Lovette Delivers at Taylor; Alex Katz at Guggenheim; Transverse Orientation at BAM

John Harnage in Solitaire. Photo: Whitney Browne

"Taylor—A New Era" 

These simple, clear words headlined the cover of Paul Taylor Dance Company’s Playbill for its 2022 fall run at the Koch Theater. Since the later years of the founding choreographer’s life (he died in 2018), under the leadership of Artistic Director Michael Novak, the organization has been trying out different strategies for moving forward without new work by Taylor. After a confusing tango with the Paul Taylor American Modern Dance umbrella (begun by Taylor himself) under which a varied slate of American choreographers were commissioned to create new works on the Taylor dancers, things seem to have reverted back to the old PTDC moniker, or simply Taylor.

Branding aside, the programming concept has certainly evolved. The Orchestra of St. Luke’s continues to be the house band, but this time, it performed musical selections with no dance on a handful of programs. While I enjoyed hearing excerpts of Philip Glass’ The Hours by the orchestra, I couldn’t help feeling that it was a bit of a wasted opportunity to showcase the talented dancers who were backstage. Nonetheless, it highlighted the importance of live music to the company.

On a bright note, Lauren Lovette’s premiere of Solitaire is further proof of her creative talent, and that naming her resident choreographer for five years was a wise choice by Novak, if somewhat of a gamble. Substantial on many levels, Solitaire featured the crisp, elegant John Harnage in the sort of poet-on-a-journey role not unfamiliar to fans of Taylor’s oeuvre. It is set to music by Swiss composer Ernest Bloch, with dramatic string sections and a sense of gravitas and impetus. Santo Loquasto designed costumes and the set, which included an ominous diamond-shaped element that loomed like a guillotine over a serene mountainscape, descending and rising.

But what pops is Lovette’s facility with making modern phrases that flow organically, but which challenge the skilled company’s technical chops seemingly beyond what most of the repertory has until now. That’s not to say that Taylor’s vocabulary is not challenging, but Lovette’s accomplished ballet career heretofore has likely seeped into her movement—in the best way. It’s not ballet, but there’s an integrity and underlying structure that comes across. She has also found a way to convey an unspecific narrative that feels like a rich story waiting to be written. Solitaire was sandwiched between Taylor’s joyful, bittersweet Company B and Syzygy, a study in freneticism done in a completely different vocabulary, forming a satisfying slate with breadth.

Shawn Lesniak and Jada Pearman in The Green Table. Photo: Ron Thiele

Speaking of which, the season included Kurt Jooss’ The Green Table, another example of the expansion of the troupe’s artistic horizons. (It had been remounting classics of American modern dance in pre-Covid seasons, but not by international artists.) This classic 1932 work about the senselessness of war, and how it is wrought by those far from the battleground, remains timeless and gut-wrenching. It makes sense for Taylor to take on this legendary dance, with its muscular phrasing and trenchant messaging. A bonus was seeing Shawn Lesniak in the role of Death (once danced by Jooss himself), carving sharp swaths, and forming perfect, machined angles with his long limbs. In other dances, without the lavish mask, makeup and headdress, I could see Lesniak’s gifts anew, and look forward to seeing him in more and more big roles.

Madelyn Ho and Alex Clayton in Syzygy. Photo: Whitney Browne

As much as (most of) the previous generation of dancers is missed, it is a pleasure to become acquainted with the new one. The dancer who seems to now be the most cast, at least in prominent roles, is Madelyn Ho, who was in everything I saw over three programs. She counters her small size, which might be less visible to the uppermost seats, with an extra dash of verve and joy. She dances with delicacy and articulation, plus ferocity and athleticism. Arden Court showed off many of the newer men—the explosive Alex Clayton, a soaring Devon Louis, and the sheer joy of Austin Kelly.

