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Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Art Nature and Dance

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Friday Score – May 1 2020

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A FRIDAY SCORE 🌥
This week’s offering is to be with the clouds… through windows or under the open sky…solo or with another…
Swipe for original text or slightly altered below.
with love, @jeniwavelength & @gatablanco .
.
Weather Sensing: Cloud Observation
 
Pick a location and watch clouds for seven minutes.
 
While continuing to watch the clouds, freewrite for another seven minutes.
 
Read your writing out loud to yourself or another.
 
From your writing, pick two phrases that will become instructions for a dance.
 
Perform your solo for five minutes with these instructions. Video it or if with another, have them witness.
 
Move in response to what you saw in your solo, or have your witness move in response.
 
Record or share observations and experiences.
 
If with another, change roles.
Follow along each Friday on Instagram and Facebook !

Friday Score – April 24 2020

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A FRIDAY SCORE
Today we have one for slippery Time – moving between past, present, future, and the unknown…
Swipe for text or read below.
With much love, @jeniwavelength & @gatablanco
.
.
Time in Three Trajectories

Select three trajectories to follow through space:

one driven by movement or a sensation you remember;
one driven by responses to the immediate perception of a sensation;
one driven by imagined movement or sensation in the future.

Travel along these trajectories in any order.

When you intersect with another body, change your trajectory.

At some point start moving backward and forward, retracing your steps.

You can choose to be outside of the trajectories at any point.
Any space outside of the trajectories is a space of dissipation or suspension, undoing or unknowing.

View this post on Instagram

A FRIDAY SCORE Today we have one for slippery Time – moving between past, present, future, and the unknown… Swipe for text or read below. With much love, @jeniwavelength & @gatablanco . . Time in Three Trajectories Select three trajectories to follow through space: one driven by movement or a sensation you remember; one driven by responses to the immediate perception of a sensation; one driven by imagined movement or sensation in the future. Travel along these trajectories in any order. When you intersect with another body, change your trajectory. At some point start moving backward and forward, retracing your steps. You can choose to be outside of the trajectories at any point. Any space outside of the trajectories is a space of dissipation or suspension, undoing or unknowing.

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Follow along each Friday on Instagram and Facebook !

Artists Reach Out: Jennifer Monson in Infinite Body

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Thanks so much to Eva Yaa Asantewaa for inviting Jennifer Monson to participate in this incredible series, “Artists Reach Out: reflections in a time of isolation.”

Read Jennifer’s response here: https://infinitebody.blogspot.com/2020/04/artists-reach-out-jennifer-monson.html

Check out other artists’ responses as well!

Friday Score – April 17 2020

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FRIDAY SCORE
During this time we’d like to offer a score a week to do solo or share with another. Continuing with “before” …
Swipe for original text or read shortened version below.
Much love to all,
@jeniwavelength & @gatablanco

Orientation Score

Stand and close your eyes. Notice the surface beneath your feet and how your body minutely adjusts its balance. Notice where your weight is falling through your feet. Sense how gravity is pulling you gently towards the center of the earth.

Shift your awareness to the surface of your face. What kind of light do feel on your skin? What air movement do you feel? Notice your breath’s movement as air passes through the lips and nostrils and fills the lungs, then passes back from the body – warmer and a bit more moist. Watch the movement of your breath rise and fall in your torso.

Once you have fully arrived, close your eyes and turn to face North. Open your eyes – how did you determine where North was? Consider your strategies for orienting yourself in this place.

Close your eyes again and turn to face your home. This is defined in any way you would like – where you are, where you were born, where your ancestors are from. Open your eyes and notice the direction you face and the paths that have brought you to this place.

Close your eyes again. Listen to a nearby sound. Even one inside your body. Take several minutes to fully listen to this sound. Then listen to the farthest away sound that you can hear – listen fully. Imagine the space between the near and the far sounds. What is in that space? Can you measure the distance? What does that space feel like?

Open your eyes. Look at an object quite close to you. Notice as many details as possible – color, shape, texture. How long has it been there? How long will it remain? What do you know and not know about it? Then look at a very faraway object and observe the same details. Sense the space between the objects – what is there? What does it feel like?

Start to notice movement and let it begin to move you through space – responding to your own movement or simply moving towards or away from movements, sounds, objects. Fully inhabit your movement in this place.

View this post on Instagram

A FRIDAY SCORE During this time we’d like to offer a score a week to do solo or share with another. Continuing with “before” … Swipe for original text or read shortened version below. Much love to all, @jeniwavelength & @gatablanco . Orientation Score Stand and close your eyes. Notice the surface beneath your feet and how your body minutely adjusts its balance. Notice where your weight is falling through your feet. Sense how gravity is pulling you gently towards the center of the earth. Shift your awareness to the surface of your face. What kind of light do feel on your skin? What air movement do you feel? Notice your breath’s movement as air passes through the lips and nostrils and fills the lungs, then passes back from the body – warmer and a bit more moist. Watch the movement of your breath rise and fall in your torso. Once you have fully arrived, close your eyes and turn to face North. Open your eyes – how did you determine where North was? Consider your strategies for orienting yourself in this place. Close your eyes again and turn to face your home. This is defined in any way you would like – where you are, where you were born, where your ancestors are from. Open your eyes and notice the direction you face and the paths that have brought you to this place. Close your eyes again. Listen to a nearby sound. Even one inside your body. Take several minutes to fully listen to this sound. Then listen to the farthest away sound that you can hear – listen fully. Imagine the space between the near and the far sounds. What is in that space? Can you measure the distance? What does that space feel like? Open your eyes. Look at an object quite close to you. Notice as many details as possible – color, shape, texture. How long has it been there? How long will it remain? What do you know and not know about it? Then look at a very faraway object and observe the same details. Sense the space between the objects – what is there? What does it feel like? Start to notice movement and let it begin to move you through space – responding to your own movement or simply moving towards or away from movements, sounds, objects. Fully inhabit your movement in this place.

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Follow along each Friday on Instagram and Facebook !

