy and power which represented a separate and sacred realm, one not of the material realities of enslavement. It represented a reality which connected one to the ancestors and reconfirmed a continuity through both time and space. Within the circle, the interaction between the individual and the community was mediated by sacred spiritual forces evidenced in spirit possession.”

Within an on-ice modern dance framework, Tracing Sacred Steps engages elements of this practice to illustrate how it continues to serve as a pathway to healing within so many Black spaces. Intent is two-fold: 1) to illustrate how this practice continues to be relevant, 2) to pay homage not only to these important cultural rituals, but also its practitioners: forcibly displaced Africans that found a way, amidst grave adversity, to work towards restoration and wholeness.

Tracing Sacred Steps features an all-Black cast of four professional skating artists and actor/vocalist Thomasina Petrus.

About Brownbody

Grounded in African diasporic perspectives, Brownbody’s mission is to build artistic experiences that disrupt biased narratives and prompt audiences to engage as active participants in the journey. Brownbody accomplishes this through a blend of modern dance, theater, social justice, and figure skating. For more information on Brownbody, visit Brownbody.org.

Come to Hopkins Dance Company’s annual Spring Recital!

Saturday, June 4
Two performances: 12:00pm and 6:00pm

Tickets available at the door or at https://buy.tututix.com/hopkinsdancecompany.

The Young Dance Performing Company, a group of passionate dancers committed to exploring themselves and their world through dance, will perform at the Walker Art Center’s Free First Saturday on June 4 at 11:00am and 1:00pm. 

Each of these performances will feature the following excerpts from RESET:

“Bird Song”
“Grace and A Tender Hand,” Choreographed by Gretchen Pick in collaboration with the dancers
“The last two years,” Choreographed by Lainey Lee
“In My Head,” Choreographed by Jensina Eccles and Esme Michaelson
“Line Square Circle,” Choreographed by Alexandra Beaumont

Young Dance Performing Company and directors will also help facilitate audience participation activities. 

For more information about all the programming on June 4, go to the Walker Free First Saturday Friend Fest Event Page. 

Due to our previous venue’s inability to uphold our Covid standards, we have moved the performance to the Tek Box Theater at the Cowles Center, which has also necessitated new dates: June 16, 17, 18 and 19. Don’t miss this captivating exploration by 6 talented artists!

Six artists share their captivating takes on the theme “Organ Recital” in the Off-Kilter Cabaret! Using dance, storytelling, theater, spoken word, puppetry, and performance, artists with disabilities explore the theme in wildly different ways, ranging from hilarious and thought-provoking to heart-breaking and profound.

Featuring the following artists:
Braille
Atlas O Phoenix
Daniel Reiva
Amy Salloway
Scott Sorensen
Young Dance

Off-Kilter is Off-Leash Area’s new cabaret performance program designed to highlight and support artists with disabilities, which makes space for and gives voice to artists with disabilities in the design and leadership of the program. Curated by the Off-Kilter Leadership Group, the inaugural year is organized around the theme “Organ Recital.” Off-Leash Area is excited to partner with Young Dance this year, whose mission is transforming lives through movement.

Performances:
June 16, 17, and 18 at 7:30pm
June 19 at 2:00pm.
Friday night performance will be followed by a Q&A with the artists.

Admission is $5-30 sliding scale, suggested donation. Tickets available at https://off-kiltercabaret.eventbrite.com

Accessibility: All performances will have audio description available. Friday, June 17 and Sunday, June 19 will be ASL-interpreted. Saturday June 18 will have live captioning. Performances are held at the fully accessible Tek Box. If you require an accommodation not listed here, please reach out to Off-Leash Area at offleash@offleasharea.org at least two weeks in advance of the show.

COVID-19 Protocols: Audience will be required to show proof of vaccination or negative Covid test within 48 hours at the door. We will provide physically distanced seating and require participants to wear masks as they are able, and otherwise follow CDC and state guidelines at the time of the performances.

Acknowledgement: This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through grants from the Minnesota State Arts Board and the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

Concerto Dance by Jolene Konkel presents Girls in the Band at the Bloomington Center for the Arts June 16-18.

Join us for our full length premiere of Girls in the Band, an original jazz dance production illuminating the history and untold stories of female musicians and composers who paved the way for women in jazz from the 1930’s to today.  Told through dance, narration, and film, Girls in the Band celebrates the “Ladies Who Swing the Band!”

Performances:
June 16 at 1:30pm – Senior Homes Matinee
June 16 at 7:30pm
June 17 at 7:30pm
June 18 at 2:30pm – Pick your price options available.
June 18 at 7:30pm

Tickets: $30 Adults, $22 Seniors/Students. Ticket also includes free admission to an all ages jazz dance masterclass on June 18 from 10:00-11:00am and the film screening of the 2012 full documentary film The Girls in the Band directed by Judy Chaikin on June 18 at 4:30pm – run time 90 min.

Box Office: blm.mn/bcatix or 952-563-8575

Visit www.concertodance/girls-in-the-band for more info.