Charmaine Warren
  • Home
    • About Me
  • Up Next
  • Dance
    • Dance/Education
    • Dance/Performances
  • Yoga
    • Yoga/Classes
    • Yoga/Workshops
  • Consulting
  • Writing
  • Blogspot
  • Suggested Links
  • Contact Me

Leslie Cuyjet + Lela Aisha Jones as part of DoublePlus @ 2016, a split-bill evening curated by Cynthia Oliver @ Gibney Dance

2/16/2017

0 Comments

 
The “Split-Bill” series is built on each curator’s special knowledge of artists they bring together.  Here, Oliver brought Cuyjet and Jones together because of their dissimilar, yet similar interests.  Oliver says, “Lela’s work draws on very specific cultural transmission linked to particular black ethnicities in the diaspora… [and]…Leslie looks at the ways experience and class have precluded bodies like hers from consideration by nature of race.” Together, their markedly different styles centered or bordered thoughts on culture, class and bodies moving—an evening of spiritual overtones and undertones.  A look at the titles could be one way in.  From Jones, there was Plight Release & the Diasporic Body: Jesus & Egun, and from Cuyjet, Alike.  Jones’ Plight… is first, it is big, and asks a good deal of the audience too.  She invites the audience to write a note and place it in one of three buckets on stage under hanging set pieces.  There was “HOUSE” for our intention; “CROSS,” if Jesus was who we called on; and “LADDER” allowing us to communicate with “EGUN/ANCESTORS.”  Jones, solo at first, is electric and the audience is willing. Responding to her tambourine, her songs (“Give me that old time religion”), and cheerful prompts— “clap your hands.” Zakiya L. Cornish and Patricia Peaches join and a lot more happens, it seems, almost all at once.  Peel away the many layers that follow and see Jones’ journey as an invitation to join her in spirit. Cuyjet’s longer Alike was radically different in all ways possible.  Darrin Wright, the one male soloist begins in a bare space, jumping, slow at first, but then faster and all around the space.  Moving fast and furious, he envelops the empty space.  When Cuyjet enters, in bright colors, her orange pants stand out the most, she too comes at us fast and furious, moving all over the place.  Stomp, move, move, move, hip swing, arms follow, stomp, twirl, slow down.   Wright exits, Cuyjet is alone.  Wright returns, and they move together again, balancing, breathing, sliding and rushing through pattern after pattern.  Without pause, midway they change their tops, all the while moving.  Towards the end, Cuyjet lies on top of Wright, they make shapes within shapes, body wrapping body, until they stop.  This mostly quiet dance about movement is uninterrupted, except once when a slow Elvis Presley tune came in—surprise?  
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Email subscription form header
    Never miss a post
    Your email address:*
    Name*
    Please wait...
    Please enter all required fields Click to hide
    Correct invalid entries Click to hide
    No spam, ever. Promise. Powered by FeedBlitz

    Categories

    All
    Articles
    Audition
    Grants
    Intensives
    Interviews
    Lecture
    News
    Opportunities
    Performance Calendars
    Positions
    Previews
    Video-clips
    What I Saw
    Workshops

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    July 2024
    June 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    October 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    May 2012

    RSS Feed

    My LinkedIn Profile

    Author

    I am a performer, historian, consultant and dance writer. I am a Empire State College's online program Center for Distance Learning.  I am also a former faculty member at The Ailey School and the Alvin Ailey/Fordham University dance major program, Hunter College, Sarah Lawrence College (Guest), Kean University and The Joffrey Ballet School's Jazz and Contemporary Trainee Program.  I write on dance for The Amsterdam News, Dance Magazine and various publications.  Click below to read more about me at my home page - "About Me."

    "About Me"
Proudly powered by Weebly