BEACON EVENT AT DIA:BEACON

Beacon, NY (June 2, 2008) Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) will conduct the fourth residency of the two-year Hudson Valley Project, culminating in performances of Beacon Event on Saturday, July 5 at 2 PM and Sunday, July 6 at 2 PM and 4:30 PM at Dia:Beacon, Riggio Galleries, within the galleries devoted to Richard Serra’s monumental steel sculptures, Torqued Ellipses.

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO - FINAL CONCERT OF FIRST SEASON

New York, NY (May 28, 2008) Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) presents the sixth concert of Experiments in the Studio on Monday, June 23 at 8:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. The concert unites the diverse experimental composer/performers Newton Armstrong, David Linton, Maria Chavez, and Stephan Moore, featuring a solo performance by each, as well as a group improvisation to wrap up the evening. This occasion promises to be a meeting of innovative minds, as Chavez’s avant-turntablism meets Armstrong’s knob-covered one-of-a-kind electronic instruments, Moore’s idiosyncratic performance software, and Linton’s Bicameral Research Sound and Projection System.

RAUSCHENBERG AND DANCE, PARTNERS FOR LIFE

New York, NY (May 14, 2008) By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

Something inherently theatrical about Robert Rauschenberg’s talent — always evident in his radical feeling for color, light, composition and new ingredients and juxtapositions —prompted him to his boldest and freshest conceptions when he worked onstage. From the early 1950s until 2007 he designed for dance. And in the late ’50s and early ’60s, when he first came to fame, he was recurrently (at times constantly) occupied in dance theater.

MERCE CUNNINGHAM STUDIO FACULTY CONCERT

New York, NY (May 7, 2008) On Friday, June 13 and Saturday, June 14, 2008 at 8:30 PM, the Merce Cunningham Studio presents a diverse evening of dance and music featuring two choreographic works by Merce Cunningham as well as contemporary work by faculty members Louise Burns, Janet Charleston, Jean Freebury, and Daniel Squire.

BEACON EVENT AT DIA:BEACON

Beacon, NY (April 15, 2008) MCDC will conduct the third residency of the two-year Hudson Valley Project, culminating in performances of Beacon Event on Sunday May 18 at 2 PM and 4:30 PM at Dia:Beacon, Riggio Galleries, within the galleries devoted to Bruce Nauman.

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO

New York, NY (April 9, 2008) MCDC presents the fifth concert of Experiments in the Studio on Monday, May 5 at 8:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. The concert unites experimental composer/performers Richard Teitelbaum (MCDC composer/performer in the 1970s), Miguel Frasconi (for his first MCDC-presented performance), Marina Rosenfeld (MCDC composer/performer 2004–05) and David Behrman (MCDC Music Committee Member, MCDC composer/performer since 1967). The program features three world premieres, Miguel Frasconi’s These Intertwined Portraits (2008), Richard Teitellbaum’s Piano Tree (2008), and Marina Rosenfeld's mirror mirror (2008), as well as David Behrman’s Freeze Dip (2008). Additional performers include Hiroko Sakurazawa for Piano Tree, Robert Black for Freeze Dip, and J.G.Thirlwell for mirror mirror. All four composer/performers will come together again later in the month on Sunday, May 18 to perform for the third Beacon Event, part of MCDC’s Hudson Valley Project residency at Dia:Beacon.

THE DANCE HAS A MEANING, BUT THAT'S NOT THE POINT

Washington DC (March 29, 2008) By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

When Merce Cunningham made Second Hand in 1970, he was already internationally established as the foremost nonballet creator of dances that were about dancing, that had no messages, that were, in Susan Sontag’s phrase, “against interpretation.”

