Hiking the Horizontal: Field Notes from a Choreographer

Contents

Contents Acknowledgments ix Prologue xiii Questions as a Way of Life 1 Fueling the Imagination 2 Asking Questions as a Way of Life 3 Two Dances: The Oldest and One Not Yet Made 8 Wondering about Books 21 The Sounds of St. Albans 22 Was Einstein a Choreographer? 25 Influence, Inquiry, Action 27 Who Gets to Dance? 39 Manifesto 40 The Roosevelt, Dancing 41 The Shipyard, Dancing 49 Speech and Silence: The Who Matters 56 A Liberation in the Gallery 59 Being Another: One Kind of Technique 60 What Is the Dancing About? 65 I Met a Physicist 66 Finding the Fish: On Meaning, Narrative, 67 and Subject Matter Dancing Dancing on Both Sides of the Brain: 76 An Essay in Text and Movement Justice and Genetics: Two Program Notes 86 The Problem of Abstraction 93 Two Ways to Be an Angel 94 Portfolio of Site-Specific Dances 96 Where Is the Dance Happening? 113 Scene at a Bedside 114 Choreographing Space 115 My Favorite Night at Temple Micah 130 The Stage and Why It Matters 135 Three Places, Three Stories 142 viii | Contents Structures and Underpinnings 145 A Brief Conversation with a Friend 147 What Happens on a Residency? 148 Dilemmas of Practice in Art and Healing: Response to an E-mail 154 Structure: The Container That Holds the Dance 161 What Is the Toolbox? 170 Rehearsal, Defined and Redefined 176 Free Fall 183 Portfolio of Stage Dances 185 Transdomain Practices 203 Calling the Ancestors 204 In Defense of Creative Research 206 Onward with Petichta 215 Fresh Readings: Reviewing Books on Tango and Nureyev 217 Ruminations and Curiosities: A Series of Anecdotes and 220 the Questions That Follow Partnering and People 228 Seven Paths to Creativity 239 Politics 241 Two Assertions 242 A Return to Inquiry 243 Activism, Professionalism, Purity 244 It Is Easier to Be against President Bush Than It Is 246 to Change Small Dynamics in Our Own Field A Job Swap and Slow Banking: Two Op-Eds 250 Pushing Back: A Rant in Three Movements 253 Small Righteous Angers 260 Bulky Love 265 To the Attendance Monitor at Sligo Creek Middle School 266 Motherhood: Stories and an Interview 267 Representation Found and Lost 273 Critical Response at Home 275 Bulky Love 278 Epilogue 281 Appendix: List of Choreographed Works, 1974–2010 291 Index 299 ...