2024-2025 Season
Elena Siyanko, Artistic Director, Curator & Producer
2024-2025 SEASON AT-A-GLANCE, PS21 Center for Contemporary Performance
INTERNATIONAL THEATER | CONTEMPORARY DANCE & PERFORMANCE | PS21 HOUSE BLEND | GLOBAL | LOCAL series| PATHWAYS | RESIDENCIES |
INTERNATIONAL THEATER:
July 5–6. US premiere of Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists. It’s 2028, Portugal is again ruled by an authoritarian regime, and every year, a family commemorates the 1954 murder of activist Catarina Eufémia at the hands of the Salazar dictatorship by kidnapping and killing a fascist. A tantalizing dystopian work by Tiago Rodrigues, Artistic Director of Festival d’Avignon, addresses one of today’s most urgent issues: What does fascism look like in 2024?
July 19–20. New York premiere of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, boldly reimagined by Chela De Ferrari, artistic director of Teatro La Plaza (Peru), for a cast of young actors with Down syndrome. Expressing the desires and frustrations of people who have historically been devalued and ignored, they invest new meaning in the play’s central question, “To be or not to be?”
CONTEMPORARY DANCE & PERFORMANCE:
May 17. Beyond Ballet/Beyond Hip-Hop: two groundbreaking, genre-defying works from Japan’s vibrant dance scene. In The Dying Swan and Its Cause of Death, celebrated Japanese ballerina Hana Sakai looks beyond the reverential Fokine classic in Toshiki Okada’s tragicomic unraveling of the legend, and Moto Takahashi’s all-woman MWMW challenges gender stereotypes with Encounter.
June 22. Noli Timere, a performance-installation by Rebecca Lazier and Janet Echelman with an original score from Jorane. Activated and transformed by nine outstanding acrobatic performers, the work synthesizes experimental dance, avant-garde circus, engineering, art installation, music, public sculpture, and social practice.
July 12–13. Gandini Juggling: Smashed2. Seven women and two men share the stage with eighty oranges and seven watermelons to disrupt the rigid conventions of etiquette, dress, and body language. The company that enchanted audiences in Phillip Glass’s Akhnaten borrows from Pina Bausch’s gestural choreography to reimagine the dark art of juggling and contemporary circus for the 21st Century.
August 2–3. Paul Taylor Dance Company. The renowned dance troupe returns to the Pavilion Theater with three of Taylor’s signature works: Brandenburgs (1988) and Promethean Fire (2002), music by J. S. Bach and Runes (1975), music by Gerald Busby.
September 29, 2024. Le sacre de Lila. French-Canadian choreographer Ismaël Mouaraki’s distillation of Lila, a nocturnal mystical ritual of the Moroccan Maghreb expressed through music and dance. Performed by the Destins Croisés dance company, the work fuses the trance and spiritual traditions of Lila (“night,” in Arabic) with Mouaraki’s signature urban dance style and a mesmerizing electronic soundscape by Antoine Berthiaume. US Premiere
January 11, 2025 CIRCA (Australia) What Will Have Been
January 4, 5 2025 Ruri Mito (Japan) Matou & Where We Were Born.
PS21 HOUSE BLEND series:
August 18. PS21 HOUSE BLEND I. Conor Hanick plays Galina Ustvolskaya’s complete Piano Sonatas.
August 19. PS21 HOUSE BLEND II. A double bill: Skylighght, written and performed by Gelsey Bell (voice) and Erin Rogers (saxophone). Plus composer/multi-instrumentalist Patrick Higgins (guitar, drums, electronics) performs select pieces from his new album.
August 20. PS21 HOUSE BLEND III. Miranda Cuckson (violin) and Conor Hanick (piano) play Iannis Xenakis: Mikka S.; J.S. Bach: Sonata in D minor (BWV 1004); Charles Ives: selections from Songs (Opus 114); Aaron Copland: Sonata for Violin and Piano.
August 21. PS21 HOUSE BLEND IV. A double bill: Bonnie Whiting performs Wang Lu’s Stages (2023) for a solo speaking/singing percussionist, with a stage design by Polly Apfelbaum, and Frederic Rzewski’s To the Earth for speaking percussionist and four flower pots (text from the Homeric Hymn to Gaia, Mother of All). Plus Bass-baritone Davóne Tines performs Eastman Evensong, a ceremony interweaving three solo vocal works by Julius Eastman, created in residency at PS21.