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO: AN EVENING WITH TAKEHISA KOSUGI

New York, NY (March 7, 2008) MCDC presents the fifth concert of Experiments in the Studio on Monday, March 31 at 8:30 PM, at the Merce Cunningham Studio. This concert celebrates the work of composer/performer Takehisa Kosugi. Currently residing in Osaka, Kosugi has performed worldwide with MCDC since 1977 and has been the Company’s Musical Director since 1995. The concert will mark his first solo appearance in New York City since 1988 and coincides with his 70th birthday celebration. The program features 3 electro-acoustic compositions including the world premiere of Multiplex, Organic Music (1962), and South E.V. (1999). The performance will be technically assisted by Stephan Moore.

HISTORY MATTERS: A LIVING ARCHIVAL PRESENTATION

New York, NY (February 27, 2008) MCDC presents its fourth installment of History Matters—a series developed by Assistant to the Choreographer Robert Swinston—on Monday, March 24, 2008 at 7 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. MCDC and distinguished artists will examine the creative life of Merce Cunningham during the 1980s by discussing dances, filmdances and videodances of that period. Noted panelists Merce Cunningham, MCDC Archivist David Vaughan, Patricia Lent (MCDC dancer 1984–1993) and filmmaker Elliot Caplan will guide audience members through a program including excerpts of filmdances Channels/Inserts (1981 Charles Atlas) and Coast Zone (1983 Charles Atlas), and videodances Points in Space (1986 Caplan) and Changing Steps (1988 Caplan). In addition, members of MCDC and the Repertory Understudy Group will perform excerpts of Fielding Sixes (1980), Trails (1982), Roaratorio (1983), and Doubles (1984).

PUBLIC RELEASE OF MERCE CUNNINGHAM'S LOOPS CHOREOGRAPHY

New York, NY (January 31, 2008) MCDC and The OpenEnded Group present the public release of Merce Cunningham’s choreography for his signature solo dance Loops, and the accompanying digital artwork created by The OpenEnded Group, on Tuesday, February 26 at 6:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. This event is co-hosted by the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center. The evening will include a presentation of the choreography and of the digital artwork, remarks from Merce Cunningham as well as Paul Kaiser
and Marc Downie of The OpenEnded Group, and a reception. The choreography for Loops will be made available under a “copyleft” intellectual property license (in the form championed by Creative Commons). This will permit anyone to perform, reproduce, and adapt this work for non-commercial purposes. Simultaneously, the digital artists of The OpenEnded Group (Marc Downie, Shelley Eshkar, and Paul Kaiser) will release their digital portrait of Cunningham, also entitled Loops, as open source software.

AN OLD MENTOR'S NEW MEDIUM

New York, NY (January 20, 2008) By Julie Bloom, The New York Times

"O.K., position, ready and..." Merce Cunningham was beginning his company class, as he does every Monday morning, in an 11th-floor studio at the Westbeth Building in the far West Village. Perched on a stool in a corner of a studio lighted only by the January sun, his arms gently resting on a ballet barre, Mr. Cunningham led the class of 25 dancers. Despite his frailty (he turns 89 in April), he was precise in his instructions.

ALTERNATE WORLDS MOVING ON TWO STAGES, PERFORMING FOR ONE AUDIENCE

Beacon, NY (January 14, 2008) By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

Because dance occurs in both time and space, it operates upon us as a demonstration of physics. This aspect becomes arresting in the work of two choreographers alone: George Balanchine and Merce Cunningham. Mr. Cunningham has often quoted Einstein's dictum "there are no fixed points in space," and since the 1980s some of the ensembles in his work have struck observers as riveting enactments of chaos theory.

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO: AN EVENING WITH CHRISTIAN WOLFF

New York, NY (January 11, 2008) Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) presents the fourth concert of “Experiments in the Studio,” featuring the music of Christian Wolff on Monday, February 4 at 8:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. Christian Wolff has been composing and performing with MCDC since 1952 and is currently a co-director of the MCDC Music Committee. The program features the world premiere of Duo 7 (2007) and the New York premiere of Grete (2007), dedicated to his former piano teacher Grete Sultan. Other pieces on the program include Exercises 1 and 10 (1974), Exercise 18 (1975), and Jasper (1991). Performers include Robert Black (contrabass), Timothy Fain (violin), Larry Polansky (electric guitar), Robyn Schulkowsky (percussion), and Christian Wolff (piano, melodica).