Maria Ambrose, John Harnage, Shawn Lesniak, Jada Pearman,
Kristin Draucker in Polaris. Photo by Ani Collier

Alex Katz—Gathering, Guggenheim Museum

The season coincided with Gathering, a Guggenheim retrospective of Alex Katz’s work, who designed many works for Taylor. Two outstanding Taylor/Katz collabs from the 1970s—Polaris and Sunset—were performed on the season finale program. Both display Taylor’s varied genius. Polaris, in which the same movement is performed by two different casts, with varied music, lighting and mood, rendering two completely unique dances; and Sunset, with its lush, romantic score by Elgar (plus loons), its old world approach to flirting and courting, and the contrasting depiction of an unrequited bond between two soldiers.

Paul Taylor, by Alex Katz

Katz’s show at the Guggenheim includes a portrait of Taylor, as well as a painting of the company performing. It’s hard to say what makes Katz’s work feel so quintessentially American—the distinct light, the flat expanses, the reductive line and composition, or all of the above? The exhibition includes some of his more intrepid experiments, such as painted aluminum cutouts (he created a bunch of dogs like this for Taylor’s Diggity) and repeated images of his wife Ada within one picture. The coincidence of his retrospective with a featured spot in the Taylor season underscored the artist’s continual output in the last half century.

Transverse Orientation, BAM

BAM presented Transverse Orientation by Dmitris Pappaionnou, whose Great Tamer had been shown a few years ago. The big imprimatur for Pappaionnou was that he was the first choreographer to be commissioned by Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch after her sudden death, as well as creating the opening ceremony for the 2004 Athens Olympics. So many artists have been influenced by Bausch, but most have been careful to avoid direct quotes. But Pappaionnou took the plunge with Transverse, inserting vignettes evocative of Bausch—a woman transformed into a fountain, and a giant wall built of foam blocks which toppled forward. Somehow it felt okay, as if enough time has passed, and because he has collaborated with TWPB. Tanztheater lives, and this iteration felt like a proper homage to Bausch and another phase in the form's continuum.

I can’t say enough about the main protagonist in Transverse, a life-sized bull puppet designed by Nectarios Dionysatos. The dancers skillfully manipulated the bull’s head so as to act as how I imagine a bull would, although it was more Ferdinand than raging. Others moved his hooves and tail, also amazingly expressive. The bull served as a sort of id to man’s ego, represented in oft-naked performers. 

The piece is constructed of many scenes, most short and some quite long, that evoke a range of sensations—humor, awe, absurdity, pathos, and so on. Magically, images crystallize from thin air, as a madonna-like woman cradled in a sheaf, bearing a dripping object that turns out to be a baby. She is subsumed into the stage floor, which is torn up to reveal a lagoon. A man swabs at the pool futilely with an old mop. I thought of melting permafrost and our inability to take action in the face of an existential crisis. And then walking to the subway past the Opera House's load-in doors, where the lagoon was draining onto Ashland Place, of the magic of theater to deliver such messages.

Dorrance/Van Young Transform the Guggenheim Into a Giant Instrument

Photo: Matthew Murphy

No other building in New York City can compare to Frank Lloyd Wright's Guggenheim. The spiral ramp that forms the rotunda may pose logistical problems when installing an exhibition, but who among us hasn't daydreamed of rolling from the top to the bottom on the ramp, ideally free of visitors? The museum is currently showing Visionaries: Creating a Modern Guggenheim, which is essentially a selection of core works elucidating the museum's mission, essentially the history of modern 20th century abstract art.

Michelle Dorrance and Nicholas Van Young. Photo: Matthew Murphy

Michelle Dorrance and Nicholas Van Young, plus her company, were given free rein on Feb 16 to turn the rotunda into a giant instrument, with the full-house audience as participants. Dorrance is known for her imaginative tap choreography, but here the company for the most part wore street shoes (at least I think that's what they were, as I watched at a distance from the top level). As Dorrance whacked a drum, dancers pushed boxes on the ground (that comprised platforms when assembled), tracing figure 8s, and slapping or stomping on them to create sounds. A pair lay on the floor and posed in various shapes which read clearly from on high.

