Choreographer David Appel to Premiere CARE PACKAGE As Part Of Art In Odd Places 2024

Choreographer David Appel will premiere Care Package on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday October 18, 19, and 20 from 1:00-3:00 pm, as part of Art in Odd Places (AiOP) 2024: CARE. 

Within Care Package, passersby are invited to be accompanied by 1-2 others over the course of part of one city block along 14th Street in Manhattan. With a person's permission, the latter provide a blend of physical and verbal support (unique to each encounter) as all traverse this distance. A most immediate form of CARE (the festival focus) personified.                      

The basic concept behind Care Package is to be able to offer the experience of palpable care and support as someone moves through a portion of one designated block (Friday: between 2nd and 3rd Avenues; Saturday: between 5th and 6th Avenues; Sunday: between 8th and 9th Avenues), without any extraneous or nefarious agenda. The project's rehearsed participants will variously: lead/re-direct a person along the way, provide walking massage, create simple dancing in relation to or with an individual, act as a momentary “carrier” for a person's belongings, point out notable spots in the vicinity, etc. Each passage will intentionally be at least slightly different, and may be responsive as well to the storefronts of local businesses existing on the specific block. As to any larger ramifications/resonances… 

The intent here is to enliven someone's “journey” in unexpected ways, with the performers acting almost as “tour guides” embodying different aspects of a care-filled environment. And that this can occur within the cityscape in a completely non-threatening fashion. The participating dancers are all experienced improvisers: this will enable them to read the nature of each trajectory as it proceeds and engage each interested person accordingly. With Randy Burd, Paris Cullen, Ann Duffy, Sophia Dunn-Fox, Cecilia Fontanesi, Ava Heller, Emilee Lord, Noa Covelo Lores, and Nicole Touzien.

David Appel is a choreographer, dancer, and teacher whose work has been presented in a range of contexts throughout North America, Europe, and in Mexico since 1973. Part of the early post-Judson generation that transmitted and transformed those artists' innovations, he has since primarily followed his own path, while performing along the way with Simone Forti, Steve Paxton, City Dance Theater of Boston, as an instigator and/or part of several dance/music collaborative and improvisation groups, and with many other individual artists in various media. He has received a number of grants and awards, including three NEA Choreographers Fellowships as well as most recently a 2023 NYSCA grant (with composer John Morton), and has been invited to festivals in both the United States and abroad. (www.youtinydancer.com)

Art in Odd Places (AiOP) is an annual festival that presents visual and performance art in public spaces along 14th Street in Manhattan, NYC from Avenue C to the Hudson River each October. Active in New York City since 2005, AiOP aims to stretch the boundaries of communication in the public realm by presenting artworks in all disciplines outside the confines of traditional public space regulations. Using 14th Street as a laboratory, this project continues AiOP' s work to locate cracks in public space policies and to inspire the popular imagination for new possibilities and engagement with civic space. Art in Odd Places is fiscally sponsored by GOH Productions, and supported, in part, by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and private donors.

Art in Odd Places (AiOP) 2024: CARE is curated by Patricia Miranda and Christopher Kaczmarek. Curatorial Manager: Valentina Zamora. Producer: Robin Schatell. Founder & Director: Ed Woodham

artinoddplaces.org