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO

New York, NY (December 11, 2007) Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) presents the third concert of “Experiments in the Studio” on Monday January 7 at 8:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. This concert unites four New York City-based experimental composer/performers for the first time as a group: George Lewis (MCDC composer/performer 2004–05), Fast Forward (MCDC composer/performer 1994–97), Zeena Parkins (for her first MCDC-presented performance), and John King (MCDC composer/performer since 1985).

PARIS FLOCKS TO A CUNNINGHAM REVIVAL: WORKS THAT REMAIN FRESH

Paris, France (December 10, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

Among the American cultural phenomena that the French have taken to their collective heart (le jazz hot, le film noir, etc.), surely nothing is more surprising than the success of the choreographer Merce Cunningham over several decades... American dance currently has no finer or more constantly rewarding export.

MERCE CUNNINGHAM, MOVER AND SHAKER

New York, NY (December 2, 2007) - Photograph by Robert Maxwell, Text by Alex Hawgood, The New York Times

The redoubtable Merce Cunningham has never been one to follow a routine. In a career spanning more than six decades, Cunningham has purposefully composed pieces without informing his dancers of the music; incorporated the art of Jasper Johns, Robert Rauschenberg, Andy Warhol and Bruce Nauman into his dances; and, in collaboration with his long-time partner John Cage, used the I Ching to determine a performance.

ELECTRONIC PIONEER WITH TIES TO DANCE

New York, NY (November 21, 2007) - By Steve Smith, The New York Times

The choreographer Merce Cunningham has played an invaluable role in fostering the creation of a substantial body of contemporary American music over the last half-century. "Experiments in the Studio," a new series at Mr. Cunningham's West Village headquarters, is taking stock of that impetus through concerts largely devoted to composers who have been associated with the company. Gordon Mumma, who worked with Mr. Cunningham from 1966 to 1974, was the subject of the second installment, on Monday night.

BROAD AND LIVELY FESTIVAL LEAVES AUDIENCES STIMULATED, DANCING

Melbourne, Australia (October 29, 2007) - By Hilary Crampton and Jo Roberts, The Age

...In the end, however, all agreed that the award for the most outstanding show belonged to the Merce Cunningham Dance Company's Program A, featuring works spanning more than 50 years of invention, risk and stunningly beautiful dance from a master choreographer who has influenced all the arts and, at 88, continues to engage with new generations of collaborators.

MASTERFUL BRUSH STROKES OF DANCE

Melbourne, Australia (October 26, 2007) - By Hilary Crampton, The Age

Watching Suite for Five, first presented in the late 1950s, is like watching a master calligrapher. One sees each action, unfolding like brush strokes on a scroll. It is spare, clean movement, exposing Cunningham's detailed exploration of the body's architecture and its movement capabilities.

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO: AN MCDC NEW MUSIC SERIES PRESENTS GORDON MUMMA

New York, NY (October 26, 2007) Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) presents the second concert of Experiments in the Studio on Monday November 19 at 8:30 PM in the Merce Cunningham Studio. This concert celebrates the music of Gordon Mumma (whose primary activity with MCDC was 1966–1974 as composer/performer), bringing five pieces to New York City for the first time. Performers include Gordon Mumma (piano and live electronics), Jenny Lin (piano), and Conrad Harris (violin and live electronics).

SQUARE DANCING BECOMES AVANT GARDE AMID THE TREES

Melbourne, Australia (October 22, 2007) - By Hilary Crampton, The Age

If there is one thing predictable about Melbourne's weather, it is its unpredictability. Having drowned out the Melbourne Festival's opening night concert in Federation Square, it turned on midsummer temperatures for Merce Cunningham's Melbourne Event, which is perhaps appropriate. After all, a central principle of Cunningham's choreography has been to avoid predictability.

