Hope Mohr Dance Announces New Events as Part of Merce Cunningham Centennial Program

Hope Mohr Dance has announced three new events as part of its 2019 Bridge Project, SIGNALS FROM THE WEST: BAY AREA ARTISTS IN CONVERSATION WITH MERCE CUNNINGHAM AT 100.

In advance of the culminating works to premiere on November 8 and 9, The Bridge Project will present two days of open rehearsals and public salons in August, an evening of four lecture demonstrations in September and a conversation with former Merce Cunningham Company dancer Rashaun Mitchell in November. The 2019 edition of The Bridge Project is a bicoastal collaboration and co-production with the Merce Cunningham Trust, ODC Theater and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's Open Space as part of the international celebration of the Cunningham centennial.

"Signals from the West looks back and forward, creating space for contemporary authorship in conversation with the past," said The Bridge Project's Artistic Director Hope Mohr. "We are proud to collaborate with 20 artists this fall. In addition to former Cunningham dancers Mitchell and Riener, who will serve as lead teaching artists and who will audition and select four dancers to perform in November, we have commissioned 10 trailblazing Bay Area artists from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds to make new work in response to Cunningham's legacy. We are also pleased to present Inherited Bodies, featuring four movement artists in a series of lecture demonstrations responding to the prompt, How do artists in different traditions contend with, honor and resist the past?"

"What distinguishes Signals from the West from the many other celebrations of the Cunningham centennial is that it looks beyond Merce Cunningham by way of new commissioned work," said Mitchell. "It focuses on our current generation of artists and their ties, thorny or otherwise, to this complex figure of modern and postmodern dance. As teachers of Cunningham's repertory, Silas and I will serve to facilitate an engagement with his work, mining it for treasures, rebalancing the components so new perspectives can emerge."

For more information, visit hopemohr.org/bridge-project-upcoming.

In addition to the premieres by the commissioned artists, the events on November 8 and 9 will include the restaging of sections from several iconic Cunningham works including Canfield (premiere date 1969) and Fluid Canvas (premiere date 2002).

The evening of November 9 will feature a pre-show "Haptic Tour and Live Audio Description" by Gravity Access Services. This event starts at 7 p.m. For more information visit jesscurtisgravity.org/access. To register and reserve a headset, please email ODC Theater Client Services at boxoffice@odc.dance.

There will also be a post-show closing reception on November 9, courtesy of SFMOMA Open Space and Honig Winery. Ticket holders from the November 8 performance are welcome to attend this event, as well.

Tickets for the performances on November 8 and 9 are $20 - $50 with a limited number of $5 tickets for artists, subsidized by SFMOMA. To purchase tickets, visit odc.dance/merce.

The mission of Hope Mohr Dance (HMD) is to create, present and foster outstanding art at the intersection of the body and the brain. HMD's Bridge Project approaches curating as community organizing to convene equity-driven cultural conversations that cross discipline, geography, and perspective. The purposes of The Bridge Project are to create an intellectual commons for artists and to facilitate alliances among artists and activists in the struggle toward equity. More information at hopemohr.org.

The mission of the Merce Cunningham Trust is to carry Cunningham's legacy into the future. The Trust preserves the recorded and physical works of Merce Cunningham and the Merce Cunningham Dance Company and offers classes and workshops in Cunningham's technique, repertory and choreographic methods to dancers and the public, keeping interest and practice alive.

ODC Theater exists to empower and develop innovative artists. It participates in the creation of new works through commissioning, presenting, mentorship and space access; it develops informed, engaged and committed audiences; and advocates for the performing arts as an essential component to the economic and cultural development of our community. This 170-seat venue is the site of over 150 performances a year involving nearly 1,000 local, regional, national and International Artists.

Photo Credit: Tetsu Kubota

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