Friday Score – April 10 2020

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A FRIDAY SCORE
During this time, we’d like to offer a score a week to do solo or share with another. We begin with “before” …

Arriving Score

Take time to consider these questions through writing [share if you would like]

A sense of place – what is one thing you know, observed, or learned about this site/place?

A sense of practice – what are some of the methods of research that you use?

A sense of time and space – how did you arrive at this place (historically, actually, metaphorically)?

 

Follow along each Friday on Instagram and Facebook !

Jun 29 – Jul 3: Jennifer returns to TicTac Art Centre

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We’re so excited to return to TicTac for another workshop and performance!

Registration: https://tictacartcentre.com/2019/11/11/systems-scores-practice-by-jennifer-monson/

SYSTEMS/SCORES PRACTICE/PROCESS
by Jennifer Monson

We will investigate how we make scores out of the systems that we live in, observe and are attracted to. In this work, a score is an open structure that creates improvisational choices for a particular context. We will create systems for movement that can be layered into performance scores. This will be our practice. How does the practice influence our approach to performance? How do we observe and shape this process? How can our practice of making scores help us to observe the possibilities in movement and choreographic systems? We will work on presence, states of moving and scales of sensation and time. We will perform our scores daily.

Dates:
Mondays till Fridays
June 29th – July 3rd

Times of this workshop:
10:00 – 13:00 and 14:30 – 17:30

Performance on Thursday July 2nd
by Jennifer Monson
Time 20:00
Duration: 20 to 60 minutes
Entrance fee is a 5€ minimum contribution.

Price of workshop:
300 Euro
Registration fee of 80 euro required (as part of the 300)

A score for the solstice

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For a full reflection on 2019, read our latest newsletter here.

16 // Leading and Following
For two people, switching between leader and follower

As the leader, take the follower by the hand and walk towards a space and/or object that compels you.

Rest together, observe the space/object. Move on when you both are ready. Switch roles and start again.

Do this several times, taking time to rest. Notice how resting changes the way you absorb the space/object.

If you are in a space with other people, create an encounter with a stranger – either to talk about the space/object or to rest with you. You may do this as a pair or on your own.

OR

Describe your interests and observations directly to the space/object itself.

To complete the score, give something to the space/object that will nurture it for a while.

En Español

16 // Llevar y Seguir:
Para dos personas, cambiando del líder y seguidor. 

Como el líder, lleve al seguidor por la mano y caminé hacia un espacio u objeto que le fascine. 

Descansen juntos, observen el espacio/objeto. Que continúen cuando ambos estén listos. Que cambien de rol y empiecen de nuevo. 

Háganlo varias veces, tomen tiempos para descansar. Fíjense en cómo los descansos cambian la forma en que absorben el espacio/objeto. 

Sí están en un espacio con otra gente, que creen un encuentro con un ser extraño- que hablen sobre el espacio u objeto o que descansen juntos. Usted puede hacer esto acompañado o solo. 

O

Describa sus intereses y observaciones directamente al espacio/objeto en sí. 

Para cumplir la partitura, dé algo al espacio/objeto que lo nutrirá por un tiempo. 

 

Press from ‘ditch’

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Thanks to all who came and supported ditch!

See below for some of the press we got for this work – The dawn is truly miraculous !

River to River dance festival — the dawn worked its miraculous transformations – Apollinaire Scherr, Financial Times

At water’s edge: Jennifer Monson / iLAND presents ‘ditch’ – Eva Yaa Asantewaa, InfiniteBody

Goings On About Town: River to River Festival – Brian Seibert, The New Yorker

6 Dance Performances to See in NYC this Weekend – Brain Schaefer, The New York Times

 

June 23-28: ‘ditch’ premieres at LMCC River to River Festival

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LMCC presents the 18th annual River To River Festival, Downtown New York City’s completely free summer arts festival, from June 18-29, 2019.

Performances and events celebrate artistic and creative diversity in all its forms throughout spaces in Lower Manhattan. This year’s festival encourages the discovery of what arises when we all slow down.

All events are free and all are welcome.

ditch explores the interactions among the forces of gentrification; the history of community activism, especially in response to Hurricane Sandy; the current pressure of development that exacerbates income inequality; as well as the ecological interactions between the life at the edge of the island in the Lower East Side. The choreography is developed from the rhythms, tones and spatial inflections of movement generated by flows of people, the traffic, weather and water along the river’s edge. ditchaccesses and creatively explores the embodied knowledge that signals both danger and safety. How do we sense impending disasters? How do we seek safe havens?

Exploring the possibilities of signaling through murky territory and dense movement, the choreography asks questions such as: What appears as a beacon? What is an orienting feature in an unstable system? The piece investigates squeezing and tightening as both a generator of movement and as choreographic strategy. The work aims to emanate an urgency and disquiet that drives the performer and viewer towards unexpected openings.

For more info and to rsvp, click here:

Performances at Melville Gallery, South Street Seaport Museum:

  • World Premiere: June 23 at sunrise, 5:30am
  • June 26, 7pm
  • June 28, 7pm

Plus! an iLANDing Workshop, Pier 35 East River Esplanade:

  • June 23, 11am, Pier 35
    (Closest entrance at Rutgers Slip)

Composer and sound artist: Jeff Kolar
Performers/dancers: Courtney Cooke, Madeline Mellinger, Kaitlin Fox
Costume designer: Susan Becker
Lighting designer:  Ben Demarest

July 29-Aug 2: Jennifer Monson at TicTac Art Centre in Brussels!

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SYSTEMS/SCORES PRACTICE/PROCESS
by Jennifer Monson

for full registration info visit:
https://tictacartcentre.com/2018/12/31/jeniffer-monson/

We will investigate how we make scores out of the systems that we live in, observe and are attracted to. In this work, a score is an open structure that creates improvisational choices for a particular context. We will create systems for movement that can be layered into performance scores. This will be our practice. How does the practice influence our approach to performance? How do we observe and shape this process? How can our practice of making scores help us to observe the possibilities in movement and choreographic systems? We will work on presence, states of moving and scales of sensation and time. We will perform our scores daily.

