amnesia studies
(solo in development)
(solo in development)
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presented in development by Estrogenius Festival, New York NY (April 2022)
creative residency at Arts on Site, Kerhonkson NY (October 2021) creative residency at Catwalk Institute, Catskill NY (July 2021) creative residency at Turkeyland Cove Foundation, Edgartown MA (February 2021) creative residency at New Dance Alliance, New York NY (November 2020) |
a b o u t - the trunk of my car is filled with detritus from to love the rise/pt.2. Capitalism wants me to throw it all out and move on to something new. I resist that, and embrace a practice that patiently excavates everything I already have, trusting that is enough to build from. amnesia studies is the afterbirth of to love the rise/pt.2. It is me patiently looking at this sediment. emerging out of pandemic survival practices, this budding solo research - currently titled amnesia studies - uses movement, drawings, video projection, trash, ladders and light bulbs to traverse and wrestle with my past, present and imagined future archive. amnesia studies is a practice of holding the to love the rise/pt.2 fossils that surround my life on Earth: Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower, my parents' slides from their archaeological excavations, memories of rising sea levels, Brooklyn skies + sidewalks, and the theoretical proposal for salvage communism put forth by the Salvage Collective. |
to love the rise/pt.2
2022
2022
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'to love the rise/pt.2' 35mm photo archive:
black & white + color 35mm photos by marion spencer of our process as it grew in various spaces & on numerous unceded indigenous lands from 2019-2022 a b o u t u s -
We are: marion spencer, Ogemdi Ude, Kimiko Tanabe, s. lumbert, slowdanger, Symara Johnson, Tara Sheena, Lindsey Jennings, Meghann Trago, Malcolm-x Betts, Athena Kokoronis, Myssi Robinson, Stephanie Acosta, the HandyQueers, Iris McCloughan, jess pretty, Shana Crawford and theo armstrong. We began in December 2019 because I - marion - wanted to be in a room making performance that was grounded in physical practice, collective imagination and relationship. It was important that I went into this process with people I love who are artists I respect and trust. We started with big ideas about the apocalypse, liminal space and utopia, asking the question: how do we rebuild together? Upon lockdown March 2020, we experimented virtually, developing practices that informed the live work. We recorded voice memos which now live in our sound score. We built tiny utopic environments using our own domestic materials and lights. Symara learned carpentry skills to make money when all dance gigs were canceled, which we later called upon to do construction in the live work. The 2020 Summer of Unrest brought a complete pause for this project, each of us doing what we needed to do. I stepped away from artmaking entirely and into the street as a full time protester and activist. I took time away from dance to center the need for action, learning and urgent allyship in my immediate community. My creative process prioritizes collective care, relationship building, and trust. As a white Latina cisgender woman, I work to hold and facilitate mulitracial, multi-gendered spaces of experimentation and exploration. Upon returning together, this collective has prioritized a human-centered and equity-centered approach to art making through antiracist, anticapitalist and abolitionist practices. This project amplifies the artistry of performers Ogemdi Ude, Symara Johnson, Kimiko Tanabe, s. lumbert, Tara Sheena, and slowdanger. We all look and move differently, and come from distinct backgrounds in the dance world. This project brings us together to thread our plurality and multiplicitous textures through the choreography, soundscore and materials. As we gathered in one of our last zoom meetings Spring 2021 before resuming rehearsals in person, I asked - what are you taking with you? what are you leaving behind? - a prompt designed for a moment in which there was hope of a real, finite departure from the pandemic. We stay asking those questions today. As our dream team grows, I am learning that above and beyond the lesson emerging from this project is that we take relationships, collective imagination and collective action. Together - as a multiracial, multigendered, femme & BIPOC-centered group - we move, groove, sense and sound, build and rebuild, lose and find order together, as a posit for a better world- t h e d r e a m t e a m - marion spencer (she/her) - director + choreographer Ogemdi Ude (she/her) - performer Kimiko Tanabe (she/her)- performer s. lumbert (they/them or ze/zim) - performer slowdanger (anna thompson (they/them) + taylor knight (they/them)) - performers + sound designers Symara Johnson (she/her) - collaborating artist + former performer Tara Sheena (she/her) - collaborating artist + former performer Lindsey Jennings (she/her) - understudy performer Meghann Trago (she/her) - understudy performer Malcolm-x Betts (he/him)- costume designer Athena Kokoronis (she/her)- costume designer Myssi Robinson (she/her)- creative archivist Stephanie Acosta (she/her or they/them)- video editor HandyQueers (lily gold (she/they) + opal ingle (they/them))- set designers Iris McCloughan(they/them)- dramaturg jess pretty (she/her) - creative producer Shana Crawford (she/her) - lighting designer theo armstrong (they/he) - stage manager |