March 3, 2025. PS21 HOUSE BLEND “special brew”: Van Kuijk Quartet and harpist Parker Ramsay in a program of colorfully impressionistic works by Debussy, Fauré, and Caplet paired with Nico Muhly and Alice Goodman’s The Street, a set of meditations commissioned by Ramsay for solo harp.
GLOBAL | LOCAL series:
June 15. Arturo O’Farrill and the Afro Latin Jazz Orchestra. 2023’s Latin Jazz Grammy winners deliver their rich big band jazz and Latin music sound, played by 18 world-class musicians.
June 26. Seo Jungmin (South Korea). Composer and virtuoso of the 25-string gayageum, in concert with percussionist You Byoung Wook and daegeum bamboo flute player Baek Dasom. Renowned Kingston-based 12-string guitarist and composer, Alexander Turnquist, opens the evening, connecting two musical worlds far apart geographically but with much in common stylistically.
July 7. Kiki Valera y su Son Cubano, with a community dance party. The master cuatro player and composer and his ensemble of internationally acclaimed musicians.
August 29. Lady Moon & the Eclipse and Kendra McKinley.
October 5. Half Waif and Elori Saxl.
PS21 PATHWAYS Community Programming. Collaborative, Participatory, Free, & Accessible, PS21’s initiative of more than 35 free events beyond our theater and 100-acres of meadows & trails, in venues throughout the region: parklands, schools, libraries, churches, village streets, farms, parking lots, and more:
June 16. PS21/PATHWAYS. The Legendary Ingramettes, Richmond’s “First Family of Gospel,” celebrate Juneteenth at Hudson’s Shiloh Baptist Church and Ps21’s Pavilion Theater with their roof-raising harmonies.
June 23, 2024 – PS21 PATHWAYS/Consuming Culture weekend. What does the food we eat say about us and the world we live in, and what stories can we tell through food? An afternoon of conversations reflecting on some of the most urgent economic, social, and environmental issues of our time through the prism of food.
Stories of Food and Migration, with writers Sanaë Lemoine and Mayukh Sen, moderated by Adam Dalva. Growing Together: Pathways to Sustainable Food Systems, Conversation + Q&A with Lindsey Lusher Shute and Emma Ractliffe, moderated by Lela Nargi. Book Signing with Sanaë Lemoine and Mayukh Sen. Tarte-ography, an interactive pastry workshop for all ages led by architect chef Savinien Caracostea, exploring the multi-cultural urbanization of New York City through flavors, textures, and patterns. Followed by a Dance Craze Dance Party with Professor Tim Davis, AKA DJ Giant Corporation and Martha Graham dancer Gillian Bowen. In partnership with the French Embassy’s Villa Albertine’s Books & Ideas.
July 19–21. PS21/PATHWAYS. Upstate Art Weekend: Enchanted Ecologies
August 4. PS21/PATHWAYS. Gamelan Yowana Sari. New York-based GAMELAN Yowana Sari, 20 artists performing traditional Balinese music and dance for the Samara Dana gamelan, plus contemporary compositions by Dewa Alit, Michael Gordon, Kyle Miller, and Evan Ziporyn
August 17. PS21/PATHWAYS. Hudson Valley CirqueFest: Cirque Kikasse (Quebec) delivers SANTÉ!, a breathtaking, mouthwatering tour de force pairing of high-flying acrobatics and juggling with fast food and bar service from their dual-purpose street truck. A PS21 PATHWAYS/CRELLIN PARK DAY event, presented in partnership with the Town of Chatham Crellin Park Recreation Committee.
September 21. PATHWAYS series. SANTÉ! By Cirque Kikasse (Quebec), at the Village of Tivoli Memorial Recreation Park.
MAY–OCTOBER, ONGOING
PS21/PATHWAYS/Movement Without Borders, weekly sessions of yoga, Pilates, ballet, and wellness classes, plus free workshops with visiting luminaries. Ecstatic Dance with Hudson Valley-based DJ Joro-Boro and Keena Maya, architectural designer, sound artist, and instrumentalist.
Season-long creative engagement with the grounds including open rehearsals with visiting artists, self-guided ecology walks, and StoryWalk, a collaboration between PS21 and the Columbia Land Conservancy.
Site-specific art installations: James Casebere’s Solo Pavilion for Two or Three, an architectural sculpture that interrogates the delicate balancing act between the human need for shelter and our desire to preserve the landscape. Dandelions: Taking inspiration from nature, while exaggerated both in scale and its durable materials, Silda Wall Spitzer and Tim Jones’ Dandelions extends the flowers’ ability to surprise and delight beyond the brief summer season.
