Park Avenue Armory Announces First Full Season of Artistic Programming

Park Avenue Armory announced its first full season of cultural programming, comprising productions of visual art, dance, theater and music that are conceived and performed "outside the box" of conventional theaters and museums. Dedicated to presenting works that cannot be realized in traditional institutions, Park Avenue Armory's season will include monumental, immersive installations by visual artists Peter Greenaway and Ryoji Ikeda; Tune-In, a contemporary music festival featuring new music ensembles curated by and including eighth blackbird, the New York premier of Inuksuit by John Luther Adams and a new site-specific commission by Sympho; a six-week residency by the Royal Shakespeare Company in a full-scale Shakespearean theater built inside the Drill Hall; and free-form performances by Shen Wei Dance Arts, Streb, and the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. With its soaring 55,000-square-foot Wade Thompson Drill Hall and array of dramatic period rooms, the Armory's unique spaces enable artists to create-and the public to experience- unconventional work in all genres that could not be realized elsewhere in New York City.

"Since the day we first saw the Armory's industrial-scaled drill hall and dramatic period rooms, our driving vision has been to provide a home in New York City where artists of all disciplines can create without the restrictions of proscenium theaters and white wall galleries," stated Rebecca Robertson, President and Executive Producer of Park Avenue Armory. "There is so much extraordinary work in site-specific installations, video art, opera, dance, music, and theater that thrives in non-traditional settings - particularly settings of scale. Until we opened our doors to the arts, there was no place in the city for such presentations.

"At Park Avenue Armory, the audience ‘enters' the work and becomes part of it, altering the way viewers respond and interact with the art. It is always a very special experience. In the last three years, we have enabled such epic and acclaimed productions as Zimmermann's Die Soldaten, Christian Boltanski's No Man's Land, Ernesto Neto's anthropodino, and Ariane Mnouchkine's les Ephemeres. We are now presenting our first full season of music, sound and video, theater, and dance, with each production offering an experience that dynamically connects the artist and the audience."

The 2010-2011 season is curated by Consulting Artistic Director Kristy Edmunds, former Artistic Director of the Melbourne International Arts Festival.

2010-2011 SEASON

Peter GreenAWAY, Leonardo's Last Supper: A Vision by Peter Greenaway December 2, 2010 - January 6, 2011

Visionary artist and filmmaker Peter Greenaway brings new insight into one of the world's most celebrated masterpieces in a multi-media interpretation of Leonardo Da Vinci's The Last Supper. Set within a full-scale replica of the Refectory of Santa Maria Delle Grazie, the home of the original fresco, a meticulously detailed "clone" of The Last Supper is brought to life through Greenaway's incisive manipulation of light, sound, and theatrical illusion. Visitors will be led through a series of animated audio- Visual Environments that provoke new ways of seeing this iconic work.

Leonardo's Last Supper: A Vision by Peter Greenaway is part of his ongoing series Ten Classic Paintings Revisited in which the artist creates a dialogue "between 8,000 years of art and 112 years of cinema." The Armory's presentation marks the first time that one of Greenaway's critically acclaimed artistic installations will be mounted in the United States.

An initiative supported by COSMIT in collaboration with the Ministero per i Beni e le Attivita? Culturali and the Soprintendenza per i Beni Architettonici e per il Paesaggio di Milano.
This program is supported by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency.

TUNE-IN MUSIC FESTIVAL February 16 - 20, 2011

Curated by Grammy-winning eighth blackbird, the Armory's five-day contemporary music festival brings together an array of today's leading new music groups, including: red fish blue fish, the percussion lab out of San Diego; Argento Chamber Ensemble; and Newspeak. Additionally, Sympho with conductor Paul Haas, has co-created with Paul Fowler and Bora Yoon a new work commissioned by the Armory to respond to its history and space.