a b o u t - the continental rise is an underwater environment found between the continental slope & the abyssal plain. Composed of all the accumulated and deposited sediments & runoff from the continent, it is the final threshold, the liminal space between the continents & the deepest part of the ocean. Here lies the detritus, the sludge, the muck from Earth- in the detritus, in the marrow, in the compost pile, lives to love the rise/pt.2- to love the rise/pt.2 is a multimedia dance project grounded in physical practice, collective imagination, and relationships, created by marion spencer and collaborators Ogemdi Ude, Kimiko Tanabe, s. lumbert, slowdanger, Symara Johnson, Tara Sheena, Malcolm-x Betts, Athena Kokoronis, Myssi Robinson, HandyQueers, Stephanie Acosta, Lindsey Jennings, Meghann Trago, Iris McCloughan, jess pretty, Shana Crawford and theo armstrong. Emerging out of a solo marion built in 2019-2020 (to love the rise/pt.1), the collaborative process has developed through an apocalypse previously imagined, and now lived, offering a feminine, feminist vision of a world built from the detritus of our current one. Through a collage of movement, vocalizations, live installation, photography, film and carpentry, a new Utopia is composted, built and traversed by the collective. Responding to Yrsa-Daley Ward’s poetry collection Bone and Rebecca Solnit's A Paradise Built in Hell, this project considers how we mend from disaster – as macro as the global pandemic and late stage capitalism, as small as one’s own personal loss and grief. Taking lessons from Mariame Kaba’s writings on abolitionist practice, this process examines what we take with us, what we leave behind, and how we move forward with scars, embracing experimentation and relationships. Offering an anti-capitalist mindset and alternative order, this project posits that our world is made by us — by us all — through imagination, collaboration and action. to love the rise/pt.2 has been supported through its development by The Chocolate Factory Theater, Mana Contemporary, Gibney, Prospect Park, an Emergency Grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, New Dance Alliance, The Field Center, Studio 44, Catwalk Institute, Bridge Street Theatre, MOtiVe Brooklyn, Center for Performance Research and Roulette Intermedium- [upcoming] premiere of the evening-length performance work presented by Roulette Intermedium (October 2022) REMNANTS: to love the rise/pt.2 premiere of our process at Center for Performance Research (September 2022) creative residency at Center for Performance Research (September 2022) [upcoming] creative residency at MOtiVe Brooklyn (September 2022) production residency at Roulette Intermedium (August 2022) presented by Bridge Street Theatre in partnership with Catwalk Institute, Catskill NY (July 2022) creative residency at Catwalk Institute / Bridge Street Theatre, Catskill NY (July 2022) presented by Estrogenius Festival, New York NY (March 2022) witness here creative residency at The Field Center, Bellows Falls VT (June 2022) creative residency at The Field Center, Bellows Falls VT (June 2021) presented by New Dance Alliance at Movement Research, (Performance Mix Festival), New York NY (June 2021) witness here presented by New Dance Alliance (film + zine), Performance Mix Festival (May 2020) witness here creative residency at Mana Contemporary, Jersey City NJ (January 2020) creative residency + public showing at The Chocolate Factory Theater, Queens NY (December 2019) witness here |
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pt.1 departure studies
2020 emerging out of a solo ('to love the rise/pt.1) that lived for about a year before the pandemic began, these solo experiments - live IRL, livestream, and film - are a burying, a retrieval, an allowing, a letting go and being now with a solo that will never be the same again- we are making a dance film we are burying we are trying to examine what remains we are amnesia, disorientation, fierce ephemeral pink plastic dripping with sand, water, sky, trash and tenderness we are nonlinear stories of visceral memory we are listening on a cellular level glinting marrow/ study #4 live-streamed virtual performance from the Kraine Theater, new york NY part of a shared ^virtual^ evening w/ Jasmine Hearn & marion spencer, presented by Estrogenius Festival October 2020 available to witness HERE operculum song/ study #3 live-streamed virtual performance from my bedroom in brooklyn presented as part of an evening of virtual performance experiments hosted by Arts On Site October 2020 available to witness HERE what remains/ study #2 live outdoor performance in Central Park, new york NY presented as part of an evening of outdoor performance experiments hosted by Soluq Dance Theater August 2020 the burial/ study #1 film presented as part of Freeskewl's On The House virtual performance series August 2020 available to witness HERE footage shot by evan carter w/ soundscapes by slowdanger edited by marion |
