SFIAF presents Megan Nicely/Dance with Shoshana Green and Kevin Corcoran

SFIAF Presents: Megan Nicely/Dance with Shoshana Green and Kevin Corcoran (USA)

"humXn forms" (2024 World Premiere)

Sat May 11, 8:00 PM

Sun May 12, 7:00 PM

Duration: 60 mins w/out intermission

Studio 210 3435 Cesar Chavez Blvd, SF, CA, 94110

TICKETS: https://tikkl.com/sfiaf/c/festival/?section=buy-tickets&eventId=4342%2C4375

Production Details: "humXn forms"

The concert humXn forms explores the life of sensations that reside underneath human appearance. Drawing on butoh, contemporary dance, and somatic practices, ignited by sonic textures and language, the 2 works on the program mine the periphery of our perceptions, asking questions that bring findings into relationship to create the performance environment. The solo Just… follows a journey of bodily discovery and emotional expression through the rhythms of sung text, silence, and touch. The trio humXn forms (dance w/live percussion) queries somatic connectivity, human-technology interaction, and ways of transforming ourselves to be with others and adapt to continually changing conditions.

Megan Nicely/Dance is committed to choreographic experimentation through the medium of the body. Drawing on contemporary release-style dance, Japanese butoh, and somatic practices, placed in conversation with philosophies of the body and performance theory, the works create intimate, immersive environments in which unpredictable encounters arise to be questioned and shared. Under the direction of artist/scholar/educator Megan Nicely (MFA, PhD), pieces often involve collaboration with other dancers, musicians, and design elements (video, set, costume). Past projects include Breath Catalogue (2015) and Shifting Time (2019) among others; the group’s performance research has been presented on both US coasts, the UK, and Europe.

Artist Biographies:

Megan Nicely is an artist/scholar whose research involves choreographic experimentation through the medium of the body. She combines critical dance and performance studies theory and philosophy with physical practice in release-based dance, Japanese butoh, and somatics. Her book Experimental Dance and the Somatics of Language: Thinking in Micromovement was just published (Palgrave 2023) and her company Megan Nicely/Dance performs semi-regularly in the Bay Area and beyond. She teaches butoh workshops in the community, studies the Alexander Technique, and is Associate Professor of Performing Arts and Social Justice/Dance at University of San Francisco.

Shoshana Green is an experimental artist using movement and image to study process, identity and relationships. She explores quotidian, esoteric and sensorial experiences and works with the body as a sculptural moving metaphor and territory for exploring non-verbal narratives. Her work is inspired by the tradition of Japanese Ankoku Butoh. She is a teacher, curator and presenter for Butoh Programming in San Francisco and also a somatic psychotherapist.

Kevin Corcoran works with an open interest in sound as it moves through music, art, communication and place. As a percussionist he is interested in techniques that extend the sonic possibilities of the instrument, emphasizing texture, friction, sympathetic vibration, sustained tones, and found objects with a focus on freely arranging sound in duration rather than marking time by rhythm. Improvisation—as a generative method and non-hierarchical exchange of ideas—is crucial to his practice. He also works with field recordings, collecting sounds in natural and built environments, and with electronic sound through feedback systems, computer software, and cassette tapes.

Allen Willner is an award-winning lighting designer for theater, dance, opera & musical productions. Awards and nominations include: TBA Award Lighting Design: Theater of Yugen's This Lingering Life, Shotgun Players Eurydice, We Players Beowulf; Isadora Duncan Dance Award for the lighting design of inkBoat’s Line Between 2011 and Heaven’s Radio 2004; 2012 Broadway World Lighting and Set Design Nomination for Symmetry Theater’s Patience Worth; 2010 Bay Area Critics Circle Lighting Design Nomination for Shotgun Players God’s Ear; Lighting Artists in Dance Award for inkBoat’s Line Between, Erika Chong Shuch’s Sitting in a Circle and Laura Arrington & Jesse Hewitt’s Adult.

Host or Publisher San Francisco International Arts Festival