» Continued from pg 5 Beyond Gravity
Europe. He holds an MFA in Choreography and a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from the University of California at Davis. jesscurtisgravity.org JOSE E ABAD is a queer social practice perfor- mance artist exploring queer futurity through an intersectional lens. abad is a collaborator in two queer performance collectives, Yum Yum Club and Lxs Des, and has performed solo and collaborative works nationally and internationally with artists including Joanna Haigood, Keith Hennessy, Scott Wells, Anne Bluethenthal & Dancers, NAKA Dance Theatre, Seth Eisen, Ivo Dimchev, Brontez Purnell Dance Company, and detour dance. ZULFIKAR ALI BHUTTO //FALUDA ISLAM\\ is an artist, performer, zombie drag queen and curator of mixed Pakistani, Lebanese and Iranian descent. Bhutto was curatorial resident at SOMArts Cultural Center where he co-curated, The Third Muslim: Queer and Trans Muslim Narratives of Resistance and Resilience and is a fall artist in residence at the Headlands Center for the Arts. GABRIEL CHRISTIAN is a multidisciplinary blaq artist. After receiving a BA in Theatre Studies from Yale University in 2013, they shifted coasts and work from their native New York to the Bay Area. His oeuvre has pivoted from stage performance to reifying queer desire, genderfluidity (or "juicyness"), and black resilience through a broader spectrum of movement arts. They have mounted commissioned work at Finnish Brotherhood Hall, Counterpulse, SO- MArts, Mason Chapel for San Francisco International Arts Festival 2017, and Red Poppy Art House for FRESH Festival 2018. ABBY CRAIN is a San Francisco Bay Area based artist who makes dances and other structures for performance. She also works as a teacher and performer. Her solo and collaborative work has been presented in the San Francisco Bay Area, New York City, Liverpool, Chicago, Cork, Berlin, Portland and Los Angeles at a range of venues including Counter- pulse Theater (SF), Headlands Center for the Arts, Berkeley Art Museum, Movement Research, and Show Box LA. Her work has been nominated for a Bay Area Izzie four times. RACHAEL DICHTER is a San Francisco based dancer, performer, choreographer and curator. Having studied dance and art history at Mills College and was a 2015 Danceweb Scholar, and 2017 Artist in Residence at Caldera and a recipient of the Robert Rauschenberg Residency. Her work has shown locally and in Berlin, St Erme France, Portland, Seattle and she had been lucky to collaborate with a number of fierce and talented folks and for four years she co-curated the San Francisco based live arts festival THIS IS WHAT I WANT.
FIND SPACE, CREATE
believe that these buildings somehow express a desire for something that is different. Texas is confusing to me. It is supposed to somehow be my home, but it somehow is not. I have a hard time in a culture that con- siders watermelon a sufficient vegetable for dinner, though I am proud to sign my line in the name of bad ass fun loving tough ladies with whisky in their trunks and cigarettes in their hands. In Lindenau (Rifle Club) party for the other siblings I am taking the Texas dance hall, a structure that figures prominently in my personal family history, as a site where the culturally devalued (dancing) and the cultur- ally overvalued (gun owning) are roommates. I am interested in this. As I am interested in dancing, but have never touched a gun, my interest is from the perspective of what it invites into the dancing. If dancing is wor- shipped in the same shrine as firearms, it must somehow be considered an important, if luna- tic, activity. Thus, my project in this piece is to value my work as a dancer, as if dancing was something as central and revered in Ameri- can culture as gun owning. Part of this is logistical and practical: I aim to keep as much of the money as possible from the fee for the piece as salary for my labor as a maker and performer. Anyone who has logged unpaid, unseen hours of labor as a homemaker or caretaker knows that no mat- ter how much we love something, money imparts value and wields power. It means something. I want to see how it changes the work if I consider my own labor to be important enough to be decently paid. Part of this is craft based: I am working on the dancing. I am training. I am working on the dancing cuz I know those dudes are shin- ing their guns. Part of this is existential: I am practicing believing that what I do is impor- tant, relevant, and essential. I am practic- ing believing that it matters, cuz they believe their stupid guns matter. To do this work, I am calling on freak ancestors and misfits and dancing fools to call me out and move with me. I am a firm opponent of human exceptionalism so some of these are not human. I am calling out the ones who haven’t been invited to the party, to the reunion, the ones who disappeared, the ones who were made invisible through sys- tematic omission and withdrawal of support. This past summer I saw an alligator gar. These are huge, ugly prehistoric fish that
Mira Kautto / photo by Mira Kautto
Sonoma Community Center: This rehearsal space features abundant natural light and is ideal for classes, rehearsals or yoga. Includes access to adjoining waiting area. The floor is fully sprung. Highlighting venues and studio space around the Bay Area
jose e abad / photo by by Deirdre Visser
Sonoma Community Center: 768 sq. ft. $30 per hour 276 E. Napa St, Sonoma
bayareaspaces.org/spaces/8185
Find more spaces for dance at bayareaspaces.org
Abby Crain / photo by Chani Bockwinkel
live in the murky brown waters of the Texas countryside. The one I saw must have been five feet long. They are systematically killed because they eat the sport fish, but these monsters still persist. They are crucial for the balance of the ecosystem in the water, even though no one is taking their picture to put on their wall. The alligator gar is invited to this party. JESS CURTIS is an award-winning choreographer and performer committed to an art-making practice informed by experimentation, innovation, critical discourse and social relevance at the intersections of fine art and popular culture. In 2000, Curtis founded his own trans-continental performance company, Jess Curtis/Gravity, based in Berlin and San Francisco. Curtis is active as a writer, advocate and community organizer in the fields of contem- porary dance and performance, and teaches acces- sible Dance, Contact Improvisation and Interdisci- plinary Performance courses throughout the US and 1. The first letter of the Arabic alphabet consisting of a simple vertical stroke
Photo courtesy Sonoma Community Center
Jess Curtis/Gravity presents Beyond Gravity: Oct 25-27, CounterPulse, SF. jesscurtisgravity.org, counterpulse.org
1 5 T H A N N I V E R S A R Y
PERFORMANCES BY STEAMROLLERDance Company HālauMakana Polynesian Cultural Arts Jean Isaacs’ SanDiego Dance Theater ODC/Dance: Kimi Okada RobertMoses’ Kin
SAT & SUN October 20 - 21, 2018 11am - 2:45pm Tours every 45 min. TOURS START 4 TH & CHANNEL ST. MISSION CREEK PARK epiphanydance.org
AisanHoss andDancers Epiphany Dance Theater FREE! WITH MUNI FARE
PHOTOGRAPHY: Andy Mogg DESIGN: Kevin Clarke BREDA MUNI MODEL: Shirley Sachsen
in dance OCT 2018
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