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to love the rise/pt.2 ^deconstructed^
(film + virtual zine) May 2020 presented by + presented AT: New Dance Alliance's Performance Mix Festival ^virtual edition^ availalble to witness HERE featuring collaborating artists Symara Johnson s. lumbert Tara Sheena slowdanger (aka Anna Thompson + Taylor Knight) Kimiko Tanabe Ogemdi Ude 'to love the rise/ pt. 2' ^deconstructed^ are film + zine expressions of our virtual process- of what being in practice looks like, feels like, WAS for us in April 2020, within the container of developing project to love the rise/ pt. 2. /film stills in collage courtesy of collaborating artists/ |
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to love the rise/ pt. 1
2019-2020 this is a solo examining ambition, growth mania, conscious femininity, liminal space and transformation, set against the reality of global capitalism, its need for relentless growth, and the resulting toll that takes on the physical body. We must be cyborgs- part human, part machine- to achieve and succeed amidst an oppressive capitalist system. The piece considers the work of feminist poet Yrsa Daley-Ward's 'Bone,’ offering lessons in decay, renewal and regrowth, and calls upon late pop star Prince's talent, ambition, magic and mysterious distance from society. This process is an ode to a systemic problem but, also, a call for change and an invitation to dream- presented by Dance HOLO, Queens NY (February 2020) presented by Mana Contemporary, Jersey City NJ (January 2020) presented by The Chocolate Factory Theater, Queens NY (December 2019) presented by Art Klub, New Orleans LA (October 2019) presented by Local Project (curated by Sierra Ortega), Queens NY (August 2019) presented by Women in Motion salon, Soundance Studio Brooklyn NY (July 2019) presented by Pie & Performance, Brooklyn NY (May 2019) presented by MERDE the show, The Footlight, Queens NY (March 2019) photos © Jessie Young |
WOLF
WOLF
2019
WOLF is a solo dance performance that explores beautiful magic and tragic happenings in our world. Digging into storms, happiness, the memory of trauma, whiteness, cleaning and transformations, this solo examines falling under spells, the wild beauty of nature and its undeniable impending loss, red wine, red blood and how we get out from under it all. Nayyirah Waheed's 'salt', Sara Ahmed's 'The Promise of Happiness', Clarissa Pinkola Estés's 'Women Who Run With the Wolves', and essays from 'The Racial Imaginary' edited by Claudia Rankine are all lessons informing this project. 'WOLF' is a tonal and energetic work that calls for action and transformation, inviting us to feel, ask questions and consider what else both imaginatively and constructively.
THANK YOU to Trina Mannino of the Dance Enthusiast for your words on 'WOLF' at Danspace Project's DraftWork 3/16/19. read the article HERE
presented by Mondo Bizarro & Dancing Grounds at Catapult, New Orleans LA (October 2019)
presented by Danspace Project (DraftWork), New York NY (March 2019)
Base: Experimental Arts + Space, Seattle WA (February 2019)
presented by Green Space (Take Root Festival), Queens NY (January 2019)
presented by Domestic Performance Agency (DPAPP), Brooklyn NY (January 2019)
presented by Center for Performance Research (Fall Movement), Brooklyn NY (November 2018)
Amherst College, Amherst MA (October 2018)
Upper Jay Art Center, Upper Jay NY (August 2018)
Movement Research at the Judson Church, New York NY (May 2018)
Domestic Performance Agency, Brooklyn NY (December 2017)
watch 'WOLF' at Danspace Project: pre-show / performance (March 2019)
watch 'WOLF' at Green Space (January 2019)
photos © Stefano Altamura
2019
WOLF is a solo dance performance that explores beautiful magic and tragic happenings in our world. Digging into storms, happiness, the memory of trauma, whiteness, cleaning and transformations, this solo examines falling under spells, the wild beauty of nature and its undeniable impending loss, red wine, red blood and how we get out from under it all. Nayyirah Waheed's 'salt', Sara Ahmed's 'The Promise of Happiness', Clarissa Pinkola Estés's 'Women Who Run With the Wolves', and essays from 'The Racial Imaginary' edited by Claudia Rankine are all lessons informing this project. 'WOLF' is a tonal and energetic work that calls for action and transformation, inviting us to feel, ask questions and consider what else both imaginatively and constructively.
