REDCAT Presents TRUTH, REVISED HISTORIES, WISHFUL THINKING..., 4/14-4/17

REDCAT is proud to present the West Coast premiere of Truth, Revised Histories, Wishful Thinking, and Flat-Out Lies, a new evening-length work for five performers by choreographer John Jasperse. The work features a commissioned score by composer Hahn Rowe, performed live by a string quartet from the International Contemporary Ensemble. Scenic and visual design is by Jasperse, with lighting design by Jasperse and Joe Levasseur. Presented by REDCAT, as part of the Sharon Disney Lund Dance Series, Truth will run at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater Wednesday, April 14, 2010 through Sunday, April 18, 2010.

In this witty, meticulously devised collage set to a score for string quartet and electronics, one of the dance world's most astute and influential innovators turns his keen attentions to the often fluid boundaries between reality and fantasy, belief and illusion, the sincere and the ironic. By juxtaposing varied styles of dance, performance and music, Jasperse asks us to examine what we believe, what we don't, and why.

In particular, he looks to the wider history of performance practice, in which illusion has been alternately cultivated, in the service of creating theatrical magic, and shunned, in the search for an honest or demystified expression. Along the way Truth explores a panoply of heresies, radical ideas, delusional thoughts--and just plain nonsense.

The New York Times describes Truth as "Entertaining. Lush. Funny... Jasperse seems here to have tapped into his inner vaudevillian. Truth exerts its charms from the moment the lights go up. ... When John Jasperse makes a new work, it should be seen: end of story."

Rich with wry humor, the resulting feeling of Jasperse's latest is a bit like a series of balloons which are blown up and which either burst or deflate in surprising ways, over and over. These real/illusions , which range from cheap to surprisingly refined, take us on a journey of sorts, where the experience is defined as much by what is hidden as by what is revealed. Images of the baroque, refinement, seduction, valiance and violence, emerge and disappear; in the end, it is left for us to decide what is real and what is a ruse, what is solid and what is full of hot air.

When speaking of the work Jasperse states: "My interest in these thematic strands lies in how we construct meaning & order in our lives, and the necessity and limitations of that order, both as we look back into our past memories and as we project forward into our future actions. It is these beliefs of who we are, personally and collectively, and what is right and wrong, which give us a sense of identity and purpose and drive us forward. The paradoxical fact is that these beliefs, which order our thoughts and our actions, can alternately shield us from or illuminate diverse aspects of truth. The social and political, as well as the personal, implications of this fact will be equally weighed in our explorations."

The work received its world premiere at the Festspielhaus Hellerau in Dresden, Germany in September 2009 and comes to downtown Los Angeles following performances at MCA Chicago (April 2010). Truth will continue to tour the United States stopping at the Walker Art Center (May 2010), the Myrna Loy Center (June 2010), and finally have its New York premiere at The Joyce Theater in June 2010.

Truth, Revised Histories, Wishful Thinking, and Flat-Out Lies runs at REDCAT April 14-18, 2010. Performances will take place Wednesday-Saturday at 8:30 P.M., and Sunday at 3:00 P.M. Tickets are $20-25 ($16-20 for students with current I.D.) and are available at www.redcat.org or by calling 213.237.2800. REDCAT is located at the corner of W. 2nd and Hope Streets, inside the Walt Disney Concert Hall complex (631 West 2nd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012).

Co-produced by the Forsythe Company. Co-commissioned by REDCAT, the Walker Art Center, The Joyce Theater, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, and NPN, with support provided by the William and Nadine McGuire Commissioning Fund and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Major contributors to NPN are the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency), the MetLife Foundation and the Nathan Cummings Foundation. For more information: www.npnweb.org/programs/creation-fund. Additional support provided by Meet the Composer's Commissioning Music/USA program and the National Dance Project of the New England Foundation for the Arts.

Visit John Jasperse Company's website at www.johnjasperse.org 

International Contemporary Ensemble's website | www.iceorg.org

Hahn Rowe's Myspace page | www.myspace.com/hahnrowe

BIOGRAPHIES
John Jasperse graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in 1985, and then moved to New York City to live and work. He is Artistic Director/Choreographer of John Jasperse Company. In 1996, Jasperse created Thin Man Dance, Inc., a New York-based not-for-profit organization; this structure supports the work of John Jasperse Company.

Jasperse has created for the company several shorter works, and thirteen evening-length works: Rickety Perch (1989), Eyes Half Closed (1991), furnished/unfurnished (1993), Excessories (1995), Waving to you from here (1997), Madison as I imagine it (1999), Giant Empty (2001), just two dancers (2003), CALIFORNIA (2003), Prone (2005), Becky, Jodi, and John (2007) Misuse liable to prosecution (2007), and Truth, Revised Histories, Wishful Thinking, and Flat Out Lies (2009), as well as various projects in collaboration with other artists. Recent shorter works include PURE (2008), Fort Blossom (2000), and Scrawl (1999). The Company has been presented by festivals and presenting organizations in the United States, Brazil, Chile, Israel, Japan, and throughout Europe.

