This article originally appeared in the Culture section of Bloomberg News on July 26, 2007. Shen Wei Dance Arts production of "Second Visit to the Empress" (Photo: Stephanie Berger) July 26 (Bloomberg) -- Thoreau was right when he wrote that urban life threatens to do us in. Frederic Flamand, director of the Ballet National de Marseille, tackles this theme in ``Metapolis II,'' which opened last night at the New York State Theater as part of the Lincoln Center Festival. A collaboration with Pritzker Prize-winning architect Zaha Hadid, the … [Read more...]

This article originally appeared in the Culture section of Bloomberg News on July 17, 2007. July 17 (Bloomberg) -- Dressed in rakish, mismatched bits of theatrical costume, six feisty dancers evoke a ragtag traveling circus onstage and off. They're down on their luck yet plucky, lacking the talent to match their big dreams. This is ``B'zyrk,'' one of the new-to-New York pieces in the opening-night program of Pilobolus, the company that will be cavorting at the Joyce Theater in Chelsea through Aug. 11. As is typical of a Pilobolus creation, the … [Read more...]

This article originally appeared in Voice of Dance (http://www.voiceofdance.org) on June 28, 2007. Mikhail Baryshnikov and Hell's Kitchen Dance / Howard Gilman Performance Space, Baryshnikov Arts Center, NYC / June 22-24, 2007 Dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov. Photo by Olivier Simola. Tragically, classical ballet dancers are athletically over the hill in their thirties. That leaves decades of life to be used constructively. Some artists--like the legendary Alicia Alonso, Margot Fonteyn, and Rudolf Nureyev--insisted upon performing until the last … [Read more...]