Times:
11.00 – 17.00

Price:
250 Euro

Registration fee of 80 euro required (as part of the 250)
Performance: TBA
Time: 20.00

Performance: Date in negotiation
Solo Improvisation by Jennifer Monson
Time: 20.00
Duration: 20 to 60 minutes

This workshop is also part of the Special Summer Package of 4 weeks of Improvisation coached by 5 different dance artists of 5 different continents. If you want to book this package, it costs only 800 Euro (or 960 Euro with daily lunch included).
www.tictacartcentre.com/2019/03/31/summer-package/

Ridgewood Reservoir receives wetland delineation!

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Dear Friends,

In 2007, I started a year-long project at the Ridgewood Reservoir in collaboration with thread collective, a Brooklyn-based architecture team, and dance artists Mariangela Lopez, Maggie Bennett and Charlotte Gibbons and composer Kenta Negai.

Our research included visits to the site with Mike Feller, Chief Naturalist of the Natural Resource Group of the NYC Parks Department; Andrew Greller, Professor Emeritus, Biology at Queens College; John Waldman, Professor of Biology, Queens College and Uli Lorimer, Curator of Native Flora, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, as well as members of the Brooklyn Bird Club including, bird census coordinator Heidi Steiner, Steve Nanz, Rob Jett and Al Ott.

We became intimately knowledgeable of the unusual rare ecologies thriving in this 60-acre bit of urban wilderness as well as the ways that the communities engaged with and enjoyed the area.This influenced the choreographic research that resulted in fall, spring and summer performances. The attention this project brought to the reservoir instigated a community of neighbors and others committed to conserving this special area as the site became hotly contested for different kinds of development.

We are absolutely thrilled to announce that this month the Department of Environmental Conservation confirmed that the majority of the area has received wetland delineation.

This was the final part the battle to save Ridgewood Reservoir. We now have wetland protection as well as protection under the National Register of Historic Place. Parks has been persuaded to preserve Ridgewood as a wildlife sanctuary and has initiated the first step toward that plan.

If you are interested you can see the results of some of our research here as well as a video of the fall performance of iMAP/Ridgewood Reservoir. http://www.ilandart.org/dance-project/imap-ridgewood-reservoir/

Here’s to art as a transformative cultural and political force!

yours in creative collaboration,

Jennifer Monson

Special thanks to the MAP Fund and NYSCA for believing in this project and funding it!

Jan 19-25: Jennifer Monson teaches workshop with MELT @Movement Research and MoMA

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iLANDing – researching context and aesthetics through embodied score techniques

Dates:

  • 1/19 1-4pm, 122 Community Center
  • 1/20 1-4pm, MoMA
  • 1/22 6-9pm, MoMA
  • 1/23 6-9pm, MoMA
  • 1/24 3-5pm, MoMA
  • 1/25 3-5pm, MoMA

Registration: click here
Cost: $150

Description: This workshop will use the framework of the iLANDing scores to research some of the art works in MOMA’s collection. What happens when we propose that the artwork itself is an ecological system that we inhabit? What kinds of movement emerge from this investigation? What new conceptual possibilities between performance and visual art are activated through this embodied process of the score? The art work becomes performance, the performance becomes the artifact, everything is experienced through movement. We will start by working with the iLANDIng scores outdoors then bring that experience into the museum to research particular artworks. From that we will create performance events as artifacts of this exchange of the resonance between movement, form, scales of sensation, time and experience -locating new aesthetic value in artistic frames for inhabiting our world.

The materials explored in this workshop will culminate with a public manifestation at The Museum of Modern Art, in conjunction with Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done. Participation in the workshop does not require you to participate in the manifestation at MoMA.

Location (venue, city, state, country): 122 Community Center and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY, USA

[Photo: Performers Jennifer Monson and Mauriah Donegan Kraker in bend the even at Chocolate Factory Theater, Photo by Ian Douglas]

Dec 1-2: Jennifer Monson teaches a workshop at Movement Research – “Immediate minutes/ Minuets”

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December 1 – 2, 2018
Location TBA
10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
Cost: $75

Jennifer Monson teaches a workshop at Movement Research!

Description:
We will start with performing instantaneous 2 minute dances for each other. Responding with various approaches to language – descriptive, poetic, non–verbal, structural, etc., we will hone our intentions as they evolve in the act of performance. Over the two days we will expand the time frame and generate material that can be used towards future research, performance and pleasure. What is performed both for witness and dancer? Is it an act, a task, a relation, a perception? How to we communicate, obfuscate, shape, clarify, and stir up mystery? We will animate different spaces of performance and dance through our research together.

For more info and to register: https://movementresearch.org/event/9046

Oct 29-30: Jennifer Monson in Montpellier, France

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Full Flyer here: INVITATION COLLOQUE ADD

Jennifer Monson heads to France next for ENSAM’s Architecture Dance Design Conference!
See a rough translation from their website:

MONDAY OCTOBER 29: BODY IN MOTION, SHARING WORKS AND A  CONTEXTUALIZED ARCHITECTURE: WHAT SENSIBLE APPROACH?
RESTITUTION OF EXPERIENCE AS RESEARCH AND PEDAGOGY

TUESDAY 30 OCTOBER:
AT THE CROSSING OF THE DISCIPLINES, INTERROGATE THE SPACE GENERATED AND SHARED. PERFORMANCE SPACE AND EPHEMERAL COMMUNITY OF GESTURES:
WHAT ARE THE RECIPROCAL CONNECTIONS BETWEEN DANCE, ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN?

SYMPOSIUM
ENSAM, in partnership with ICI-CCN, La Sapienza and the French Institute of Rome, organizes the Architecture Danse Design conference.
This symposium puts in conversation several disciplines around theory and practice, research and creation, pedagogy and transmission, and retraces the experiences of the organizing institutions in connection with the resident artist.
Guest sessions led by: Emmanuelle Huynh, Jennifer Monson, Mathias Fish – choreographers, Francesco Careri, founder of Stalker, collective of architects, Alix de Morant, lecturer in theatrical and choreographic studies at the Paul-Valéry University Montpellier 3.
Free RSVP at: ADDreservation@montpellier.archi.fr

Oct 20-22 : FEVERISH WORLD at University of Vermont

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FEVERISH WORLD (2018-2068): Arts and Sciences of Collective Survival will be a three-day symposium and convergence intended to catalyze the building of bridges between the arts and the sciences, and between academe and the broader community, to help prepare UVM and the Burlington region for the next 50 years of anticipated “feverishness.” (Fill in your own blanks about the likely sources of that feverishness–climate and ecological changes, resource wars, movements of refugee populations, clashing political paradigms, and so on.)