THANK YOU to Trina Mannino of the Dance Enthusiast for your words on 'WOLF' at Danspace Project's DraftWork 3/16/19. read the article HERE
presented by Mondo Bizarro & Dancing Grounds at Catapult, New Orleans LA (October 2019)
presented by Danspace Project (DraftWork), New York NY (March 2019)
Base: Experimental Arts + Space, Seattle WA (February 2019)
presented by Green Space (Take Root Festival), Queens NY (January 2019)
presented by Domestic Performance Agency (DPAPP), Brooklyn NY (January 2019)
presented by Center for Performance Research (Fall Movement), Brooklyn NY (November 2018)
Amherst College, Amherst MA (October 2018)
Upper Jay Art Center, Upper Jay NY (August 2018)
Movement Research at the Judson Church, New York NY (May 2018)
Domestic Performance Agency, Brooklyn NY (December 2017)
watch 'WOLF' at Danspace Project: pre-show / performance (March 2019)
watch 'WOLF' at Green Space (January 2019)
photos © Stefano Altamura
storm studies
storm studies
2018
extremely honored & excited to have been in residence at Brooklyn Studios for Dance summer-> fall 2018 with composers Daniel Siles& Juan Pablo Siles through SoundStep II- BKSD's choreographer/composer residency. We collaborated to build a new dance & sound performance. What emerged was a study in storms- natural and unnatural storms, mind storms, emotion storms, political shit storms- and of what remains after it all passes.
creative residency at Brooklyn Studios for Dance, Brooklyn NY (August-October 2018)
presented by Brooklyn Studios for Dance, Brooklyn NY (October 2018)
watch 'storm studies' at BKSD (October 2018)
2018
extremely honored & excited to have been in residence at Brooklyn Studios for Dance summer-> fall 2018 with composers Daniel Siles& Juan Pablo Siles through SoundStep II- BKSD's choreographer/composer residency. We collaborated to build a new dance & sound performance. What emerged was a study in storms- natural and unnatural storms, mind storms, emotion storms, political shit storms- and of what remains after it all passes.
creative residency at Brooklyn Studios for Dance, Brooklyn NY (August-October 2018)
presented by Brooklyn Studios for Dance, Brooklyn NY (October 2018)
watch 'storm studies' at BKSD (October 2018)
Rosalie
Rosalie
2018
Rosalie, an assisted solo performance, examines celebration's power and pitfalls, and the lessons we learn from places and people. The piece honors female-bodied goddesses and mentors present and past, and asks, how do we keep going, what is it that gets us through, when does celebration help and when does it hurt? Rosalie invites you to join me in a world, part sweet and personal, part dream, part nightmare. We will chat together, eat chocolate, listen to Venezuelan radio and to a bedtime story. It is a study in memory, letting go and in how we carry lessons learned from places and people.
made & performed in collaboration with Dr. Elsa Redmond, aka my mom.
presented by Dance Now Festival at Joes Pub, New York NY (September 2018)
presented by Triskelion Arts (Split Bill Series), Brooklyn NY (April 2018)
presented by Gibney (Work Up), New York NY (March 2018)
Triskelion Arts (Summer Shake Up series), Triskelion Arts, Brooklyn NY (August 2017)
Three's Brewing (All Together Now: an evening of Interdisciplinary Performance) Brooklyn NY (May 2017)
watch Rosalie at Triskelion Arts
watch Rosalie at Gibney
photo © Whitney Browne Photography
2018
Rosalie, an assisted solo performance, examines celebration's power and pitfalls, and the lessons we learn from places and people. The piece honors female-bodied goddesses and mentors present and past, and asks, how do we keep going, what is it that gets us through, when does celebration help and when does it hurt? Rosalie invites you to join me in a world, part sweet and personal, part dream, part nightmare. We will chat together, eat chocolate, listen to Venezuelan radio and to a bedtime story. It is a study in memory, letting go and in how we carry lessons learned from places and people.
