Suzanne Beahrs Dance Returns to Danspace Project with RISE World Premiere This Weekend

Suzanne Beahrs Dance presents a full evening of dance this weekend, February 5-7, 2015 at 8 pm as part of Dance:ACCESS at Danspace Project, located inside St. Mark's Church, 131 East 10th Street, NYC 10003. Tickets are $20 / $15 Danspace Members and are available at danspaceproject.org.

People often refer to being true to yourself. Uplifting quotes, casual pep talks with friends, children's books, and stories of coming out, coming home, leaving home, finding God, and leaving religion often include this idea. On one level, we all know what it means to "be yourself," but why do we so often find ourselves doing it wrong? As we grow up and grow old, we learn (and relearn) how to feel at home in our own skin. This process demands that we let go of everything that we are not, and stop acting as if we can replicate our role models. We can never replicate anything, because we does not exist outside of ourselves, and that is all we will ever be.

RISE begins with letting go, as we unfurl into more open versions of ourselves. The dancers move with buoyant, airy grace and bold, weighted strides. Physical support between the dancers represents the influences of our best teachers and coaches as they push us to fulfill our specific potential. As the piece progresses, the movement becomes rhythmic and driving, a confident and even defiant proclamation of the eccentricities that we have bared. The piece itself seems to let go and reveal itself, echoing the task so many of us undertake: uncovering who we are underneath.

Dancers: Suzanne Beahrs, Sarah Hillmon, Julia Jurgilewicz, Monica Mordaunt, Jessica Nolan, Julie Seal, and Celine Syslo.

Music: Chopin, marching band drumlines, LCD Soundsystem, text by Pablo Neruda, and more.

Lighting design: Brittany Spencer

Artistic Statement - "I love suddenly finding myself alone in an elevator, with no one around to bump into or wonder what the heck I'm doing. When the elevator doors close, I may have only a few moments, but my arms swipe and curve, my spine arches and folds, and my legs swing and step. This is how I really feel. As a dancemaker, I try to share with others something that is like what I experience in my elevator moments, daring to reach beyond how we thought we should behave. In order to share this experience with the audience, first I try to tap into something based on some seed of intuition, feeling whatever my body does if I let go of any holding or resistance to try something out. Beyond this initial searching, the work of making dances demands a lot of questioning, revising and refining; I want to create dances that connect us with the intricacy of the present moment through movement that is as potent as it is vibrant." - Suzanne Beahrs

DETAILS:

Date/Time: Thursday, February 5, 2015 - 8pm

Friday, February 6, 2015 - 8pm

Saturday, February 7, 2015 - 8pm

Location: Danspace Project at St. Mark's Church, 131 East 10th Street, NYC 10003

Tickets: $20 General / $15 Danspace Members

Box Office: (866) 811-4111

Online: danspaceproject.org

Presented as part of Dance:ACCESS, a self production series administered by Danspace Project that serves independent choreographers and dance companies.

Suzanne Beahrs Dance investigates and celebrates the impermanent human experience through kinetically driven modern dance. The company aims to bring more modern dance to more people by presenting this choreography in live and recorded performance and through teaching classes and workshops to all levels of dancers.

Suzanne Beahrs dances, teaches, and choreographs in New York City. With her company, Suzanne Beahrs Dance, she has shown her work at NYC venues including Danspace Project, Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, 92nd St. Y, Judson Church, Gibney Dance Center, Dance on the Greenway (commissioned by Dance Theater Etc) and many others. In the San Francisco Bay Area, Suzanne has shown her work at the Subterranean Arthouse in Berkeley as 2010 Artist in Residence as well as at the West Wave Dance Festival (ODC Theater). Suzanne Beahrs Dance has also toured to the Paramount Center in Boston and others. Suzanne has been called a "rising name" by The New York Times. Suzanne has been on modern dance faculty at Dance New Amsterdam and Dancewave, and has taught at Mark Morris Dance Center, Gibney Dance Center, and the 92nd St. Y. She has been Education Manager at Cora Dance in Brooklyn, where she was also a 3G (Give/Get/Grow) Resident Artist and set choreography on the Cora Youth Company. In addition to in her own work, Suzanne has performed with Mare Nostrum Elements, Dana Boll, Clare Cook Dance Theater, and others (NY) and Ishika Seth and Dancers, Dance Ceres, Mo Miner, Christine Cali, and others (CA). Suzanne received her MFA in Dance from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and her BA in Geology from UC Berkeley.

For more information, visit www.suzannebeahrs.org and www.facebook.com/suzanne.beahrs.

Photo Credit: Christopher Duggan

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