FEVERISH WORLD will include panels and roundtables, keynote talks and conversations, as well as public art and music performances, a “tent city” encampment of TentWorks installations, a parade, and more. Among the featured speakers and artists will be
– anthropologist and philosopher of science Bruno Latour, whose Burack Lecture on “The Politics of Gaia” will take place on Monday October 22 at 4 p.m. in Ira Allen Chapel;
– Brazilian sculptor Nele Azevedo, whose Minimal Monument ice sculpture will be installed on the back steps of City Hall Park on Sunday October 23;
– painter, sculptor, and installation artist Torkwase Dyson, whose art works will be exhibited at Williams Hall (and potentially the new Cohen Building) and whose Molly Ruprecht Talk will take place on Monday October 22 at 7 p.m. in Ira Allen Chapel;
– environmental philosopher and jazz musician (known for his recordings with animals) David Rothenberg, whose keynote talk will take place on Sunday October 21, with a musical performance on Saturday evening;
– Burlington City Arts artist-in-residence Pauline Jennings, who will lead a performative urban wilderness walk/game on Saturday October 20;
– eco-artist and engineer Natalie Jeremijenko, director of the xDesign Environmental Health Clinic at New York University, who will be in residence at the Green House Residential Community for the week leading up to and including Feverish World;
– UVM composer David Neiweem, whose church bell compositions will be heard at various sites and times over the three “feverish” days;
– Abenaki historian and archaeologist Frederick Wiseman, who will speak on the history of this land on Sunday October 21;
– Anne Strainchamps and Steve Paulson, co-hosts of the award-winning public radio program “To the Best of Our Knowledge”;
– Vermont poet laureate Chard deNiord, artist and eco-arts theorist Linda Weintraub, ecology and religion scholar Bron Taylor, musicians including cellist Anne Bourne, Rural Noise Ensemble, Metamorph, Pantet, and others.

The event is being organized by a group of UVM faculty and Burlington and area activists working under the auspices of the EcoCulture Lab, with generous support from the Gund Institute for Environment, the UVM Humanities Center, the Rubenstein School and the Steven Rubenstein Professorship, the Dan and Carole Burack Lecture Fund, the Molly Ruprecht Fund for Visual Arts, and from UVM departments and programs including Environmental Studies, Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Global and Regional Studies, Art and Art History, as well as the Fleming Museum, Champlain College, Burlington City Arts, the McCarthy Art Gallery at St. Michael’s College, and the Shelburne Institute.

A partial list of speakers and guests can be found here (others are still being confirmed):
https://ecoculturelab.net/speakers/

A tentative schedule of events (to be updated with more detail in the coming weeks) can be found here:
https://ecoculturelab.net/program/

Feverish World will be free and open to the public, though select events, as well as roundtable paper access, will require pre-registration

If you are interested in volunteering or in coordinating classes with any of the visiting artists or programs, please contact us at ecoculture@uvm.edu.

Jennifer Monson – special guest @ TicTac Art Centre in Brussels in August 2018!

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JENNIFER MONSON/SCORES AND SYSTEMS FOR PERFORMING IMPROVISATION
09:15-11:15am, Mon-Wed, Aug 13-15

FROM THE 12TH-19TH OF August 2018 David Zambrano and Mat Voorter will finally open TICTAC Art Centre in Brussels, Belgium.

From Sunday 12 until Sunday 19 August 2018, we will be celebrating the opening of TicTac Art Centre with a non stop of daily art activities:

  1. Master Classes by Marlon Barrios Solano, Jennifer Monson, Yoshiko Chuma, Terence Lewis, Archie Burnett, David Zambrano, Horacio Macuacua, Enano, and TimSon.
  2. Performances:  Every evening will be improvisational performances by a selection of a long list of invited artists. The performances will be announce on the same day each day on the website and Facebook page of TICTAC ART CENTRE.
  3. Exhibitions by local and international visual artists will be presented throughout the TicTac Art Centre spaces. 

More info: http://tictacartcentre.com

URGENT: Please attend a meeting July 9, 10 or 11 on NY storm surge barriers

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From John Lipscomb and our friends at Riverkeeper:

(Full post here)

Fast-tracked Army Corps proposals threaten the future life of the Hudson.

Outer harbor GatewayThe U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is considering six different plans for massive offshore barriers and/or land-based floodwalls intended to “manage the risk of coastal storm damage” to New York Harbor and the Hudson Valley. Several of these alternatives could threaten the very existence of the Hudson as a living river.

Click here to read our new blog post with more information.

If you live anywhere near the shorelines of New York City, New York Harbor or the Hudson up to Troy, your community will be forever affected by this decision.

Anyone who cares about the life in the Hudson River needs to become informed and involved, now.

Please attend one of these meetings, just announced:

• Monday, July 9, 3-5 p.m., NYC: Borough of Manhattan Community Center in Tribeca, enter at 199 Chambers St, New York, NY 10007, between Greenwich St. and the West Side Highway. The session is in the Conference Room-Richard Harris Terrace, on the main floor.

• Monday, July 9, 6-8 p.m., NYC: (duplicate session) at the Borough of Manhattan Community Center in Tribeca, enter at 199 Chambers St., Manhattan, between Greenwich St. and the West Side Highway. The session is in the Conference Room-Richard Harris Terrace, on the main floor.

• Tuesday, July 10, 3-5 p.m., Newark: Rutgers University-Newark Campus, Paul Robeson Campus Center, 2nd floor, Essex Room. Entrance is at 350 Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Newark, N.J.

• Tuesday, July 10, 6-8 p.m., Newark: (duplicate session) at Rutgers University-Newark Campus, Paul Robeson Campus Center, 2nd floor, Essex Room. Entrance is at 350 Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Newark, N.J.