made & performed in collaboration with Dr. Elsa Redmond, aka my mom.
presented by Dance Now Festival at Joes Pub, New York NY (September 2018)
presented by Triskelion Arts (Split Bill Series), Brooklyn NY (April 2018)
presented by Gibney (Work Up), New York NY (March 2018)
Triskelion Arts (Summer Shake Up series), Triskelion Arts, Brooklyn NY (August 2017)
Three's Brewing (All Together Now: an evening of Interdisciplinary Performance) Brooklyn NY (May 2017)
watch Rosalie at Triskelion Arts
watch Rosalie at Gibney
photo © Whitney Browne Photography
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Studies in Solitude September 2015 created and performed while in residence at Catwalk Art Institute, Catskill NY Studies in Solitude is a dance film and performance project that investigates the solo body's relationship to self and natural surroundings. The work examines how the container of a body shifts based on the content of surrounding landscape. This first installment of Studies in Solitude was created up in the Catskill Mountains and Hudson River Valley, and engages with both poetic pastoral landscapes as well as raw and real homes and neighborhoods of communities displaced up to Hudson from the Bronx. These studies invite the viewer to witness a body navigating within, around and amongst spatial histories. watch Studies in Solitude installment 1 photo © Marion Spencer |
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Disappearbox, May 2015 performed at Spoke the Hub as part of Alexandra Beller’s Choreolab performance showcase, Brooklyn NY Disappearbox is an unfinished solo that explores humility and recovery. Drawing from studies of how a body thinks and processes information and feelings - specifically hurt and loss - this solo asks the questions “how do we heal?”and “when are we healed?” The embodiment of patience and persistence as they relate to healing and to achievement are investigated throughout the work, and the relationship between healing and achievement is examined. This work invites us to watch a body think, process and persist. watch Disappearbox film still © Martijn Hart |
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how did i get here? November 2014 Tigermen Den, part of the New Orleans Fringe Festival, New Orleans LA made & performed by Ellery Burton and Marion Spencer how did I get here? Is a duet about labyrinths, direction, destiny and finding one's way. It is a journey wrestling with control over one's fate, amidst an environment that is disorienting you, disorienting us all perhaps. The piece invites us to consider our own individual paths and how much agency we have within our lives. how did i get here? first premiered in October 2014 as part of The Nature of Now, a Prospect 3+ exhibition at 3308 Magazine Street Gallery in New Orleans LA. watch how did i get here? photo © Claire Bangser |
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The Most Important Thing September 2014 part of the Dance for Social Change Festival, New Orleans LA The Most Important Thing, a solo performed by Kehinde Ishangi, is a dance that investigates dehumanization and what it takes to see people as people. This dance begins with the literal metaphor of human as trash, with Kehinde dancing inside of a black trash bag unnoticed by the audience at first. Ultimately, this work proposes that the beginning of the end of dehumanization might just possibly be things as simple as listening and dancing together. watch The Most Important Thing photo © Bound Entertainment, New Orleans |
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Straw June 2014 presented as part of New Noise's Sound OFF VI: Works in Progress Festival Clouet Gardens, New Orleans LA Straw is a solo work in progress referencing the phrase "the last straw" and "the straw the broke the camel's back." The piece examines those final blows, and how we handle and accept what comes to pass in our lives. watch Straw photo © Marion Spencer |
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Anansi/Anna March 2013 live art installation made and performed in collaboration with Monica Rose Kelly at Dancing Grounds "I've been absolutely terrified every moment of my life, and I've never let it keep me from doing a single thing I wanted to do" -Georgia O'Keeffe what is your greatest fear? what scares you the most? are you weaving your dreams into reality? Anansi is a durational and interactive live art installation that builds a giant spider web around everyone over the course of an evening, asking viewers to write down answers one of the above questions, that then get woven into the web, captured as prey. Anansi is inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe's famous saying, and asks us to meditate on our own lives, perhaps inviting us to face our own fears and work to realize our wildest dreams. watch highlights from Anansi photo © Brita Everett |
banner photo by Whitney Browne of Ogemdi Ude in to love the rise/pt.2