Category Archives: Theater for the New City

SPIRAL WAVE is an interdisciplinary project that features sculptures, musical theater, and dance. This is a work in progress that is based on a proposed full-length production that is to take place at the Theater for the New City for a three-week run, tentatively scheduled from May 2013 to June 2013. Tonight we are using projections to take the place of the stage set, a large-scale spiral-shaped, modular wood sculpture by Argentinian/American artist Jose Landoni. The spiral wave concept translates to music and movement as well as history, as the subtext connects with the different “waves” of immigration to New York in the 20th century and the multiple cultures they brought with them. There will be Spools Dance, led by choreographer Peter Cramer, and music composed by Elodie Lauten, which was produced electronically with state-of-the-art technology. 

Background: 

This project began when Curator Carolyn Ratcliffe went to an opening of Jose Landon’s “Great Wave “ May 5, 2007. The sculpture which is 42’L x14’W x13’H, made such a strong impression that she asked the artist if he had ever considered a multidisciplinary piece incorporating the sculpture with music and dance. She then went to another friend, Elodie Lauten, a well-known composer to show her images of the sculpture and to ask if she too would be interested in collaborating on a multidisciplinary piece based on the sculpture’s theme of the Wave. The artists were introduced and we began the search for a chorographer who would be interested in the project. Along the way, through discussion the theme of waves of immigration was introduced as a subtext to the piece. It fit with the background of the artists as we had all emigrated to New York City and were familiar with the ethos of landing on a distant shore.

About the Artists: 

PETER CRAMER- DIRECTOR– SPOOL DANCE- Is anInterdisciplinary artist & activist living on the Lower East Side since 1981. His films, installations and performances have been featured in alternative spaces, museums and cultural centers internationally. Achievements include, with his partner Jack Waters the co-creation of Allied Productions Inc non profit arts umbrella in 1981, serving as directors of ABC No Rio alternative art collective from 1983-1990. and co-founder Le Petit Versailles (1996) community garden based in New York City. SPOOL Dance is the latest incarnation of collectives from POOL (Performance on One Leg) in the 80’s to DanceTube in 00’s, initiated by Cramer & Waters that engage and explore movement, media, art and activism with all types of participants whether they are performers or academics or students. 

CaRLO MARIA AMPIL is a student of anthropology and opera diva/dork living in Brooklyn and dreaming of an enchanted life. PEARL MCLOVE, born in Taiwan and moved to New York in 1998, is a classical singer, dancer and also a martial art trainer who enjoys performing on stage for people who loves FINE ART. RICARDO HORATIO NELSON is a Kingston born photographer who seeks to inject the spirit of the zephyr hills from which he hails into the soul of the concrete jungle.

BEN ROSENBERG is a performer, designer, and sex worker currently based out of Brooklyn, NY. JACK WATERS is a film maker, writer, media artist, choreographer, and performer.

ELODIE LAUTEN– IS A COMPOSER, performer and media artist. As a leading exponent of post-minimalism, Lauten’s compositions have had 30 releases to-date on many major and independent labels in the US and Europe. Her music has been presented in New York by the Lincoln Center Festival, the New York City Opera, WNYC, The Whitney Museum, The Kitchen, the Performing Garage, La Mama, Theater for the New City, and throughout North America with performances and university residencies, as well as in Europe, notably at the Paris Museum of Modern Art. Recently a retrospective of her drawings, collages and digital art was featured in the Women Forward show at the Williamsburg Art and Historical Center. Born in Paris, daughter of jazz composer Errol Parker, she has lived in downtown New York since the mid-70s. She holds a Bachelors in Economics from the Institut díEtudes Politiques in Paris, and a Masterís in electronic composition from New York University. She has taught composition at NYU and at the New York City College of Technology. She is the artistic director and curator of Lower East Side Performing Arts, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to present accessible, community oriented music programs. Recently Theater for the New City presented two of her operas: The Two-Cents Opera in 2009 and The Death of Don Juan in 2011, both 3-week runs. Additional information is available from: http://www.elodielauten.net. Email: elauten@yahoo.com

JOSE LANDONI– SCULPTOR, was born in Rio Tercero, Cordoba, Argentina, 1957. He received a Bachelors in Fine Arts majoring in Sculpture of the University of Cordoba, Argentina. In 2001-2002 he was Artist in Residence at Chashama in New York City. He spends his time between New York and Argentina where he has had a long list of exhibitions in Buenos Aires and Cordoba. He has also participated in group shows in New York notably at the Cork Gallery at Lincoln Center. His work can be viewed at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAx_6HRb8to

He works with cellular bodies and individual modules, connected in a pre-established order, creating a single piece with organic or geometric shapes that possesses, at once, a strong and delicate character. This way, I attempt to achieve purity of lines as a visual and composite element of my work; purity of line in space, in a perfect balance between light and shade.

CAROLYN RATCLIFFE-CURATOR, came to New York in 1974 to work in an art related field in 1974. She received a BA degree in Fine Art from the University of Alabama with a major in painting. She worked for the American Red Cross SMVH and the US Army Special Services in the field of recreation, planning activities and presenting events for servicemen. She developed a Performance Festival at La Plaza Cultural Community Park and Garden which she directed from its inception in 1995 to 2003, bringing such as events as La Corizon, Lincoln Center Out of Doors,, Yoshiko Chuma’s School of Hard Knocks in The Neighborhood Living room Project, Demeters Daughter by Tamar Rogoff and Danspace’s The Urban Bushwomen. She left to attend Miiano Graduate School of Management, New School to work on a Masters in nonprofit management. She is a photographer and one of the founders of Artistas de Loisaida, which became Art Loisaida Foundation, in 2008. She has curated art exhibits from 1995 on, exhibiting with Artistas de Loisaida and is the Artistic Director of Art Loisaida Foundation and has curated the LES festival of the Arts exhibit for the past 3 years at Theater for the New City

Many thanks to Crystal Field, Alex Bartineff , Roy Chang and the staff at theater for the New for City for their support and help with this project.