STAGE TUBE: Preview Khecari's THE CLINKING, CLANKING LOWESLEAF and PALES, Coming to Chicago

Celebrating the 10-year anniversary of Khecari, choreographers Jonathan Meyer and Julia Rae Antonick present two world premieres co-presented by Links Hall in Chicago. The Clinking, Clanking Lowesleaf and Pales spans over two weekends, July 20 – 22 and July 26 – 29. Check out a preview of the works in the video!

The Clinking, Clanking Lowesleaf was created by Julia Rae Antonick and Jonathan Meyer by installing the work in progress in different venues like the Museum of Contemporary Art for the Dance/USA conference in June 2011 and then in December at Hamlin Park. Born from a long study of partnering techniques including tango, swing, and contact improvisation and influenced by movement as diverse as capoeira, butoh, Indonesian and modern dance, the work is a paean to the "kinetic joyride"; a deep exploration of physical connection and momentum flow. It ranges from fierce to soft, explosive to subtle. In starting with a narrative as source material to generate a non-narrative work, the artists reconfigured fairy tale tropes to look at what was underneath – the odd combinations in fairy tales of the childish and sinister, frivolous and somber, sweet and ominous.

Pales, a work for four dancers created by Jonathan Meyer, derives from a fertile mythology interweaving fact and fiction, wandering from Croatian shepherds to the Portuguese overthrow of the Moors. This exegesis presents a playground mined with turmoil. Somatically-derived partnering and intricate floorwork sculpt refined concert dance and awkwardly denuded pedestrian moments to engage a fascination belying an ambiguous terrain binding and fracturing community, identity, and ownership. Music for Pales is composed by Christopher Preissing, with whom Meyer has collaborated on multiple occasions, and includes a multi-speaker score complemented by four live chamber musicians.

Khecari is a Chicago based non-profit contemporary dance company presenting the work of choreographers Julia Rae Antonick and Jonathan Meyer as well as their collaboration together. We are committed to rigorous artistic inquiry supporting emotionally grounded and socially relevant performance. Our work stems from somatically based choreographic generation, investigation into momentum and kinetically exuberant partnering, and re-envisioning the intricacies of the theatre to offer unexpected modes of audience experience. For more, go to www.khecari.org.