University of Wisconsin’s dance department will debut their first show of 2020 tonight , Feb. 6, at the Margaret H’Doubler Performance Space in Lathrop Hall at 8:00 p.m.
The show will feature six total dances, including two large group pieces, three mid-sized group pieces and one solo piece. UW Dance faculty artists Duane Lee Holland, Li Chiao-Ping, Marlene Skog, Chris Walker and Jin-Wen Yu will be presenting an array of contemporary, ballet and hip-hop numbers. The show will close with excerpts from guest artist Sean Curran’s contemporary piece “Social Discourse,” which the dance department describes on their website as “an abstract work with robust athletic partnering.”
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Assistant Professor Duane Lee Holland is the first Hip-Hop scholar on UW’s Dance Faculty and will be premiering his piece entitled “Heartbreak Hotel.” Holland was formerly an associate professor at Boston Conservatory at Berklee and has performed with modern dance choreographers such as Ronald K. Brown, Garth Fagan, Bill T. Jones and Makeda Thomas.
Professor Li Chiao-Ping will be premiering her piece “Dirt,” which, according to the UW Dance Department website, “casts 14 dancers as microorganisms in a whimsical free-form fantasy.” Formerly the chair of the Dance Department at UW, Chiao-Ping was named by Dance Magazine as one of the “25 to watch,” and specializes in a variety of dance disciplines.
Professor Jin-Wen Yu will present “Said and Done,” a piece that explores non-verbal expression, assistant professor Marlene Skog will present an exploration of Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and professor Chris Walker will present an ensemble work titled “The Bend,” a piece which explores the dinki mini, an Afro-Jamaican traditional dance.
Sean Curran is a graduate and faculty member of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and is the current Chair of the Dance Department at Tisch. His notable projects include “Salome” (Opera Theatre of St. Louis, San Francisco Opera, Opera Montreal, San Diego Opera), “Much Ado About Nothing” and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (The Shakespeare Theater), “Romeo and Juliette“ (Metropolitan Opera) and many others. He is a highly sought-after choreographer whose work will surely close the night out with a bang.
The show will also run Friday, Feb. 7 at 8:00 p.m., Saturday Feb. 8 at 2:30 p.m. and the following week with the same days, times and location.
Tickets to the event are $22 for the general public and $16 for students, and can be purchased at UW Campus Arts Ticketing website. There will be complementary food and beverages following the Friday night shows in Lathrop Hall’s Virginia Harrison Parlor.