The performers hit together red plastic sticks, and mock dueled one another. A trio stood mid-level and sang out into the atrium. They then ran down the ramp for a circuit, repositioned themselves against the railing, and sang again. Just below me, a team with longer plastic tubes whacked them against the railing in rhythmic patterns. 

Photo: Matthew Murphy

Van Young stood at the ground floor's center and conducted us, the audience, in alternating rounds of claps, varying in speed and pattern. It was remarkable how quickly people picked up what he was doing, and what we needed to do in response. He and Dorrance hit some spheres floating in the small pool (which I always forget is there), creating yet more types of sounds. Wooden platforms for tapping were dragged in, and the dancers carried their tap shoes out, laced them up, and made a cacaphonous barrage of reports which bounced around the rotunda. Dorrance's ingenuity emerged not only in the tap routine she performed solo, but in the simple yet effective section where most of the company marched in a looping line, each step resonating loudly.

The event is part of the Works & Process Rotunda Project, which intends to activate the main gallery space. Dorrance/Van Young certainly left no area unused, showing the potential of the iconic space when in the hands of visionary creators. The next work in the series will be in September by ABT principal Daniil Simkin. 

The Need for Speed

Ivo Pannaggi, Speeding Train (Treno in corsa), 1922, oil on canvas, 100 x 120 cm
Fondazione Carima–Museo Palazzo Ricci, Macerata, Italy. Photo: Courtesy Fondazione Cassa di risparmio della Provincia di Macerata

The Guggenheim in New York, with its utopian form obedient to laws of physics more than the needs of its inhabitants, is the perfect venue for Italian Futurism, 1909-1944: Reconstructing the Universe, a survey of a morally flawed movement guided by style and dogma. Futurism began in literature with the 1909 publication of a manifesto by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti. Aligned with the rise of Fascism, it was meant to shake things up, and courted controversy by promulgating war and lashing out against feminism. Inflammatory tenets aside, it glorified technology and speed, which have thrived in modern Italy in the form of sleek Ferraris. Nonetheless, many Futurist artifacts made lasting impressions, and hundreds are gathered here by curator Vivien Greene.
 

Tullio Crali, Before the Parachute Opens (Prima che si apra il paracadute), 1939, oil on panel, 141 x 151 cm
Casa Cavazzini, Museo d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, Udine, Italy, © 2014 Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York/SIAE, Rome
Photo: Claudio Marcon, Udine, Civici Musei e Gallerie di Storia e Arte

One of the main themes of Futurism was capturing movement, and thus time. In this respect, it crossed over with Cubism, although Futurism was far more concerned with speed and the political implications of its many genres. The Guggenheim show includes monuments familiar from textbooks, notably Boccioni's bronze sculpture, Unique Forms of Continuity in Space (1913). But it is largely fleshed out with examples of literature, photography, film, textiles and clothing, and furniture and homeware. Graphic design and typography were particularly ripe expressive milieus for this movement that relied on verbal bombast and propaganda. One of the most powerful works is the final painting, at the zenith of the ramp—Tullio Crali's Before the Parachute Opens (1939) in which the skydiving soldier appears to be made of bronze, as if we're sitting at a dizzying height above a monumental statue looking down at its domain. Like a number of Futurist paintings, it's a snapshot of several dimensions.

Christopher Wheeldon's DGV: Danse à Grand Vitesse. Photo credit Paul Kolnik.

The urge to capture the dynamism and thrill of speed remain inspirations. Coincidentally, in its final week of the winter season, New York City Ballet performed Christopher Wheeldon's DGV: Danse à Grand Vitesse, to Michael Nyman's MGV: Musique à Grand Vitesse (both riff on the French bullet train moniker, TGV). The set, designed by the fortuitously named Jean-Marc Puissant, illustrates the effects of speed, its sheets of translucent mesh peeling off the floor as if sucked up in the wake of a passing vehicle or speedboat. The dance is full of rapid, forceful sections, and the dancers themselves become emblematic of a utopian mammal—sleek, muscular, fast, idealized. The old Futurists might have been pleased but for the prominence and relative equality of the women, and the peaceable intent.

