Based on Radial Courses (1976) and Interior Drama (1977) by Lucinda Childs

the performance

Beutler’s cover is a veritable feast of physical suspense.
Sander Hiskemuller, 29 march 2010, De Trouw (Dutch national newspaper)

Fascinated by the radical and deceptively simple minimalism of Lucinda Childs’ early work, Beutler chose to remake two of her silent dance pieces, Radial Courses (1976) and Interior Drama (1977), setting the latter to a specially composed work by Gary Shepherd.

The underlying choreographic scores are captivating and indecipherably complex. Radial Courses is based on three movement sequences in a constantly shifting, circulatory composition. In Interior Drama five dancers conform to an apparently perfect system, moving in repetitive and hallucinatory patterns. Childs describes her own work as an ‘intense experience of intense looking and listening’. Beutler’s reinterpretations centre on the individual dancer’s efforts and responsibilities within the group patterns, revealing parallel realities and the ritualistic qualities of both dances.

Childs often operates like a sculptor rendering her dances into objects that can be turned around, observed from many angles… each dance, for the spectator, is a process of remembering, noticing, making contrasts and comparisons, constructing patterns and making sense of their juxtapositions to other nearly identical patterns. (Sally Banes, “Lucinda Childs: Making the world Whole” In: Performance, December 1981)

the people involved

concept, choreography Nicole Beutler
made in collaboration with:
repetitor Ty Boomershine
artistic assistance Bojana Mladenovic
dancers Hillary Blake Firestone, Naiara Mendioroz, Aimar Pérez Gali, Javier Vaquero Ollero, Marjolein Vogels
internship Rozemarijn de Neve
lighting design Minna Tiikkainen
costume Jessica Helbach
music composition Gary Shepherd
piano Alecs Gruijc
technique Martin Kaffarnik
production Josta Obbink
management Janine Dijkmeijer
many thanks to Hester van Hasselt, Frederic Gies, Felix Ritter

commissioned by COVER #2
coproduced by Cover #2 and nb

premiere 24 march 2010, Frascati, Amsterdam

press photos

tourdates


May 4, 2011 / Theater Kikker, Utrecht (NL)
₂₀₁₀
November 20 / De Lieve Vrouw, Amersfoort (NL)
Oktober / Festival City of Women, Ljubiljana (SLO)
Oktober 2 / De Nederlandse Dansdagen, Maastricht (NL)
September 27+28 / Sadler’s Wells, Festival of Miniatures, London (UK)
September 9,10,11+12 / Flux-S Festival, Eindhoven (NL)
June 2 / RADIAL COURSES ONLY – Korte metten, Vooruit Citadelpark, Gent – 12 uur! (B)
March 24+25 / Cover#2, Frascati, Amsterdam (NL)