Catherine Gallant/Dance to Present RETROGRADE UNIVERSE, 6/23-25

Catherine Gallant/Dance and Dances by Isadora present Retrograde Universe, a 3-night program, June 23-25 at Danspace Project/St. Mark's Church on Manhattan's Lower East Side. Retrograde Universe, which is also the title of Gallant's new world premiere, will include four pieces by Gallant and three Isadora Duncan works. Duncan works include a historical re-animation of Duncan's Beethoven No. 7, which has not been performed since 1979, Three Scriabin Etudes, danced by Kristen Foote of the Limón Company on opening night, and Valse Brillante. Gallant's Finally, The Secret and Meeting #12 will complement these works with an evening of dance that is both inspired and collaborative.

Gallant's world premiere work Retrograde Universe, is a contemporary work for an ensemble of four, that uses indeterminate structures to investigate the fragility and uncertainty of the material world. Video projection by Nadia Lesy, provides a sound and visual score of crumpling paper and images of flight to personify a world of imagined reality and a seemingly fraught future.

"Our program provides audiences great insight into how dance continues to shape and be shaped by our world," comments Catherine Gallant, choreographer and Artistic Director of Catherine Gallant/Dance. "I want this program of historic and new work to invite audiences to celebrate the works of yesterday-while considering how instrumental they are to the works of tomorrow."

The program will open with Gallant's very first work, The Secret, created in 1980 under the guidance of then teacher Anna Sokolow, a dance master of the 20th Century. The duet was created by Gallant when she was new to New York and will be accompanied by pianist Yegor Shetsov. As films or notation of Isadora's dances were not made until long after her death in 1927, Duncan's choreography has been preserved through the teaching of one generation of Duncan dancers to the next, with the interpretation of phrases and physicality. In 2011, Gallant began to explore Duncan's work to the Beethoven No. 7 (Allegretto and Presto movements), and has now re-imagined this 108-year old work for the stage. During this performance weekend, Gallant, with an ensemble of 10 dancers, have spent the last year enlivening this piece for contemporary audiences and will be restaged with both seasoned dancers and the company's next generation of Isadora dancers.

Retrograde Universe will take place Thursday, June 23 through Saturday, June 25 at 8:00 p.m. General admission seats are $20, $15 for Danspace members, seniors and students. Tickets are available online at http://www.danspaceproject.org/calendar/catherine-gallant-dance/.

Danspace Project is located inside of St. Marks Church at 131 East 10th St. and accessible by the 6, N, R, F and L trains.