BY TWOS: FROM PRIVACY TO FUSION IN A CUNNINGHAM DUET

Hanover, NH (October 9, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

They have their exits and their entrances, and in between, the members of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company dance. Hence, surely, the name of Mr. Cunningham's latest marvel: "Xover" (pronounced "Crossover"), whose world premiere was the climax of a weeklong residency at Dartmouth College here.

ONE STAGE FOR EACH EYE, AND PLENTY FOR THE EARS TOO

Beacon, NY (October 1, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

Paul Valery wrote in "L'Ame et la Danse" (1921) that the essence of dance lay in metamorphosis, that what dance shows is the constant change of one physical image into another. His point works for all dance, but to no choreographer can it apply more fully than Merce Cunningham. Change is the continual condition of his dance theater, and not just of one image, shape or rhythm into another.

PAST PRESENT, SAVORING THE LEGACY AND LIFE OF MERCE

New York, NY (September 25, 2007) - By Deborah Jowitt, The Village Voice                                                              Dancers and choreographers tend to be unconcerned with what came before them; they live in a sweaty present of creative ferment, occasionally glancing toward the future. They, along with Merce Cunningham's admirers, can gleam much from the company's new History Matters evenings - a mix of information, reminiscences, archival footage, and live performance.

AN ARTIST TURNED TOWARD COMPLEXITY

New York, NY (September 20, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times

This year Merce Cunningham and colleagues have presented a retrospective series of evenings about his choreography called "History Matters" at his studio at Westbeth in Greenwich Village.

HUDSON VALLEY PROJECT
Beacon, NY (August 31, 2007) 2-year residency at Dia:Beacon; Inaugural Performance: Sun. Sept. 30 at 3 PM. Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) will inaugurate a two-year residency program at Dia:Beacon, Riggio Galleries entitled the Hudson Valley Project on Sunday, September 30 at 3 PM with the performance of Beacon Event in the Andy Warhol Shadows Gallery of Dia:Beacon, Riggio Galleries, the day after the MCDC 2007 Gala Celebration, also at Dia:Beacon.

FALL PREVIEW 2007
New York, NY (August 31, 2007) Merce Cunningham Dance Company's Fall preview press release.  Featuring the following: Experiments in the Studio: an MCDC new music series; 2007 Gala Celebration at Dia:Beacon; Hudson Valley Residency at Dia:Beacon; World Premiere of XOVER at Dartmouth, NH; Tour to Krannert Center and Columbia College, Chicago IL; Melbourne International Arts Festival, Melbourne, Australia; Festival d’Automne, Paris, France.

HISTORY MATTERS: A LIVING ARCHIVAL PRESENTATION
New York, NY (August 30, 2007) Merce in the 1970s; Tues. Sept. 18 at 7PM. The third in a series of evenings dedicated to exploring the history of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) and examining the creative life of Merce Cunningham.  MCDC and distinguished artists will examine the creative life of Merce Cunningham during the 1970s. The evening features a discussion led by noted panelists including Merce Cunningham, David Vaughan, Robert Swinston, Valda Setterfield, and Meg Harper, accompanied by performance and video excerpts of seminal works from this decade: Signals (1970), Westbeth (1974), Changing Steps (1975), Blue Studio: Five Segments (1975), Torse (1976), Fractions (1977), and Locale (1979).

EXPERIMENTS IN THE STUDIO: AN MCDC NEW MUSIC SERIES
New York, NY (August 10, 2007) Opening night; Mon. Sept. 17 at 8:30PM.  Merce Cunningham Dance Company (MCDC) launches a new music series called “Experiments in the Studio” on Monday, September 17 at 8:30 p.m. The series will feature original music and improvisations by collaborators of Merce Cunningham and John Cage, including: David Behrman, John King, Stephan Moore, Christian Wolff, Takehisa Kosugi (Music Director of MCDC), Gordon Mumma, George Lewis, Fast Forward, Zeena Parkins, Richard Teitelbaum, Miguel Frasconi, and Marina Rosenfeld.

