NORTE MAAR To Celebrate The Fifth Season Of COUNTERPOINTE, 4/7-9

­ Norte Maar, a committed international think-tank dedicated to the creation, promotion, and presentation of collaborations in the disciplines of the visual, literary, and the performing arts, together with Brooklyn Ballet, present CounterPointe, April 7-9, 2017 in downtown Brooklyn's The Actors Fund Arts Center. This annual curated performance series features new work by women choreographers for pointe. For this, its fifth anniversary season, 7 women choreographers have been paired with 7 female visual artists to collaborate and create both a new physical and visual work by each--investigating the process of creation, inspiration and development.

CounterPointe5 will present collaborations by series curator Julia K. Gleich (Gleich Dances) with artist Elana Herzog, konverjdans with artist Nancy Baker, Brandi Marsh with artist Emily Noelle Lambert, Lynn Parkerson (Brooklyn Ballet) with artist Cornelia Thomsen, Ursula Verduzco with artist Lizzie Scott, Margaret Wiss with artist Noël Hennelly, and Eryn Renee Young (XAOC Contemporary Ballet) with artist Leslie Kerby.

Inaugurated in 2012 CounterPointe is focused on the presentation of new works by women choreographers for the pointe shoe. The series has been celebrated for breaking new ground expanding the ballet concert vocabulary, investigating new and historic territory, encouraging discussion and creating a forum for women, young or old, emerging or established, to take artistic risks.

"CounterPointe has become the mainstay series featuring new work by women choreographers who continue to push the limits and tradition of ballet," explains Julia Gleich, Co-Founder of Norte Maar and the originator CounterPointe. "The series continues to be one of the only in New York City to feature new work by established and emerging women choreographers. The collaborative element, pairing each choreographer with an artist, brings an added inspiring layer to the series offering a fresh new look at the ballet idiom and furthering the collaborative spirit while normalizing the role of women as creative leaders."

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department for Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.

SCHEDULE

Friday, April 7 at 7:30 p.m.

Saturday, April 8 at 7:30 p.m.

Sunday, April 9 at 4:00 p.m.

Post-Performance discussion with the choreographers led by an invited guest will be held Saturday, April 8.

TICKET INFO

General admission tickets are $25, Students and seniors, $20. Tickets can be purchased at the door or online athttps://www.eventbrite.com/e/counterpointe5-tickets-31237520264.

VENUE INFORMATION

The Actors Fund Arts Center is located at 160 Schermerhorn Street in downtown Brooklyn and accessible by A, C, or G trains to Hoyt-Schermerhorn. 2, 3 to Hoyt Street. F, R to Jay St./Metrotech. 4, 5 to Borough Hall.

PERFORMANCE NOTES

Pas de Deux|Premiere

Presenting company: Brooklyn Ballet

Choreographer: Lynn Parkerson

Visual artist: Cornelia Thomsen

Music: Jean-Phillippe Rameau

Piano: Julius Abrahams

Length: 9.5 minutes

Pas de Deux is a mixed-movement duet performed by a ballerina and a gliding hip-hop dancer. The piece explores intimate connections between the two bodies and the two dance vocabularies as well as virtuosity and bravura as implied in the dance's title "Pas de Deux". Artist Cornelia Thomsen provides the scenic backdrop, projecting a mélange of stripe paintings underlining the sharp contrast between the dancers but also bind the dancers to each other through stark but vibrant formalism.

Bi-Polaris|Premiere

Presenting company: Benjamin Briones Ballet

Choreographer: Ursula Verduzco

Visual artist: Lizzie Scott

Music: Philip Glass

Costumes: UBCostumesandDancewear.com

Length: 7minutes

With fear as the driving force, Bi-Polaris d, responds to growing anxiety in uncertain times, and the effect is has on brain and behaviour. With tangible obstacles placed by Visual Artist Lizzie Scott, a new normalcy becomes like a new language- a constant visual struggle, and a palpable hope against falling prey to desperation.

Martha Edwards|Premiere

Presenting company: Gleich Dances

Choreographer: Julia K. Gleich

Visual artist: Elana Herzog

Music credit: Country Western selections

Old Western movies, remnants, and movement motifs from classic ballet death scenes merge in a collage combining feminine and masculine traits from classic characters, weaving the movement we expect to see in a ballet performance with ideas we hate to love.

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About Norte Maar

Norte Maar for Collaborative Projects in the Arts is a 501(c)3 non-profit arts organization founded in 2004 by curator Jason Andrew and choreographer Julia K. Gleich with a mission to create, promote, and present collaborations in the disciplines of the visual, literary, and the performing arts: connecting artists, choreographers, composers, writers, and other originating artists with venues and each other.

About Brooklyn Ballet

Brooklyn Ballet is a professional, not-for-profit dance company dedicated to artistic excellence, education and serving Brooklyn's diverse communities. The company was founded in February 2002 by Artistic Director Lynn Parkerson, the first of its kind in Brooklyn in more than 40 years. Brooklyn Ballet brings a contemporary vision to the treasured art form of ballet, with repertory and programs that revitalize a

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