skybetter and associates April 5, 2012

Brooklyn-based skybetter and associates presents deepening investigations into affect, mathematics, and memory. Tracing the development of artistic director Sydney Skybetter’s formalism, the company will perform Near Abroad (2008), The Laws of Falling Bodies (2009), Temporary Matters (2011), Little Boy (2012) and the World Premiere of For Want of Sleep, featuring a commissioned score by composer Sxip Shirey.

Near Abroad refers to the antithetic impulse to contain yet remain separate from another, exploring the physicality of partnership and loss. With its assiduous sparseness, the piece suggests that the most intimate bonds are formed not out of what is shared, but what is mutually had and then lost. The Laws of Falling Bodies reflects on photographs of jumpers captured during the chaos of 9/11. Simultaneously beautiful and disturbing, these images compel a work conceived to render gorgeous movement and abject horror simultaneously, with sequences of arrested falling punctuated by moments of impact. Temporary Matters is a meditation on parenthood and the passage of youth, employing iterative mathematics in an effort to contend with underlying themes of loss of innocence and life. The resulting work is at once haphazard and serendipitous, using the temporal nature of dance to address the chaotic nature of birth. A dense, sweeping work, Little Boy references literary source material (ranging from Borges to Murakami) and the nascent movement of vocabulary of Skybetter’s infant son to explore themes of lineage and recurrence. For Want of Sleep (World Premiere) takes its title from a poem by Philip Larkin, and uses variations on the formal structure of mirroring to examine the rhythms of insomnia and partnership.

skybetter and associates has partnered with nel shelby productions to produce an innovative multi-camera live stream of the performance on April 15. “When we live-streamed our sold-out season at Joyce SoHo in 2009, exponentially more people saw our work on the Internet than in the theater. Even given our extended run this year, we project that Internet audiences will outnumber tickets sold by as many as 5 to 1,” said Sydney Skybetter.

Every performance will be followed by a talkback with various artists, scholars, consultants and managers, including Eduardo Vilaro, artistic director of Ballet Hispanico (4/5); David Parker, artistic director of Bang Group (4/7); Bill Bragin of Lincoln Center and composer Sxip Shirey (4/14); Tim Cynova, deputy director of Fractured Atlas (4/20); and Jennifer Edwards of Edwards & Skybetter | Change Agency (4/22).

“I’ve learned through extensive work in the dance community as a marketer and technologist that post-show talk backs are square one in audience engagement. So we thought, why just have one during the run when we can have one following every show,” said Sydney Skybetter.

skybetter and associates appears as part of Joyce SoHo’s "In rep" series, in which three companies rotate performances over a three week season. skybetter and associates performs at Joyce SoHo from April 5-22, 2012, with performances on April 5, 7, 11,15 and 20 at 7:30pm; April 14 and 22 at 2pm. Joyce SoHo is located at 155 Mercer Street (between Houston and Prince), NYC. Tickets are $18 ($12 for students/seniors) and are available by phone at 212-242-0800 or Joyce.org. Tickets to Joyce SoHo performances purchased at joyce.org carry no service fees!