James Turrell—Light Ascending

Aten Reign, 2013. Daylight and LED light. Site-specific installation, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York 
Looking up into the Guggenheim's rotunda.

What more appropriate day to view James Turrell at the Guggenheim than yesterday, the summer solstice, with more hours of sunlight than any other day of the year? Well, basically any other day through September 25 (natural light is just a part of it); just try and get there for this transporting installation.

Aten Reign, the main artwork, occupies the entire rotunda of the Wright building, which apparently influenced Turrell's concepts for his ongoing, monumental Roden Crater, based in a volcano in Arizona. Once inside, you may not recognize the Guggenheim. The airy ground-floor lobby has been walled off to create a viewing area. Lie back on one of the encircling benches, look up, and spend as much time as you can observing the light, continually shifting hue and intensity. (As Turrell remarked, he included his favorite colors, and, like musical notes, you need them all to make music.) Additional artworks are installed in the High Gallery, just up the ramp (which is devoid of artwork), and in the Annex on 2 & 5.

The installation of Aten Reign is extremely well executed. The surfaces of the nesting oval rings that narrow toward the perfectly egg-shaped oculus are made of stretched fabric. Rounds of LEDs provide the continually phasing light. The effect is simple, humbling, and so profoundly, mysteriously moving that it feels silly trying to talk about it. Previous works by Turrell have had a similar, if muted, effect; it's magic spun from relatively simple materials and technology and, most of all, light. Perhaps part of the allure is the evanescence of light, the key material—the coaxing and sculpting of it, like some supernatural, life-giving substance tamed.

It's hard not to contrast it with the other big show that opened this week—the Paul McCarthy show at the Armory, an exercise in excess, indulgence, and the messy side of human imagination and the psyche. Both recreate certain circumstances of nature and tap emotions and subconscious feelings. The Turrell caused my to heart sing and made me want to stay indefinitely, although it demands little work. The McCarthy show, which is nothing if not demanding, made me queasy and want to run out the door. Together, they cover the emotional and cerebral gamut of the human condition.

A handful of older works by Turrell are on view, including the very cool Afrum I (White), 1967, in which projected light forms a floating cube. But you may, as I did, regret every moment I spent away from Ater Reign. Crowds may be a problem, but it's worth it.

Picasso Black and White at the Guggenheim

The Milliner's Workshop, 1926

Believe it or not, it's been 32 years since MoMA’s Pablo Picasso retrospective. In addition to the Met’s King Tut show in 1976, it was one of the first such blockbuster exhibitions as we know them, necessitating timed ticket entry, long lines, and ubiquitous tote bags. That 1980 show made such an imprint on contemporary culture’s memory that it gave us enough Picasso for a very long time. MoMA did a thoughtful 2003 examination of Picasso in relation to Matisse, and Gagosian Gallery has showcased selections from the Spaniard’s work, but until the Guggenheim’s current Picasso Black and White survey, through January 23, 2013, his work has been oddly simmering in the background.

As the title implies, the Guggenheim’s show, organized by Carmen Giménez and travelling to the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, focuses on the artist’s black, white and in-between work. It’s a smart and bracing premise for Picasso, among the most prolific modern artists both in terms of sheer quantity and genre-wise, allowing some thematic pruning. A bit of a magpie, he flitted between styles and approaches, bouncing ideas off of his peers, experimenting constantly and keeping what stuck. The show covers an astounding stretch, between 1904 and 1971, with 118 artworks, 38 of which are new to our shores. The reductive nature of many of the artworks spotlights Picasso’s genius of converting concept into representation. 