• Wednesday, July 11, 6-8 p.m., Poughkeepsie: Hudson Valley Community Center (Auditorium room), 110 South Grand Avenue, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.

This process is being fast-tracked, and it’s an outrage. The Army Corps gave only 12 days’ notice for meetings on an issue that will take many years to resolve and could change the river forever.

The six alternatives are under consideration as part of the New York – New Jersey Harbor and Tributaries (NYNJHAT) Coastal Storm Risk Management Feasibility Study, affecting more than 2,150 square miles. We all know that sea level rise and more frequent, intense storms require action and planning. But there is a difference between creating more protective, resilient shorelines over time, and installing massive, in-water barriers that threaten to change the ecosystem forever. Offshore barriers will choke off tidal flow and fish migration – the very life of our river.

Riverkeeper is working on an information piece to tell you what you need to know. Please mark your calendars and stay tuned.

See Riverkeeper’s letter to the Army Corps of Engineers requesting scoping comment period extension.

May 21: Circus Amok’s Benefit – Monday of 1000 Stars!

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Monday of 1000 Stars!!
Benefit Flyer
A Benefit for Circus Amok’s 2018 Parks Tour !
Monday May 21
7:00pm Doors
7:30pm Performancesat Dixon Place
161A Chrystie Street, NYCPerformances by:

Rev Billy & the Stop Shopping Choir!
Cathy Weis!
Monstah Black
Becca Blackwell
Ashley Brockington
Machine Dazzle
Patricia Hoffbauer
Jennifer Miller
Jennifer Monson
Nicky Paraiso
STREB
David Thomson
….and special surprise guests!

CLICK FOR TICKETS:
$50 general admission
or Join the Center Ring Host Committee for extra perks!

All proceeds go to support the 2018 Parks Tour September 1-16 !

 

Colin Gee responds to in tow!

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A little over a year ago, in tow premiered at Danspace Project. This work continues to feed new processes, teaching, and collaborations. Jennifer has had several conversations with performance artist and writer Colin Gee about in tow over the past year. These conversations have led to the beautiful essay you’ll find below. He brilliantly gives voice to some of the larger philosophical questions of the work.

Please read it with care: ColinGee_intowResponse_2017

 

Announcing A Field Guide to iLANDing

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I am tremendously excited and proud to announce the publication of A Field Guide to iLANDing by 53rd State Press. It is such a pleasure to hold this pocket-sized book of scores in hand after the years of hard work that went into creating it.

I can’t wait to share it with you all. This book is the result of deeply stimulating collaboration and holds the creativity and brilliance of our entire iLAND community. I hope it will guide you into your own adventurous creative research with urban ecologies and beyond.

Books are available for $15. If you’re able to donate a bit on top for added support to iLAND’s upcoming projects, we’d be so grateful.

The book is accompanied by a redesign of our archives that include information about past dance projects, residencies, symposiums, and iLANDing laboratories. These archives hold additional information about all of the projects represented in the book. Once you activate the scores in the field guide, you can view detailed documentation on our website about each of the collaborative projects as a companion piece to your own research. Thank you to Julia Handschuh for this beautiful reorganization of the iLAND archive!

We have also recently reconstructed the www.birdbraindance.org website. This project happened from 2000-2006 and was the foundation of iLAND. It remains an important archive of environmental research and performance. Thank you to Jason Woofenden for his hard work and generosity in making this website available to the public again!

All of these projects were made possible with financial support from the Doris Duke Impact Artist Audience Development Fund and we are deeply grateful for their support.

And as always, we offer our heartfelt gratitude to all of the folks that created and participated with such risk and enthusiasm to generate this delicate and innovative approach to collaboration, especially the iLAND Board and the iLAB Residents.

Next week, we will be announcing re-runs of IN TOW TV and sharing a thoughtful and provocative essay about in tow written by Colin Gee.

So please – buy a copy of A Field Guide to iLANDing, crack it open and start collaborating! We look forward to following your discoveries and insights into dancing with our urban ecologies.

With Love and In Collaboration,
Jennifer

Process Workshops with Pier 35 Festival Commissioned Artists

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Photo from June 1 Workshop with Tatyana Tenenbaum and Andy Luo

The Pier 35 Festival is happening in June 2018 in partnership with Lower Manhattan Cultural Council and Two Bridges Neighborhood Council. This project is supported by a Building Demand for the Arts Implementation grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. These workshops are supported in part by the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs.
[Read more…] about Process Workshops with Pier 35 Festival Commissioned Artists

Paths to Pier 42: Summer Waterfront Celebration City of Water Day

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Paths to Pier 42: Summer Waterfront Celebration and City of Water Day
Saturday, July 18, 2-6pm
Pier 42
The 2015 iLAB Residency groups, Water & Im/migration and The Urban Backstage, invite you to Pier 42 on Saturday, July 18th, to join in the Paths to Pier 42: Summer Waterfront Celebration and City of Water Day. As part of the Waterfront Alliance’s larger City of Water Day celebration, Paths to Pier 42 will host an afternoon of family-friendly activities including the iLAND events listed below.
 
 
2PM  The Urban Backstage: Collect Pond Park performance 
Location: The performance begins at the southern end of Collect Pond Park
The first of three linked walking and talking performances about the city and its relationship to water. Visit the place where Collect Pond used to be, and imagine the city when it was the primary source of fresh drinking water and a place of leisure and escape.
 
 
2:45PM   The Urban Backstage: Wreck Brook / East River walk 
Location: The walk begins at Foley Square and ends at Pier 42
The second of three linked walking and talking performances: walk the trail of the former Old Wreck Brook from Foley Square to the East River exploring the links between natural and engineered water systems.
4PM    Water & Im/migration: Shore of Hope – Part II
Location: Pier 42
Enjoy arts activities for all ages, including a calligraphy workshop, a choral performance by members of the Open Door Senior Citizen Center, and movement sharing to explore the themes of Water and Immigration (for ages 7 and older).
 
4:30PM  The Urban Backstage: CSO Theater
Location: Starts at the Pier 42 welcome tent
The last of three walking and talking performances: travel from Pier 42 to the East River Amphitheater where ideas about what’s hidden–under our city, and in ourselves–take to the stage.
 

