Reciprocities: Making and Supporting Dance between France and the United States

Villa Albertine presented the professional symposium Reciprocities: Making and Supporting Dance between France and the United States which livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network on Thursday 26 October and Friday 27 October 2023.

How do we sustain a practice of global exchange in dance at a time of climate and funding crisis; a time marked by social inequities and cultural upheavals? What are the privileges and abundances, the tools and creative resources that can be shared and imagined in common? Drawing on a rich tradition of choreographic exchange and collaboration, the symposium gathered dance artists, curators, scholars, and funders working on both sides of the Atlantic to reflect upon and speculate on the models and approaches that can best guide future partnerships and cooperative action.

This two-day event featured artists dialogues as well as roundtables with experts and one-on-one artists’ dialogues on topics such as choreographing residencies, pedagogy as performance, acts of transmission, and curatorial ecologies.

Curated by Noémie Solomon with the support of an Advisory Committee and the Albertine’s team.

The Professional Symposium was organized as part of the Albertine Dance Season: a year-long celebration of the art of dance from inception to performance.

Schedule

Thursday 26 October 2023

Welcome

9:30 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 15:30 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)

Introductions

10 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 16:00 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)

Roundtable I: Pedagogy as Performance

10:30 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 16:30 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
What can hybrid spaces of learning–where pedagogy meets performance and vice-versa–teach curatorial practices? What are the educational and experimental models that drive the development of “creative campuses” and dance programs on both sides of the Atlantic?

Panelists:
Raphaëlle Delaunay, Choreographer and Dance Educator, Program Élan–Centre National de la Danse (CND), Pantin; Joshua Lubin Levy, Director, Center for the Arts, Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut; Noé Soulier, Choreographer and Director, Centre National de Danse Contemporaine (CNDC), Angers; Dr. Julia M. Ritter, Dean, University of Southern California Glorya Kaufman School of Dance, University of Southern California.

Moderated by Tara Aisha Willis, Performer, Curator, and Scholar.

Respondent: Ashley Dehoyos Sauder, Curator, Diverseworks, Houston, TX.

Artists Provocation I

12 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 18:00 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
Linda Hayford (FAIR-E collective) and Alain “Hurrikane” Lauture.

Roundtable II: Choreographing Residencies

2:15 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 20:15 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
Drawing on artistic needs, how can we design malleable infrastructures of care than span extended periods of time and various geographies? How might the creative residency foreground issues of research and deceleration in a product-oriented economy?

Panelists:
Edgar Miramontes, Executive and Artistic Director, Center for the Art and Performance (CAP-UCLA), Los Angeles; Elsa Safarti, Director, Espace 1789, Saint-Ouen; Catherine Tsekenis, Executive Director, Centre National de la Danse (CND), Pantin; Marýa Wethers, Independent Creative Producer and Curator, New York.

Moderated by Judy Hussie-Taylor, Director, Danspace Project, New York.

Respondent: Ashley Ferro-Murray, Director, Arts Program, Doris Duke Foundation.

Artists Provocation II

3:45 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 21:45 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
Emmanuelle Huynh and Tara Lorenzen.

Friday 27 October 2023

Introductions

9:30 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 15:30 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)

Artists Provocation III

10 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 16:00 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
Dorothée Munyaneza and Will Rawls.

Roundtable III: Acts of Transmission

11:00 a.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 17:00 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
What is the role of transmission in dance making and curating? How does it play out across practices of composition and performance, preservation and mediation? What are the strategies that enable choreographic works to live on, to reach out to and gather various assemblies thus bridging generational and cultural divides?

Panelists:
Anne Collod, Performer and Choreographer; Serge Laurent, Director of Dance and Culture Program, Van Cleef & Arpels; Linda Murray, Curator, Jerome Robbins Dance Collection, NYPL-Performing Arts; David Hamilton Thomson, Choreographer / Performer.

Moderated by André Lepecki, Professor Department of Performance Studies and Associate Dean, Center for Research & Study, Tisch School of the Arts, NYU.

Respondent: Ruth Estévez, Independant curator.

Artists Provocation IV

1:15 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 19:15 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
Rachid Ouramdane and Lauren Bakst.

Roundtable IV: Curatorial Ecologies

2:15 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 20:15 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)
What are the roles and responsibilities of dance curators today in regard to various artists, works, collectivities? How can we account for stark social inequalities, as well as the ecological challenges we face while continuing to nurture exchanges locally and internationally?

Panelists:
Tanguy Accart, Director of Development and Artistic Projects, Biennale de la Danse + Maison de la Danse, Lyon; Rachid Ouramdane, Choreographer and Director, Chaillot-Théâtre National de la Danse, Paris; Janet Wong, Associate Artistic Director, New York Live Arts.

Moderated by Angela Mattox, Senior Manager of Awardee Engagement, Creative Capital, New York (ex-curator, PICA)

Respondent: Ali Rosa Salas, VP of Visual and Performing Arts, Abrons Arts Center, New York.

Conclusions

3:30 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 21:30 CEST (Paris, UTC +2)

About Noémie Solomon

Noémie Solomon works in the field of dance and performance as a writer, teacher, and curator. She edited the collections DANSE (an anthology and a catalogue published by Presses du réel, 2014 and 2015) that translate and present key texts on the somatic and linguistic trades between French and North American choreographic cultures. She holds a PhD in Performance Studies and is director of the Institute for Curatorial Practice in Performance.

About The Advisory Committee

To nurture the exchanges and develop the professional symposium, an advisory committee 2022-2023 has been created with twelve US and French representatives led by Noémie Solomon as advisor and the Villa Albertine’s team.

It includes from United States:
Philip Bither, senior curator, performing arts, Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota; Angela Mattox, senior manager of awardee engagement, Creative Capital, New York (ex Curator, PICA); Sophie Myrtil-McCourty, founder and director, Lotus Arts Management, New York, New York; Anne-Gaëlle Saliot, associate professor of romance studies and core faculty of the arts of the moving image program. Duke University, Durham, North Carolina; Will Rawls, multidisciplinary choreographer working in dance, video and installation and associate professor, University of California- Los Angeles; Tara Aisha Willis, dancer and writer (ex-curator in Performance and Public Practice at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Illinois.)

From France:
Catherine Tsekenis, executive director, Centre National de la Danse (CN D), Pantin; Gaëlle Massicot-Bitty, director, music and live arts, Institut français, Paris; Laurent Vinauger, advisor, dance, Ministry of Culture-délégation à la danse, Paris; Collectif FAIR-E, co-directors–National Choreographic Center, Rennes; Tanguy Accart, director, productions and development, Maison de la danse, Lyon; Serge Laurent, director of dance and culture program, Van Cleef and Arpels, Paris.

About HowlRound TV

HowlRound TV is a global, commons-based, peer-produced, open-access livestreaming and video archive project stewarded by the nonprofit HowlRound. HowlRound TV is a free and shared resource for live conversations and performances relevant to the world’s performing-arts and cultural fields. Its mission is to break geographic isolation, promote resource sharing, and develop our knowledge commons collectively. Anyone can participate in a community of peer organizations revolutionizing the flow of information, knowledge, and access in our field by becoming a producer and co-producing with us. Learn more by going to our participate page. For any other queries, email tv@howlround.com or call Vijay Mathew at +1 917.686.3185 Signal. View the video archive of past events.