Head of a Horse, Sketch for Guernica

There are many smaller-scaled sketches. A number are of day-to-day subjects; still lifes, cats and roosters, intimate portraits. Several are studies for some of his iconic larger politically-themed canvases, including Guernica and Rape of the Sabines, isolating a detail that might get lost in the larger tumult, such as Head of a Horse, Sketch for Guernica. Some freshly-seen works are astonishing, such as The Milliner's Workshop, which bridged cubism and surrealism and parlayed the quotidian into the realm of the sublime. 

Picasso's great output meant that he produced a lot of mediocre stuff while running through the checklist of the 20th-century's styles. But his named is equated with genius for a reason. This show refreshes an appreciation of how revolutionary and inventive he truly was, before the time of tote bags.  

Photos: The Milliner’s Workshop (Atelier de la modiste), Paris, January 1926. Oil on canvas, 172 x 256 cm. 

Musée national d’art moderne/Centre de création industrielle, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Gift of the artist, 1947. © 2012 Estate of Pablo Picasso/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: CNAC/MNAM/Dist. Réunion des Musées Nationaux/Art Resource, NY

Head of a Horse, Sketch for Guernica (Tête de cheval, étude pour Guernica), Grands-Augustins, Paris, May 2, 1937. Oil on canvas, 65 x 92 cm. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Bequest of the artist. © 2012 Estate of Pablo Picasso/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: © Archivo fotográfico Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid

Cunningham and Bokaer: Legacies Touring and Vanishing, 7/21/11

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Cunningham: Merce Fair, and Jonah Bokaer's On Vanishing at the Guggenheim.

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/blog/museums/cunningham-and-bokaer-legacies-touring-and-vanishing/1481/

On Vanishing. Photo by Michael Hart.

The end of an era began two years ago, when Merce Cunningham passed away. After an intense period of (ongoing) mourning by the dance world and the world at large, plans were unveiled by the company for the ominously titled Legacy Tour, which is in its final stages, after which the company will disband. The third-to-last New York phase took place last weekend as part of Lincoln Center Festival. (It will appear in BAM’s Next Wave Festival in December with three programs, and then leading up to New Year’s Eve at the Park Avenue Armory. Then, kaput.) But meanwhile, at the Guggenheim a few days prior to “Merce Fair,” MCDC alumnus Jonah Bokaer was quietly adding to his own oeuvre (and, in a sense, to Merce’s) with a polished, solid work, On Vanishing.

Abstraction Invades Manhattan, 9/28/09

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O'Keefe at the Whitney and Kandinsky at the Guggenheim

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/blog/museums/abstraction-invades-manhattan/756/

Two of last century’s revered artists are having major shows in New York at the same moment: Georgia O’Keeffe (1887-1986) at the Whitney, and Vasily Kandinsky (1866-1944) at theGuggenheim. The coincidence of the two exhibitions offer some interesting parallels and divergences, not to mention a look at a wealth of revolutionary artwork that altered art history’s path.

The O’Keeffe show, through January 17 (score one for O’Keeffe—her show runs four days longer), is subtitled Abstraction, and so excludes the best-known icons of her oeuvre depicting her identifiable New Mexico surrounds. It’s a revelation, like being able to have a meaningful conversation after deafening music stops. Certainly some work is familiar—imagery of crevasses, flowers, skies. But much of it is fresh, permitting an appreciation of O’Keeffe’s talents as an abstract painter. Elegant lines in spare compositions, intriguing hints of source imagery, and a gorgeous, clear palette. Dense shapes reminiscent of storms, waves, and geology mix with lighter ones of skies, clouds, plants.

Wright Again, 5/29/09

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Frank Lloyd Wright at the Gugg

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/blog/museums/wright-again/714/

There’s a lot happening on Museum Mile these days. Among many highlights, the Met just opened their new American Wing, with a cascade of period rooms and galleries of decorative and functional objects orbiting around the huge Charles Engelhard Court, an atrium showcasing sculpture and stained glass. And up the street, the Guggenheim is celebrating its 50th anniversary with an overview of work by its dad, Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959).

