Sarah Michelson's OCTOBER 2017/ Coming to The Kitchen

The Kitchen presents October2017/, a new work the institution has commissioned from Sarah Michelson, October 18-21.

Playful, demanding, rigorous and inscrutable, Sarah Michelson creates dances of intensity and beauty. The only choreographer to win the Whitney Biennial's coveted Bucksbaum Award, she is as controversial and elusive as she is acclaimed.

Performances of October2017/ take place October 18-21 at 6:30pm at The Kitchen (512 W 19th St, New York). Tickets, $25, are available at thekitchen.org.

The titling of October2017/ concretizes the time-stamped nature of the relationship between Michelson and the commissioning organization, in this case The Kitchen. October2017/ is independent from, yet in proximity to, September2017/, performed at the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College last month. In this approach, Michelson considers her daily working practice to be a continuum that hybridizes itself with each institutional context as she composes each presentation on its own terms, with its own chronological and artistic conditions. Michelson's relationship to The Kitchen, its architecture, and its artistic legacy is longstanding, having presented seven previous works at The Kitchen, beginning with Miami 3XLA in 1999 through to For James Tyson in 2015. In addition, she serves as a curatorial advisor and mentor for artists at The Kitchen, including many terms as the facilitator of Dance and Process, The Kitchen's longest-running series. October2017/ is organized by Matthew Lyons.

Sarah Michelson's work has been presented and commissioned by The Kitchen, BAM, PS 122, LMCC's River to River Festival, The Walker Art Center (Minneapolis), Crossing The Line Festival, On the Boards (Seattle), and Chapter Arts (Cardiff, Wales); and has toured to Cutting Edge Festival in Frankfurt, the Venice Biennale, SommerSzene in Salzburg, Tanz im August in Berlin, and Zürcher Theater Spektakel in Zürich, where she received the Der Foerder prize.

She has created numerous evening-length works, including The Devotion series: Devotion, which premiered at The Kitchen (2011) and toured to the Walker Art Center, ODC Theater in San Francisco, and On the Boards; Devotion Study #1, The American Dancer at the Whitney Museum of American Art (2012); Devotion Study #3-Untitled at the Museum of Modern Art, for the Some sweet day series curated by Ralph Lemon (2012); 4 forthe Whitney Museum of American Art (2014); tournamento for the Walker Art Center (2015); and For James Tyson for The Kitchen (2015).

Michelson has received two Bessies for choreography and one for visual design; a Doris Duke Artists Award, the Bucksbaum Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Award, the Alpert Award in Dance, a NYFA Fellowship; and support from Altria, Creative Capital, Jerome Foundation, NYFA BUILD, Mid-Atlantic's USAI, AMC Live Music for Dance, MAP Fund, the DNA Project, NEFA's National Dance Project, NPN, Sophie and Leonard Davis Fund, Yellow House Fund and Arts International.

The Kitchen is one of New York City's most forward-looking nonprofit spaces, showing innovative work by emerging and established artists across disciplines. Our programs range from dance, music, performance, and theater to video, film, and art, in addition to literary events, artists' talks, and lecture series. Since its inception in 1971, The Kitchen has been a powerful force in shaping the cultural landscape of this country, and has helped launch the careers of many artists who have gone on to worldwide prominence.