Partial View - 2005 — Neil Greenberg

Partial View

2005

4 dancers

50 min

With Partial View I got the chance to collaborate with John Jesurun, a theater and media artist whose work I’ve followed and admired since the early 1980’s. In the 1990’s I created choreography for his serial play, Chang in a Void Moon, in which my company appeared under the nom-de-danse “Baby Hokaido and Bunzel Dance Group.” For Partial View Jesurun and I worked together on the video concept and design.

For my part, I was expanding upon the work with video that I began in a commission for Ricochet Dance Theater in London in 2001, P.O.V., and continued with my Dance Theater Workshop premiere from 2003, Two. In both works I used live video projections to expand the stage space and provide an alternative text to the dance information, in much the same way I’ve sometimes used projected written text. Jesurun upped the ante further by providing pre-recorded images, which were mixed with the live video on two screens.

I was interested in how the juxtaposition of the live and the mediated might reveal something related to meaning-making. The title, too, points toward the incomplete and tentative nature of how we humans construct meaning. (Although I did hear that at least one audience member was quite miffed when they read “Partial View” on their ticket.)

The program also included partial view solo, which I performed as an introduction to Partial View.

Premiered at Dance Theater Workshop, New York City, in April 2005.

Credits

Performed by: Justine Lynch, Paige Martin, Luke Miller, Colin Stilwell

Video: John Jesurun

Original Music: Zeena Parkins

Acoustic and electric harp, wasp synth: Zeena Parkins
Marimba, vibraphone: Jim Pugliese
Framedrums, wooden flutes, voice: Raz Mesinai
Mixing and Mastering: Doug Henderson at Micro-Moose Studio

Lighting Design: Michael Stiller

Costumes: Liz Prince and The Company

Production Stage Manager: Leo Janks

Video Coordination, Editing and Operation: Ray Roy

Rehearsal Assistant: Patrick Mueller

Support

Commissioned by the Bessie Schonberg/First Light Commissioning and Creative Residency Program of Dance Theater Workshop with support from the Ford Foundation and the Jerome Robbins Foundation, and in association with Ginny and Tim Milhiser of the David R. White Producers Circle

Multi-Arts Production (MAP) Fund, a program of Creative Capital supported by the Rockefeller Foundation,

National Endowment for the Arts

New York State Council on the Arts

The Harkness Foundation for Dance

Purchase College Faculty Support Fund

American Music Center Live Music for Dance Program

Developed in part through a residency at Skidmore College

Videotaped by the Dance Collection of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts for preservation in the Jerome Robbins Archive of the Recorded Moving Image

Recorded at Dance Theater Workshop in April, 2005 by Character Generators, Mark Robison, Director. Edited by Ray Roy.

Press

Jennifer Dunning, New York Times

Deborah Jowitt, Village Voice

Victoria Looseleaf, Los Angeles Times

Tresca Weinstein, Times Union, Albany

Don Daniels, Ballet Review

Additional Links

Time Out New York Audience “Bessie” Award Citation

Excerpts from Partial View

8-minute excerpt from Partial View