2015 iLANDing Laboratory Program

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2015 iLANDing Laboratory Program

Following the successful inaugural year of the iLANDing Laboratory Initiative, we had the pleasure of programing a second year. The 2015 iLANDing Laboratory Program occuipied the Spring and Summer seasons with a series of experimental workshops/laboratories designed by members of the iLAND community and those who are aligned with the values of iLANDing. [Read more…] about 2015 iLANDing Laboratory Program

Use Values: Re/Imagining Urban Waste

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Use Values: Re/Imagining Urban Waste

Led by Zena Bibler, Katarina Jerinic, and Juliette Spertus

Saturday May 2 1-4pm & Sunday May 10 1-5:30pm

Island between exit 30 off the eastbound BQE and Classon + Flushing Avenues in Brooklyn

This two-part workshop takes place on a leftover piece of land at Exit 30 off the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, a site maintained by volunteers through the Adopt-A-Highway program which, according to the program’s mission, is devoted to “beautification or other aesthetic-related activities.” During the workshop, we will use this location as a laboratory for exploring the role of waste, refuse, and acts of discarding in the formation of the urban landscape. We will play along the spectrum of owning, consuming, and throwing away, and follow the paths of objects beyond the moment at which they are initially discarded. In addition to studying the combination of systems that act on the landscape, we will take time to reorganize and reimagine the site through functional and aesthetic lenses. Finally, we will host an open house to share food and discussion with other workshop participants and visitors.

May 2 1-4pm: Collect & Analyze In this first session, we will examine the ways the site is shaped by the movements of animate and inanimate material in and around the island triangle. What are the discernible forces acting on the site? How does this site participate in broader urban ecosystems? We will document our findings in the form of movement scores and maps that will be shared with future visitors in a letterbox onsite.

May 10 1-4pm(Open House 4-5:30PM): Sort & Select In the second session, we will clean the site—collecting, re-organizing, and displaying discarded material. In addition to working with our observations of the site as we encounter it, we will also develop other possible uses for the site and its materials. We will conclude the session with an open house for visitors to experience the re-organized space and share food and discussion.

Please meet us directly at the site. Participants can take public transit to the site using either the G train to Classon Ave and walking to the site, or by taking the bus (B48, B69, or B44). Please wear clothing that covers your arms and legs and that you don’t mind getting a little dirty. We will be working with trash! Gloves will be provided. Bring any desired forms of documentation (camera, sketchpad, etc). We will provide all materials that are necessary, but participants are invited to contribute to documentation in their desired format.

Check out the Use Values Blog: http://usevalues.tumblr.com/ to see updates about the project.

Zena Bibler creates dance structures that use the moving body as a means of experiencing diverse environments, phenomena, and modes of being. Much of her recent activity is centered on collaborations with the Movement Party (co-founded in 2010 with Katie Schetlick). Her work has been presented at Movement Research, NADA Hudson, Gibney Dance Center, Dixon Place, Lublin International Dance Theatre Festival (Poland), Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (Egypt), Museum Perron Oost (Netherlands), and Sesc Vila Mariana (Brazil). Her dance films have been featured in Dance Magazine, Dance Films Association, and Moviehouse Brooklyn, and have screened nationally and internationally. As a teaching artist, she has developed workshops in the areas of sensory attunement, improvisation, choreographic viewing, and integrated techniques for Fleet Moves Dance Festival, New York University, Yale University, University of Virginia, the Floating Library, and Studio 303 (Canada), among others. She has had the pleasure of dancing in the work of Katie Schetlick, Brandin Steffensen, Athena Kokoronis, Anne Zuerner, Steve Paxton, Mariangela Lopez, and the Movement Party.

Juliette Spertus is an architect and co-founder of ClosedLoops, an infrastructure strategic planning and development firm. Her experience as a designer in Boston and New York inspired her to explore the integration of invisible support infrastructures, including the networks that bring goods and remove wastes, into urban design. In 2010, she created the exhibit Fast Trash: Roosevelt Island’s Pneumatic Tubes and the Future of Cities and the online resource fasttrash.org. Fast Trash led to two NY state-funded studies on the costs and benefits of pneumatic waste collection in New York City, which she led with researchers from CUNY’s University Transportation Research Center. She has presented her research on waste and urban design in conferences, design studios, papers, and articles in the US and Europe. She received a BA in Art History from Williams College and an architecture degree from l’Ecole d’Architecture des Villes et des Territoires in Marne-la-Vallée, France.

Katarina Jerinic’s photography, mixed-media projects, and public space-based installations respond to and intervene in built environments in order to draw attention to our interactions with surrounding spaces. Jerinic has been a resident at MacDowell Colony, Peterborough, NH (2008); the Center for Book Arts, New York, NY (2010); Tokamak at Helsinki International Artist Program, Helsinki, Finland (2013); and the Experimental Television Center, Owego, NY (2003); and participated in the Bronx Museum of the Arts Artist in the Marketplace program (2005). Her work has been included in exhibitions and programs at Storm King Art Center, Mountainville, NY (2014); Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, NY (2006); Queens Museum of Art, Queens, NY (2009, 2010); Proteus Gowanus, Brooklyn, NY (2013); NurtureArt, Brooklyn, NY (2009); BRIC, Brooklyn, NY (2008, 2011, 2013, 2015); the Peekskill Project, Peekskill, NY (2012); the Conflux Festival, New York, NY (2010); Temple Gallery at Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA (2011), as well as other spaces and places near and far. Jerinic’s collaborative, participatory project with Naomi Miller The Work Office (TWO), a re-interpretation of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) for New York City artists, has been awarded grants from the Black Rock Arts Foundation (2009), the Brooklyn Arts Council (2010), Chashama (2009), Lower Manhattan Cultural Council Swing Space (2010), and the Times Square Alliance (2011). She received her MFA from the School of Visual Arts and BA from American University in history. She lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.

 

Happy New Year! Donate to iLAND Today

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Dear Friends,

As the year comes to a close, we write to reflect on the past year and to look forward to 2015. It is the time of year when we reach out to ask for your support which will be directed towards iLAND’s various public programs. Please consider giving a contribution to bolster the future of interdisciplinary collaboration in New York City. 