PS21 sponsors Kinetic Independent Solar System: Greenwash (K.I.S.S.), an installation by artist Deville Cohen during Upstate Art Weekend (July 18–21) and at Columbia County Climate Carnival (September 14).
PATHWAYS Community Workshops:
May 14. Hip-Hop Master class with Japanese dancers from MWMW dance company.
May 31. Movement and dance workshop with choreographer Rebecca Lazier and dancers of Noli Timere within the suspended nets of Janet Echelman’s net sculpture. The work is activated as a civic gathering site for everyone to experience.
June 1-7. The NEXT Festival of Emerging Artists workshop and student performances at the Chatham Central School District.
June 15. Arturo O’Farrill and musicians, a percussion workshop for a group of students from Hudson Kids for Harmony and Hudson Youth at PS21’s Solo Pavilion for Two or Three.
June 16. Morning service, discussion + Juneteenth Performance by the Legendary Ingramettes at Shiloh Baptist Church in Hudson. In partnership with WhoWeBe!
July 5, 6, 9. In conjunction with PS21’s US premiere of Tiago Rodrigues’s Catarina and the Beauty of Killing Fascists, Thomas Bartscherer, Bard College Hannah Arendt Center scholar in residence, leads three seminar-style discussions, exploring the intersection of theater and politics, past and present, and considering the presence of violence in political life and artistic representation.
July 13. JUGGLING FOR ALL workshop with members of GANDINI JUGGLING.
July 19–21. ENCHANTED ECOLOGIES. Upstate Art Weekend (Hudson Valley Artists). A celebration of local artists along with local ecology, free workshops & installations.
July 31. Film screening: Paul Taylor: Creative Domain
August 2. Master class, with members of Paul Taylor Dance Company.
August 4. Gamelan Yowana Sari hands-on workshop with members of the gamelan ensemble.
August 5, 7. Deep Listening workshops with composer Nomi Epstein
August 29. Singer and songwriter Ngonda Badila aka Lady Moon leads a workshop that features song, dance and an introduction to the Bantu-Kongo cosmology that influences their music at The Spark of Hudson.
September 14. PS21 sponsors Kinetic Independent Solar System: Greenwash (K.I.S.S.), an installation by artist Deville Cohen. At Columbia County Climate Carnival, Chatham NY Fairgrounds
Open Trails Explore PS21’s fields and trails and learn about environmental stewardship. PATHWAYS invites everyone to learn about PS21’s open spaces through self-directed activities created in partnership with neighboring organizations, with a focus on environmental stewardship. Throughout the season, from sunrise to sunset, all are welcome to explore PS21’s 100 acres of meadows, woodlands, and trails at their own pace. Encounter artists engaged in creative practice and animals nestled among installations as you wander.
SPECIAL EVENTS
March 22. Quatuor Van Kuijk (France). Producers Circle Concert and Reception in a Tribeca Loft
June 21. PS21 GALA. Noli Timere
Aug 3. a Producers Circle evening, featuring a pre-performance Farm-to-Table Dinner.
PS21 RESIDENCIES, 2024 -2025:
June 1-8, 2024. The Next Festival of Emerging Artists Residency. Plus concerts and PATHWAYS workshops with local schools. June 7, 2024. The Next Festival of Emerging Artists Final Concert. Three World Premieres, plus Rebecca Saunders’ Ire, concerto for cello, strings, and percussion, featuring guest artist cellist Seth Parker Woods
*Deville Cohen’s April 2024 residency developing Three Duets, a site-responsive multi-channel sculptural video environment for live performance, utilizes media and technology to communicate between three dancers and a group of motorized kinetic sculptures;
*Six-week residency of choreographer Rebecca Lazier and sculptor Janet Ecehlman creating Noli Timere, with a new score commissioned from composer songwriter Jorane, (May 19–31 and June 8–21, 2024)
*Davóne Tines developing Eastman Evensong in residency at PS21, a new suite of solo vocal works (August 16-22, 2024)
*Kyle Marshall, director and choreographer of Kyle Marshall Choreography (KMC) will devote his PS21 residency to completing Femenine, the first work in his Julius Eastman Trilogy, dances set to the music of Black queer composer Julius Eastman. (January – February, 2025)
Brooklyn Youth Chorus workshop a new production PORT(AL) by Paola Prestini, before its premiere in Spring 2025 at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and at PS21 in June 2025. PORT(AL) is an innovative choral theater experience that delves into the history of the Brooklyn Navy Yard, exploring its past as a bustling port and its evolution within the ever-changing tides of the city. January 27 – February 2, 2025