DANCE

Friday and Saturday, June 17 & 18, 2011 – Dancepatheatre has gathered a collaborative team of artist/performers to create its new work, Beyond the Molting Season....  Artistic Director and choreographer Sara Draper is participating in the creative process with Natasha Manley (music specialist), Neil Ellis Orts (writing/performance art specialist) and Lindsey Thompson (dance specialist). Everyone on the team has multiple artistic talents, and each performs both movement and voice in this premiere work.

Weaving together authentic life stories with a unique adaptation of the classic Hans Christian Anderson tale, The Ugly Duckling, transforms this children's favorite into a new look at personal transformation in life's twisting, turning journey. With sensuous and sometimes humorous dance, spoken word, singing, physical acting and recorded narration, Beyond the Molting Season... takes audience members on journeys of their own.

This work is a natural for Dancepatheatre, already known for fusing dance with story, word, and voice, with its forte of telling personal, authentic stories. The new element in this project is the depth of the interdisciplinary collaborative nature of the process. “This type of project is something I’ve wanted to do for years,” Draper says.

 “In the past, I often worked, for example, by choreographing around a poet’s live performances of her completed poems. That’s a simple, straightforward way to collaborate and I love it. This is more complex.” Draper first gathered the collaborative team together, and they, “began with a clean slate, chose our theme and clarified our process together, and moved forward from there. I’ve given up a great deal of artistic dominance in this piece to let some fresh energy in. It’s an experiment that I’m enjoying and I think the audience will enjoy the richness of the result.”

Beyond the Molting Season… will be performed as part of Program C in the Big Range Dance Festival at 8 pm on June 17 and 18, 2011 at Barnevelder Theatre, 2201 Preston, Houston, TX, 77004.

This project is funded in part by an Arts Project Grant from the City of Houston through  Houston Arts Alliance.

Photo by Lindsey Thompson. Neil Ellis Orts, Natasha Manley, Lindsey Thompson, and Sara Draper rehearsing Beyond the Molting Season… with Dancepatheatre. (detail above, full image below).