Company Wang Ramirez To Explore Limitless Possibilities Of Dance And Acrobatics At Northrop Debut

High-flying international dance sensation Company Wang Ramirez soars into town and makes its Northrop debut with Borderline at 7:30 pm Sat, Mar 3. This dreamlike work combines hip-hop, contemporary dance, acrobatics, visual poetry, and the illusion of weightlessness to explore the limits of borders and boundaries. Le Monde raves, "It isn't enough for Borderline to just be awesome to watch. It opens itself up like hip-hop knows how to do."

Press photos can be found here. A video preview for the performance can also be found here and here. Tickets and information about the program can be found here.

Northrop Presents
Company Wang Ramirez
Sat, Mar 3, 7:30 pm
Carlson Family Stage

Borderline

Company creators and artistic directors Honji Wang and Sébastien Ramirez have created a new version of modern dance that defies gravity and leaves audience members speechless. Born and raised in Germany by Korean parents, Wang developed her own dance language that is an abstraction of hip-hop dance and integrates techniques from her early martial arts and ballet training. Ramirez, an internationally acclaimed dancer, choreographer and artistic director, is inspired by aerial work and choreographic rigging that is in contrast to the grounded quality of contemporary dance. Together, the unlikely duo merges their distinct talents in a mesmerizing fashion.

The company debuts at Northrop with Borderline, which explores themes of human relationships-how we build them, and how we tear them apart-as well as themes of manipulation, constraint, and the very meaning of democracy. Attached to aerial rigging, the company's acrobatic dancers of Wang Ramirez navigate their own borderline between hip-hop and contemporary dance, defying categories and eagerly exploring new forms.

Katie Arial of the Five Points Star writes, "It seems...that these multicultural Spanish-French-Korean-German artists were just ahead of the political curve with their interest in boundaries and borders, in what flows over and between and what is halted or corralled by the lines and boxes we make around our cultures and communities."

Tickets for Company Wang Ramirez are on sale now, and are free to all U of M students for this special performance.