Article by Ismary Munet
Photo credit Niko
From February 20 to 23, TAO Dance Theater opened the second annual Visions + Voices Global Performance Series at the New York University Skirball Center for the Performing Arts.
TAO Dance Theater appeared and sold out at the Lincoln Center Festival in 2012, and this year Tao Ye, Chinese choreographer, reprises “4” and premiered “5” in the United States. Ye is also the artistic director and founder of TAO Dance Theater. Ye formed his company in Beijing in 2008, and his dances, standing all on their own, have taken the modern dance world by storm.
The company has also performed in festivals worldwide, such as has performed at major festivals around the world, including American Dance Festival, Singapore Arts Festival, DanceXchange/Birmingham, Europalia International Arts Festival in Brussels, M.A.D.E in Stockholm, and Spring Dance in Sydney.
The Visions + Voices Global Performance Series is a performing arts series held at the NYU annually. Skirball Center creates unique opportunities to celebrate and closely examine a singular world culture through different artistic lenses. This year’s focus is China, and highlights artists who build upon cultural tradition while still embracing modernity.
In particular, “4” and “5” continue Ye’s experimentation with the human body. In “4,” four dancers seem to pull away and come together again with what seems like a magnetic connection. It has been described by others as “hypnotic,” and moving “with the fluidity of water.” The outstanding aspect of this performance is that the dancers, with black painted faces and matching grey tunics and black bottoms, are able to achieve this flowing effect without ever coming in actual contact with one another.
The performance in “5” is much more intimate as five dancers help Ye explore the concept of touch. The dancers, all with shaved heads, light-brown baggy pants and long-sleeved shirts, maintain in contact as their bodies and form are molded and remolded on the floor, and never disconnecting; their limbs even sprouting from the mount of bodies creates an almost bizarre and creepy scene, but still captivates the audience with awe.
NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts is pleased to announce the second annual Visions + Voices Global Performance Series which will focus this spring on China, and will run till May 12, 2014, for more: http://nyuskirball.org/calendar/taodancetheater.
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