At first glance, the two seemed only tangentially related, tied by opening date and only the broadest of tags. The Met’s new American atrium holds some familiar sculpture and stained glass, but the sparse installation also served as a reminder of how Euro-centric the museum’s holdings are. The many cases of household items—pewter, porcelain, silver—are now sandwiched in a relatively glamourous mezzanine between the court and Central Park.

A tour (starting with the spiffy new glass elevator—Morgan Library, take that!) through the largely revamped period rooms shows just how young this country still is, or how little the past century’s industrial design has emanated from the US. (Or how little is has been valued by collectors and curators, in any case.) The earliest room, from the 1680s, feels cave-like, and the furniture is tiny in scale, especially compared to the giant maw of the fireplace.  The 20 rooms ascend chronologically as you descend, culminating in Frank Lloyd Wright’s room.

The Third Mind—Asia Gets Its Props, 2/12/09

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The Third Mind at Guggenheim.

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/blog/museums/the-third-mind%E2%80%94asia-gets-its-props/673/

The Third Mind: American Artists Contemplate Asia 1860-1989, at the Guggenheim, derives its title from a mixed-media work by William Burroughs and Brion Gysin in which disparate elements combine to make a new form. The show, on view through April 19, in the works years before the current economic tailspin, coincides with the moment’s need to diminish the material and seek the spiritual. (Okay, many of the objects in the show are still worth a bundle. And then there’s The Death of James Lee Byars, a room covered in fluttering, luminous gold leaf…)

The exhibition is fascinating when it doesn’t list into the overly ambitious.And sprawl it does, drawing on more than 100 artists. It explores various Asian inspirations and sources for many familiar and less-known American artists in the last century and a half. Curator Alexandra Munroe (Senior Curator of Asian Art) divided the show into seven chronologically organized sub-themes, all of which would serve nicely as doctoral theses. The sections pretty much cover the bases of formal, philosophical, spiritual, geographical, and in addition to visual art, pulls from literature, performance, and dance.

theanyspacewhatever, 11/4/08

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theanyspacewhatever, the Guggenheim's exhibition that examines its most famous work of art—its building.

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/blog/film/theanyspacewhatever/640/

If you recall with cynicism some of the Guggenheim’s more commercial exhibitions over the last decade (such as The Art of the Motorcycle, Brazil: Body and Soul, and the Armani retrospective), you might feel redeemed by the current show, theanyspacewhatever(http://www.guggenheim.org/exhibitions/exhibition_pages/anyspace/index.html). Or you might feel a bit duped, depending on your persuasion and/or patience.

Theanyspacewhatever emphasizes the exhibition itself as the medium. If you like to see art objects, for example Louise Bourgeois’ excellent show at the Guggenheim that closed recently, you may be disappointed. However, if you do a little homework, and like to be challenged by food for thought and not just food, theanyspacewhatever might float your boat. The ten artists included emerged in the 1990s, channelling their points of view through sometimes untraditional genres: rituals, information, storytelling. They traffic in engaging the viewer in a dialogue.

Rirkrit Tiravanija famously lived in Gavin Brown Enterprise for a spell, inviting viewers to join him for meals. Here, he has created a documentary, Chew the Fat, featuring the Guggenheim artists talking about their work and the 90s. Text is important in the work Douglas Gordon, who collaborated with Tiravanija on an upper floor coffee bar with bean bag chairs. HisPrettymucheveryword… includes phrases—some hidden, some in plain sight—all over the place, on walls, in corners, high, low. Some are painted in enamel in lovely, silly, or colored fonts; others are carved into the curved plaster walls of the museum (egad): “I’m right there,” “Nothing can be hidden forever,” and other meaningful or non sequitur phrases are encountered seemingly at random. Liam Gillick’s primary medium here is also text. He created an aluminum signage system that can be helpful or annotative: “this way,” “halfway,” “drunk from the firehose.”