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The Difference is Spreading
August 10, 2024 @ 10:00 am - 12:00 pm
THE DIFFERENCE IS SPREADING
I read this quote about Gertrude Stein’s Tender Buttons and thought this is how I feel sometimes about “technique” and “improvisation.” “She takes ordinary language—the “language of information”— and makes it strange, forcing us to be acutely aware of the way words work.” What if we take what is ordinary about dance class, dance vocabulary, and our embedded knowledge about dancing and make it strange, becoming acutely aware of the way “technique” works on, with and through us? We will move continuously, allowing patterns to emerge, saturate, transform, and spread. All techniques, anti-techniques, and fake techniques warmly invited.
SHANNON STEWART
Born in the South and raised in the mountains and DIY music scenes of the Pacific Northwest, shannon stewart | screaming traps explores the intersection of dance with embodied identities and social choreographies. Shannon’s creative practice is body centered–working with sensation, perception, and orientation to time and space, understanding that these things are shaped by context and social constructions, including the context of “the field of contemporary dance.” Her/Their work traverses through disciplines often crossing into essay, poetry, and film, and relies on comedy, pop culture, drag, and self-reflection to create intimate and honest works described as “mesmerizing” and “brutally poetic.”
A 2023 USA Artist Fellowship nominee, Shannon’s choreography has been presented by DOCK 11 (Berlin, Germany), CONARTE (Monterrey, Mexico), Improspekcije (Zagreb, Croatia) Movement Research at the Judson Church, Future Oceans Festival (NYC), Velocity Dance Center, On the Boards (Seattle), RISK/REWARD, Performance Works Northwest (Portland), Philadelphia Dance Projects, the Hinterlands/Playhouse, Wasserman Project (Detroit), Definitive Figures Festival, Marigny Opera House, Tulane University (New Orleans), Bryant Lake Bowl, Cowles Center (MPLS), the Work Room (ATL), Pivot Arts Incubator (Chicago), Good Children Gallery, the Front Gallery, invited to the V&A Late in London, and John F. Kennedy Center (Washington, D.C.). Her collaborative dance films have screened at festivals around the world. The development of Shannon’s work has been supported by the National Dance Project, National Performance Network, Foundation for Contemporary Art, UCROSS Foundation, Art Omi, and the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography, among others. Planet Detroit published their first submitted poem in July 2023.
As a performer and collaborator, Shannon has worked with Cherdonna Shinatra, Matty Davis Williams, Aurora Nealand, Deborah Hay, Christopher Matthews, tEEth performance/Angelle Hebert, zoe | juniper, Dayna Hanson, Pat Graney and has also performed the work of visual artists Tino Sehgal and Joan Jonas. She has co-founded two youth arts nonprofits on the west coast focused on underground culture and released a book distributed by AK Press documenting these efforts nationwide.
Shannon has a Masters of Fine Arts from Tulane University in Interdisciplinary Dance Performance and a BA in Urban Design from the University of Washington. She has been a core mentor for ROAR Berlin and a member of the Front Gallery in New Orleans. She is an Assistant Professor of Contemporary Dance at the University of Kansas and lives part- time in Detroit, Michigan (Waawiyatanong) with her partner and dog.
Photo by Jingzi Zhao