Your support will sustain the eight iLANDing Laboratories scheduled for next Spring and Summer, the annual iLAND Symposium, and three iLAB Residencies that will activate areas along the East River (presented in partnership with the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council). Jennifer Monson’s creative work will continue to develop through in tow – a new evening length work with DD Dorvillier, Zeena Parkins, David Zambrano, Susan Becker, Val Oliveiro, and Rose Kaczmarowski, that will have various residencies and performances throughout 2015 (including Rauschenberg at Captiva Island and Vermont Performance Lab).

Thank you for the many ways you have shown support for us in the past. We look forward to seeing you at an iLAND event in the spring!

iLAND Board & Staff

Live Dancing Archive

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Live Dancing Archive

Friday November 21 at 8pm, Saturday November 22 at 3:30pm, Sunday November 23 at 3:30pm

Fisher Center at Bard College

This fall Jennifer Monson will perform Live Dancing Archive at Bard College as part of The House is Open, an inquisitive and playful pop-up exhibition that transforms the Fisher Center will be transformed into a temporary museum, hosting the work of major artists who are working at the fast-changing intersection of the performing and visual arts.  Jennifer Monson’s Live Dancing Archive is an evening-length performance featuring a visceral exploration of the dancing body as a physical archive of experience and place. Drawing from more than a decade of dance-based environmental research, Live Dancing Archive was choreographed using material from video documentation of the BIRD BRAIN Osprey Migration (2002)—an 8-week dance project along the Atlantic Flyway—as well as improvised scores accumulated over the past decade. Originally premiered at The Kitchen in 2012 as a solo, this newly remounted iteration  will expand to feature three new collaborators, Niall Jones, TatyanaTenenbaum  and Valerie Oliveiro along with Monson and composer Jeff Kolar, lighting designer Joe Levasseur and costume designer Susan Becker. The project is accompanied by a video installation by Robin Vachal and a digital archive by Josephine Young Jae Bae that query the process of archiving as well as the shifting nature of dance and environmental phenomena.

On Saturday the Fisher Center Coach will be taking a group from New York City to Bard for a round trip fare of $20. Buy tickets for the bus HERE.

Request for Proposals – 2015 iLANDing Laboratories Initiative

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Request for Proposals – 2015 iLANDing Laboratories Initiative

Dear iLAND Community Members,

Following the successful inaugural year of the iLANDing Laboratory Initiative, we are pleased to announce that the program will continue for a second year. The 2015 iLANDing Laboratories will continue in an experimental format as a series of workshops/laboratories designed by members of the iLAND community as well as those with a strong interest in proposing a Laboratory that aligns with iLAND’s mission and the values of iLANDing (for more information please see appendix below). The Laboratories will serve as focused forums and platforms for a reflective, advanced discourse around urban ecology, kinesthetic experience, and new approaches to interdisciplinary creative processes and draw on the history of iLAND programming which has been cultivated over the past eight years through the iLAB Residency program, iLAND Symposia, and the development of the iLANDing Method.

This Request for Proposals is open to all past iLANDing Laboratory participants, iLAB Residents, iLAB applicants, Symposium participants and others with a strong interest in proposing a workshop that aligns with the values of iLAND. New combinations of collaborators are welcomed and encouraged. Past iLANDing Laboratory residents are welcome to reapply for continued support in order to deepen into the process of a previously presented workshop. Laboratories should take on the structure (forum, workshop, walk, charette, tour, discussion, performance, potluck, experiment) and duration (two hours, two days, a month of Sundays), which will best support the proposed investigation. Laboratories will take place between March-July 2015.

An honorarium of $250 will be awarded to accepted proposals to assist in covering workshop expenses. iLAND will assist with online and print promotion for the Laboratories and provide planning support and mentorship in designing the laboratories

Proposals must be submitted to info@ilandart.org by October 20, 2014. Please limit your proposal to a two pages and send as a PDF attachment. If you have questions, please contact Jennifer Monson at 917-860-8239 or jennifer@ilandart.org. Final decisions will be announced on November 20, 2014.

We hope these workshops will provide an opportunity to share your current work and interests as well as to revisit and expand upon ideas that might have been initially explored during previous iLANDing Laboratories, iLAB Residencies, and/or iLAND Symposia.

Yours,

 

iLAND Board & Staff

 

APPENDIX: iLANDING CORE VALUES

iLANDing  is a collaborative methodology that is constantly evolving as it is practiced.

iLANDing Core Values: The exchange of knowledge through collaborative process; engagement with landscape/system or site as an active collaborator; the re-orientation of knowledge production through embodied, kinetic experience; fostering innovative connections across disciplines in order to gain new perspectives and understandings of complex systems; integration with public discourse as a means to craft and activate ethical, indeterminate practices that value the reciprocal nature of human actions and natural systems.

iLANDing is a platform to:

  1. explore, revise, and re-imagine and expand individuals’ understanding of their own disciplinary methods, practices and processes
  2. develop new interdisciplinary / hybrid methods and practices from the experiences of sharing process, language, and on-site experience
  3. engage the site/ecosystem as collaborator and in the long term shape an informed and in depth understanding of the relationship between the site and human action
  4. create meaningful public engagements that activate kinetic, as well as scientific approaches to understanding urban ecologies

In over ten years of iLANDing we have found that there are six components to every process that all interdisciplinary teams had to address in the process of working together.

