"PURPLE is", an improvisation-based performance by Judith Sánchez Ruíz, with Sam Wentz
Company:
Hope Mohr Dance/The Bridge Project
HMD's 2020 Bridge Project POWER SHIFT: Improvisation, Activism, and Community presents
PURPLE is, the fourth iteration of Judith Sánchez Ruíz’s improvisational duet form in homage to the late choreographer Trisha Brown. This performance will be live streamed via Zoom and feature fellow Trisha Brown Dance Company alum, sam wentz (2009-14) The last segment of this performance will include a Q&A moderated by TBDC alumna Hope Mohr.
Sunday OCTOBER 11, 2020, 12 PM (PDT)
TICKETS: $0 - $100, sliding scale.
This performance will be live streamed. You will receive a link to access the live stream the day of the performance.
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PURPLE is, the fourth iteration of Judith Sánchez Ruíz’s improvisational duet form in homage to the late choreographer Trisha Brown, takes place over Zoom with fellow Trisha Brown Dance Company (TBDC) alum sam wentz (2009-14). Judith’s homage connects dancers and collaborators from the company’s 50+ year span. Previous renditions of this tribute have been performed with Lance Gries, Laurel Jenkins, and Jodi Melnick.
This version of “PURPLE is” will connect alumni of the company across both time and space, with Sánchez Ruíz livestreaming from Berlin and wentz from Los Angeles. The distance between the performers--5,781 miles--will produce a 10 second delay in their connection. The performers, in their respective locations, will utilize projectors to engage with life-size versions of the each other. Spanning across geographic, experiential, historical, and temporal distance, the performers will reach for intimacy in isolation.
The last segment of the performance will be a Q and A among the dancers and the audience moderated by Hope Mohr, also an alumna of TBDC. By bookending the dancing with talking, the performers acknowledge that history lives on and expands through both oral and physical language.
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ABOUT JUDITH SÁNCHEZ RUÍZ | The Berlin–based director, choreographer, teacher, improviser Judith Sánchez Ruíz (CU- GE) was based in New York since 1999 and relocated to Berlin in 2011. She’s created numerous choreographic and site specific works and improvisation projects. Former member of Sasha Waltz & Guest, Germany (2011-2014); Trisha Brown Dance Company, US, (2006-2009); Mal Pelo Company, Spain (1997-1999), and DanzAbierta Company, Cuba, (1991-1996). She has also worked with David Zambrano (1997), Jeremy Nelson & Luis Malvacias (2001-2002), DD Dorvillier (2002), and Deborah Hay (2012). Sánchez’s work has been presented in numerous international festivals and has received commissions from Danspace Project; Work & Progress at the Guggenheim Museum; the Whitney Museum; and Storm King Art Center. She has been awarded grants by Rockefeller Brothers Fund, American Music Center’s Live Music for Dance program, and Baryshnikov Arts Center, among others. She has made work and taught at: SEAD Salzburg Experimental Academic, Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris, SNDO Amsterdam, the Danish National School of Theatre and Contemporary Dance, Dance Umbrella Festival, Movement Research's Summer Melt, Berliner Festspiele, and NYU, among others.
ABOUT SAM WENTZ | sam wentz is a movement and dance artist based in Los Angeles. He graduated from Idyllwild Arts Academy in 2006, completed his BFA in Dance at NYU Tisch School of the Arts in 2009, and received his MFA in Dance and Choreography as a Teaching Fellow at Bennington College in 2016. He has performed with the Trisha Brown Company (2009 – 2014), Wally Cardona + Jennifer Lacey, Jay Carlon, Gerald Casel, Dimitri Chamblas, the Merce Cunningham Trust, Katherine Helen Fisher, Levi Gonzalez, Jmy James Kidd, Mark Morris Dance Group, Abigail Levine, Annie B. Parson, and Susan Sgorbati. In the Spring of 2019, he was one of 75 performers selected by the Merce Cunningham Trust to perform in “Night of 100 Solos: A Centennial Event”. His own work has been presented at the Bennington Museum (VT), the Geffen Contemporary at MoCA, Pieter Performance Space, REDCAT, and The Tank NYC. sam joined the CalArts School of Dance faculty in the Fall of 2018.
ABOUT POWER SHIFT | POWER SHIFT: Improvisation, Activism, and Community invites artists and activists to share the practice and performance of improvisation. Co-curated by Cherie Hill, Hope Mohr, and Karla Quintero, POWER SHIFT brings you inside the improvisational practices of Black/African American, Latinx/Latin American, Asian American, female-identifying and queer improvisers and social justice activists. The program highlights voices from African dance, jazz aesthetics, social and street dance, contemporary forms, and Capoeira.
POWER SHIFT is about more than performance. A wide array of intensives and workshops at the intersection of dance and social action offer opportunities to build and share tools for the creative process. In these spaces, we will move and imagine together. We will cultivate power and resilience in the face of shifting and uncertain landscapes.
For more information on the entire Power Shift line up visit bridgeproject.art/powershift.
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Photo (L to R): Judith Sánchez Ruíz by David Beecroft; sam wentz by Anca Brinzan.
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