Antigone Sr. // Twenty looks or Paris is burning at the Judson Church (L)

New York, early 1960s. In Greenwich Village a group of dancers and choreographers – Lucinda Childs, Steve Paxton and others – invent postmodern dance. The artists are white, middle-class members of the artistic elite. They introduce everyday, ‘authentic’ movements into the dance idiom. At the same time, the voguing dance style starts in the ballrooms of Harlem, a form of dance practised by African-Americans and Latinos, gays and transsexuals. Although voguing is very ‘pop’ and trendy it is also looking for ‘real’ movements.

Since 2001 the American dancer and choreographer Trajal Harrell has been obsessed with the question of what would have happened if the two had actually come together? This has resulted in a series of wonderful performances, Twenty Looks or Paris is Burning at The Judson Church, in seven ‘sizes’: Extra Small (XS), Small (S), (M)imosa, Antigone (Jr.), Antigone Jr. (Plus) Plus (presented at CAMPO in 2013), Judson Church is Ringing in Harlem (Made-to-Measure), and Antigone (Sr.). 

n Antigone Sr., the (L), Trajal wishes to re-imagine the classical theater of ancient Greece. Is it possible that voguing and this theater of antiquity were not so far apart in their performative strategies?

ON LOCATION: NTGent Minnemeers
In copresentation with NTGent 

LANGUAGE NO PROBLEM