Focus: Using a well-defined research topic to facilitate and inspire collaborative research

Research Methods: Exploring, using and re-crafting research methods from different disciplines as well as developing hybrid research practices in the process of working together

Common Language: Facilitating communication within the group when words have different meanings for people of different backgrounds

Component of Site: Working on (and with) a particular site and treating the site itself as a collaborator in the process; negotiating the relationship between working on site versus working remotely (such as studio)

Individual versus Collective: Finding a balance between individual space and working collectively

Documentation: How you document the process and capture moments of insight or inspiration when something new begins to emerge

 

For more information about the 2014 iLANDing Laboratory Program visit the program page HERE

iLANDing Laboratories 2014

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2014 iLANDing Laboratories
March-July 2014
In celebration of iLAND’s 10th anniversary, the 2014 iLAB residency will take on an experimental format as a series of workshops/laboratories designed by members of the iLAND community.  These workshops are focused forums and platforms for a reflective, advanced discourse on ideas about urban ecologies, kinesthetic experience, and new approaches to interdisciplinary creative processes as cultivated throughout 8 years of the iLAB Residency Program.All of these programs are FREE and open to the general public. However, some events have limited space and so we ask you RSVP to info@ilandart.org to reserve a spot. For all other programs reservations are encouraged, but not required.  We are excited to share these workshops with you and hope to see you at an event this spring!
Click on the event titles below for more information:
Funding for the 2014 iLANDing Laboratory Series is provided with support from NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, the Robison Foundation and private individuals.
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End of Year Appeal

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Dear friends of iLAND,

As the year comes to a close, we move into our second decade of creative, collaborative, interdisciplinary research of New York City ecologies. With the evolution of iLAND, we will continue to experiment with new forms, practices and methods between dance and other disciplines. 2014 marks a change in the iLAB residency program. In an effort to deepen the ongoing work developed over the past 8 years, we have asked past iLAB residents and community members to propose a new series of laboratories, which will be launched in the New Year. They are intensive, focused and available for all to attend! This year we are also excited to announce iLAND’s role as part of the curatorial team for the Movement Spring Festival, which will focus on a critical examination of Sustainability in our community and beyond. The iLAND symposium will be a part of this exciting series of events in May 2014.

As we look back on 2013, we celebrate the presentation of Live Dancing Archive in NYC, Illinois and its inclusion in the Performance Archiving Performance Exhibit at the New Museum as well as the continued evolution of iLANDing through retreats at Earthdance, SMU/Taos and various workshops throughout New York City. We are thrilled to have worked with Fantastic Futures and Jason Munshi South in this year’s iLAB residency – Through Body, Through Earth, Through Speech.

Next year along side of the Laboratories, Artistic Director Jennifer Monson will continue to develop her new project, in tow. Live Dancing Archive will also be performed again at New York Live Arts in the Fall 2014.

As the year closes, we would like to take this opportunity to ask for your financial support of our activities. Most of our events are free to the public so we depend on donations from people like you to keep our programs growing.  To donate to iLAND, please click HERE!

We are incredibly grateful for all of the support, creativity, and collaboration you have shared with iLAND in our first decade and we look forward where the next decade will take us!

Yours,
Jennifer Monson
Artistic Director/ Founder
iLAND

iLAB 2014 Announcement

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2014 ilANDing Laboratory Initiatives 

We are pleased to announce that we have chosen 8 proposals to present workshops, community events, and expeditions as part of our 2014 iLANDing Laboratory Initiatives. These events will take place in the spring between February and July of 2014. Specific dates and a full calendar will be announced later.
Patch-Work-Walk-Picnic-Dance – Athena Kokoronis
  • Take a walk and share a picnic with choreographer Athena Kokoronis and ecologist Leila Mougoui Bakhtiari to learn about trees in local parks. Participants will develop scores based on walks and combine them in an improvisatory quilt with others.
Expedition to White Island – Charles Dennis
  • Join Charles Dennis on a canoe trip to Gerritsen Inlet in Marine Park, Brooklyn and explore the natural landscape. After group improvisation, take time to read, meditate, and journal.
Wayfaring – A Poetic Walk Through Public Space – E.J. McAdams, Douglas Manson, and Virginia Millington
  • EJ McAdams, Douglas Manson and Virginia Millington will take us on a guided walk of a transect within the urban landscape, exploring poetry, pacing and environment.
Creating Habitat, Form & Function – Kathleen McCarthy
  • Help rebuild habitat at the Bronx River Salt Marsh by planting wetlands and discussing threats to urban wildlife.
Navigating the Queens Plaza Transportation Hub Street Level without an SmartPhone or Other Prepared Map – Lise Brenner
  • Complete a journey using landmarks, interaction with others, and intuition to guide you. Then work with others to propose new plans for easier navigation to City Council.
Repetition / Series, Dialogue / Transposition – Kate Cahill and Maggie Bennett
  • Explore collaboration and the methodology of practice through a workshop of movement, writing, modeling, and construction.
Temporal Dislocation: Body Gates through Stars, Water, and Land – Moira Williams
  • Join choreographer Jill Sigman, astrophysicist Tony Faddoul and multimedia artist Moria Williams for an exploration series for stargazing, a design charette, collaborative walks, and a potluck picnic panel.
Liminal Narratives: From Context to Text – Sonal Modi
  • Investigate a commercial street and notice multiple narratives at each liminal junction. Develop a coherent narrative yourself using a variety of multi-media.

Panel Discussion with Artists of “Performing Archive Performance”

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On Saturday November 16th from 2-4pm, there will be a panel discussion in conjunction with the exhibition “Performance Archiving Performance” at the New Museum. The discussion surveys different artists’ approaches to the concerns of archiving performance and how those concerns might be taken up and addressed by museums and institutional archives. The artists included in “Performance Archiving Performance” discuss the development of and future goals for their individual archiving projects with the curator. Participants include Yanira Castro, Kathy Couch, Jennifer Monson, Julie Tolentino, Sara Wookey, and Travis Chamberlain, Associate Curator of Performance. More information on the panel discussion HERE.

 

Movement Research Studies Project Vulnerable Systems: Moving Beyond Sustainability

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The reality of climate change has brought an increased awareness around the fragility of our environment and a heightened interest in sustainable practices. How do we move beyond sustainability towards resiliency, a term currently in broad use in the social sciences? How do we address the current crisis from its roots, rather than perpetuating unworkable systems? Is change a value or an action? How can our practices within the dance community serve as models for adapting to change? We will discuss different framings of sustainability from the perspectives of various fields, including social science, economics, and urban ecology in a roundtable conversation which invites the dance community and the larger public to explore concrete ways to create resilient systems in their own communities and beyond.

This discussion is conceived in partnership with Jennifer Monson and Movement Research. More information on the discussion HERE.