For Immediate Release

Contact: Randal Fippinger - (413) 597-4808

rfippinger@williams.edu

LUCINDA CHILDS

DANCE

CHOREOGRAPHY BY LUCINDA CHILDS

MUSIC BY PHILIP GLASS

FILM BY SOL LeWITT

[WILLIAMSTOWN, MA, September 1, 2009] – The ’62 Center for Theatre and Dance will present Lucinda Childs’ highly acclaimed, rarely performed signature work DANCE. This evening-length piece, featuring original music by Philip Glass and film by Sol LeWitt, will be performed by nine dancers under the direction of Ms. Childs. Performances will be September 25^th & 26^th at 8 PM on the ’62 Center Mainstage, located at 1000 Main Street, in Williamstown, MA. Tickets are on sale as of September 8^th.

DANCE was commissioned by BAM and choreographed in 1979 by Lucinda Childs. It consists of three dances. Dances #1 and #3 are performed by four men and four women, while the solo, Dance #2, was originally danced by Lucinda Childs. The music for DANCE was composed by Philip Glass and, for this remounting, a new recording was made by the Philip Glass Ensemble. The decor for the work is a black and white film by Sol LeWitt, which consists of selected passages of the choreography from each of the three dances. In performance the film is projected on a transparent scrim downstage of the dancers, and is perfectly synchronized with the live dances on stage. Through shifts in the camera angle and changes of scale (the dancers are seen sometimes in close up or sometimes in long shot) the spectator’s point of view is subjected to a series of manipulations. Lucinda Childs was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for this work.

Continuing its mission to contextualize arts within scholarly inquiry, the Center presents an impressive body of work that sets student work side-by-side with that of professional artists. We strive to challenge traditional forms, engage with a larger political dialogue and allow our audiences to explore diverse modes of expression. Not content merely to present popular work, the Center’s professional performances, workshops and student productions are designed to invite the entire community to engage, debate, and celebrate the experience of both witnessing and creating live art.

These performances are made possible by the W. Ford Schumann ’50 Endowment for the Arts and the Lipp Family Fund for Performing Artists.

Lucinda Childs graduated as a dance major from Sarah Lawrence College in 1962 (where she studied with Judith Dunn and Bessie Schönberg) and then studied at the Merce Cunningham studio. She began her professional career as a choreographer and performer in 1963 as an original member of the Judson Dance Theater in New York. After forming her own dance company in 1973, Ms. Childs collaborated with Robert Wilson and Philip Glass on the opera Einstein on the Beach, participating as a lead performer and choreographer.

Since 1979, Ms. Childs has collaborated with a number of composers and designers, including John Adams and Frank Gehry, on a series of large-scale productions. Ms. Childs has received a number of commissions from major ballet companies including the Paris Opéra Ballet, Pacific Northwest Ballet, Berlin Opera Ballet, Lyon Opéra Ballet, Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo, Geneva Opera Ballet, Ballet du l’Opéra du Rhin, the Boston Ballet, and the Bayerisches Staatsballett of Munich.

In 2003 Ms Childs choreographed Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe for the Geneva Opera Ballet and revived Concerto with music by Henry Gorecki (which was choreographed for her own company in 1993), Opus One, a new solo for Mikhail Baryshnikov with music by Alban Berg, and Bartok’s Mandarin Merveilleux for the Ballet de l’Opéra du Rhin. In 2005, Ms. Childs choreographed Ten Part Suite for the Boston Ballet with music by Arcangelo Corelli.

In April 2007 Childs appeared in Robert Wilson’s production of Bach’s Passion of Saint John at the Théâtre de Chatelet in Paris, before returning to the Opéra du Rhin to choreograph and direct Stravinsky’s Le Rossignol and Oedipus Rex.

Since 1992, Ms. Childs has worked extensively in the domain of opera, including Luc Bondy’s production of Richard Strauss’s Salome, which she choreographed for the Salzburg Festival, and then later revived for La Scala in Milan in March 2007. In 1995 she choreographed Bondy’s production of Verdi’s Macbeth for the Scottish Opera, and Peter Stein’s De Nederlandse Opera’s production of Moise et Aron. That same year Ms. Childs directed her first opera, Mozart’s Zaide, for La Monnaie in Brussels. In 2001, Childs choreographed the Los Angeles Opera’s production of Wagner’s Lohengrin, conducted by Kent Nagano. In 2002, Ms. Childs directed Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice for the Scottish Opera and in 2003 Ms. Childs was invited to return to Los Angeles Opera to choreograph and direct a new production of Orfeo ed Euridice. Ms. Childs also choreographed Roland Aeschlimann’s production of Wagner’s Parsifal, which premiered at the Grand Theatre de Genève in 2004, and most recently she choreographed John Adams new opera, Doctor Atomic, directed by Peter Sellars, which premiered in 2005 with the San Francisco Opera, and was later revived by the Holland Festival in June 2007, and recently appeared at the Lyric Opera of Chicago in December 2007.

In 2004 Ms. Childs was appointed by the French Government to the rank of Commandeur dans l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.

Dance will be performed on Friday, September 25 and Saturday, September 26 at 8:00 pm on the ’62 Center Mainstage, located at 1000 Main Street, in Williamstown, MA. Tickets are $3 with valid student ID & $10 for all others.

For tickets, visit the Williams ’62 Center Box Office Tues-Sat, 1-5 pm or call (413) 597-2425. For more information, please visit http://62center.williams.edu