Over recent years, Mr. Jasperse's work has been awarded several prestigious awards both in the United States and abroad, including a New York Dance and Performance ("Bessie") Award in 2001 in recognition of his body of choreographic work, the 1999 Scripps/ADF Primus-Tamaris Fellowship, the Doris Duke Award (1998), the 1997 Mouson Award by Künstlerhaus Mousonturm in Frankfurt, Germany; three prizes in the 1996 Rencontres Internationales Chorégraphiques de Bagnolet; and the Choreography Prize at the 3rd Suzanne Dellal International Dance Competition (1996) in Tel Aviv, Israel for Excessories.

Under the umbrella of the Company, Jasperse has created several works for other companies: See Through Knot, commissioned by the Baryshnikov Dance Foundation for White Oak's Dance Project (2000); The Rest, commissioned by the Batsheva Dance Company in Tel Aviv, Israel (2000); à double face for the Lyon Opéra Ballet, France (March 2002); missed FIT for The Irish Modern Dance Theater, Dublin, Ireland (October 2002); and most recently Highline, as a part of the Montana Suite Project for Headwaters Dance Company, Missoula, MT (2007).

Jasperse's choreographic work has been supported by fellowships from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts (2003), the Tides Foundation's Lambent Fellowship in the Arts (2004-2007), John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (1998), the National Endowment for the Arts (1992, 1994, 1995-96) and the New York Foundation for the Arts (1988, 1994 and 2000). In addition to numerous commissions for new works, Jasperse's work and the Company have also been supported by grants from Altria Group, Inc., American Music Center Live Music for Dance Program, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Arts International, Bossak/Heilbron Charitable Foundation, Creative Capital Foundation, Dance Magazine Foundation, Fonds d'Aide à la Production Chorégraphique du Conseil Général de Seine-Saint-Denis (France), Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Greenwall Foundation, The Harkness Foundation for Dance, Heathcote Art Foundation, Jerome Foundation, James E. Robison Foundation, Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, Meet the Composer, the Multi-Arts Production Fund, National Endowment for the Arts, National Performance Network, New England Foundation for the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts BUILD program, New York State Council on the Arts, the Lila Acheson Wallace Theater Fund, established in The New York Community Trust by the founders of The Reader's Digest Association, and the Trust for Mutual Understanding.

Since 1991, he has regularly taught workshops and classes in the U.S., Europe, Mexico, and Brazil. As a dancer/performer, he began his career working with Lisa Kraus and Dancers (1985-1987), creating original roles in four works, and performing in the US and Europe. In 1988 and 1989, he worked in Belgium with Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker's Rosas, performing in Ottone, Ottone in major festivals and venues through Europe. From 1987 to 1993, he worked with Jennifer Monson, both performing in her work and collaborating on improvisation projects.

Composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist (violin, guitar, electronics) Hahn Rowe has migrated freely between the rock, electronic music, improvisation and new music scenes for over 20 years. As a member of composer Glenn Branca's ensemble in the mid 80s, he was introduced to NYC's cross pollinating music and art scenes. It was during this time that he joined atmospheric chamber rock quartet Hugo Largo, who released two acclaimed records on Brian Eno's Opal/Land label.

Hahn Rowe has worked on a diverse assortment of recordings by people such as David Byrne, Foetus, Ikue Mori, Antony and The Johnsons, Mimi, R.E.M., That Petrol Emotion, Syd Straw, Swans, Zahar, Firewater and Michael Brook.

Hahn Rowe's work with Brussels/Berlin based choreographer Meg Stuart (Damaged Goods) has resulted in the creation of 7 major evening length dance/theater works - Disfigure Study, No Longer Readymade, Swallow My Yellow Smile, Replacement, Blessed, Forgeries, Love and Other Matters, and Do Animals Cry.

Hahn is currently active as a composer for film and television, creating scores for films such as Clean, Shaven by Lodge Kerrigan, Spring Forward by Tom Gilroy and Married in America by Michael Apted.

ABOUT REDCAT
Opened by CalArts in 2003, REDCAT (Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theater) introduces diverse audiences, students and artists to the most influential developments in the arts from around the world, and gives artists in this region the creative support they need to achieve national and international stature. REDCAT is the newest partner in an international network of adventurous art and performance centers, which together are playing a vital role in the evolution of contemporary culture. REDCAT is a center for experimentation, discovery and lively civic discourse.

For more information, visit www.redcat.org.

 

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