les BALLETS C de la B Returns To The Joyce Theatre 10/19-24

Belgium's les BALLETS C de la B will return to The Joyce Theater with the New York premiere of Out of Context - For Pina, a 90-minute dance/theater piece created by the company's founder Alain Platel,from October 19 - 24. Tickets for The Joyce Theater debut engagement of les BALLETS C de la B start at $10 and can be purchased through JoyceCharge at 212-242-0800 or online at www.joyce.org. The Joyce Theater is located at 175 Eighth Avenue at 19th Street.

Out of Context - For Pina is an intimate, surreal, uninhibited dance/theater work that displays the company's continued investigation into how movement conveys human emotion. Inspired by chorea, a disorder of the nervous system resulting in hysteric and uncontrolled movements, the piece combines compression and contortion into a unique physical poetry that mirrors the accelerating anxieties of our time. This is a witty, highly original piece, with nine dancers clad only in underwear, performing wrenching movements on an empty stage to an eclectic score that includes Glenn Gould's landmark interpretations of Bach's Goldberg Variations, music by Ravel, and R&B hits. Created by Alain Platel, one of Europe's most highly-regarded dance artists, and members of the Belgian choreographic collective les BALLETS C de la B, the work is dedicated to dancer and choreographer Pina Bausch - Platel's friend, mentor and inspiration.

ABOUT les BALLETS C de la B
Founded in 1984 by Alain Platel on a dare and a joke, les BALLETS C de la B ("Les Ballets Contemporains de la Belgique") is a cacophonous, many-headed dance-theatre collective whose performances careen between surrealism, social psychology, slapstick and semiotics. Since its founding, the Ghent, Belgium-based physical theater collective has enjoyed great success both at home and abroad and has developed into an artistic platform for a variety of international choreographers and artists such as Christine De Smedt, Koen Augustijnen, Hans Van de Broeck and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui. The company maintains its original principal of enabling artists from various disciplines and backgrounds to take part in the dynamic creative process.

ABOUT The Joyce Theater
The Joyce Theater Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization, has proudly served the dance community and its audiences since 1982. The founders, Cora Cahan and Eliot Feld, acquired and renovated the Elgin Theater in Chelsea, which opened as The Joyce Theater in 1982. The Joyce is named in honor of Joyce Mertz, beloved daughter of LuEsther T. Mertz. It was LuEsther's clear, undaunted vision and abundant generosity that made it imaginable and ultimately possible to establish the theater. One of the only theaters built by dancers for dance, The Joyce Theater has provided an intimate and elegant New York home for more than 300 domestic and international companies. The Joyce has also commissioned more than 130 new dances since 1992. In 1996, The Joyce created Joyce SoHo, a dance center providing highly subsidized rehearsal and performance space to hundreds of dance artists. New York City public school students and teachers annually benefit from The Joyce's Dance Education Program, and adult audiences get closer to dance through pre-engagement Dance Talks and post-performance "Dance Chat" discussions. The Joyce Theater now features an annual season of approximately 48 weeks with over 340 performances for audiences in excess of 135,000. Additionally, for the last six years The Joyce has co-produced Evening Stars as part of the River To River Festival in Lower Manhattan.
The Joyce Theater debut of les BALLETS C de la B, featuring the NY Premiere of Out of Context - For Pina, an evening-length dance/theater work by the company's founder Alain Platel, will perform the following schedule from October 19 - 24: Tuesday-Wednesday at 7:30pm; Thursday-Saturday at 8pm; Sunday at 2pm. Dance Chat, a free post-performance talkback with the artists, will take place on Wednesday, October 20, and is open to all attending that evening's performance. Tickets start at $10 (for the front row) and range up to $49 (top price for Joyce Members is $37). Please note: Ticket prices are subject to change. The Joyce Theater is located at 175 Eighth Avenue at 19th Street.

A video illustrated Dance Talks will take place on Monday, October 11 from 6pm - 8pm at Joyce SoHo (155 Mercer Street). Curator, dramaturge, writer and NYU professor André Lepecki facilitates an exploration into les Ballets C de la B's work Out of Context-For Pina and a discussion about the ingenious way the choreographer Alain Platel combines humor, emotion and loss of control to create an atmosphere that narrows the divide between the performers and the audience. Dance Talks is a free event, however reservations are required and can be made by calling Call 646-792-8377.