DESIGN MEETS DANCE AND RULES ARE BROKEN
New York, NY (June 17, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times                                                          ''SUPPOSE your daughter is getting married, and her wedding dress won't be ready until the morning of the wedding, but it's by Dior,'' the composer Morton Feldman said to a friend in 1958. He was explaining how Merce Cunningham could be choreographing ''Summerspace'' in one part of the country while Robert Rauschenberg is was designing it in another and he, Feldman, was composing the music in a third.

INVENTION: MERCE CUNNINGHAM & COLLABORATORS
New York, NY (June 19, 2007) - The works and the methods of the great choreographer and dancer Merce Cunningham and the renowned artists with whom he has worked are the focus of Invention: Merce Cunningham & Collaborators, the exhibition opening Tuesday, June 19 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Invention: Merce Cunningham & Collaborators is on view from June 19 through October 13, 2007 at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza. Admission is free. For exhibition information, telephone 212.870.1630 or visit the Library's website at www.nypl.org.

DANCE CRITICS ASSOCIATION HONORS DAVID VAUGHAN AS 2007 SENIOR CRITIC
New York, NY (June 17, 2007) The Dance Critics Association (DCA) is thrilled to announce that critic, scholar, biographer, Cunningham Foundation archivist, and performer David Vaughan will be honored at the DCA’s annual June conference as the organization’s 2007 Senior Critic. Choreographer Merce Cunningham is scheduled to introduce him. Mr. Vaughan will address the conference on June 17. The title of his speech —“Commence to Dancing” — is derived from a song in the Laurel and Hardy movie Way Out West. A longtime cabaret performer in a duo with the late Al Carmines, Mr. Vaughan may also sing a little in the course of his presentation. During the 2002 Lincoln Center Festival presentation of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, Mr. Vaughan joined Mr. Cunningham as a reader in the company revival of How to Pass, Kick, Fall and Run (1965).

HISTORY MATTERS: A LIVING ARCHIVAL PRESENTATION
New York, NY (May 23, 2007) Merce Cunningham Dance Company announced today its third iteration of History Matters: A Living Archival Presentation. On June 7, 2007 at 7pm, The Merce Cunningham Dance Company and a panel of distinguished artists will examine the creative life of Merce Cunningham and the extraordinary experimental and varied period of the 1960s. The evening features a discussion led by noted panelists including Merce Cunningham, David Vaughan, Lewis Lloyd, and Robert Swinston, accompanied by performance and video excerpts of Merce Cunningham’s period seminal works: Story (1963), Cross Currents (1964), Variations V (1965), How To (1965), Place (1966), Scramble (1967), RainForest (1968), Walkaround Time (1968), and Canfield (1969).

Los Angeles, CA (May 19, 2007) - By Susan Josephs, Los Angeles Times                                                                  Back in the mid-'50s, when he faced both financial woes and the snobbery of the New York dance establishment, choreographer Merce Cunningham started taking his fledgling troupe on the road for "one-night stands" at any venue he could book. In a VW bus bought with borrowed money, "we used to travel great distances. After all, performing for one night was better than nothing," he says with a chuckle.

EXPLORING SPACE
Los Angeles, CA (May 20, 2007) - By Laura Bleiberg, The Orange County Register                                              Saturday night's Merce Cunningham dance concert at the Orange County Performing Arts Center was about as close to a 1960s "happening" as you never thought you'd witness behind the Orange curtain. The big difference between 1967 and 2007? Not hairstyles – it's technology. It was integral to Saturday's experience with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, and some of us needed handholding to keep it all straight.

MERCE CUNNINGHAM, THE MIX MASTER
Los Angeles, CA (May 21, 2007) - By Chris Pasles, Los Angeles Times                                                                              For a few hours Saturday, the Orange County Performing Arts Center became one of the hippest places around. That's because the Merce Cunningham Dance Company took over the site, performing in three locations — the new Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, the Community Arts Plaza (on film) and the older Segerstrom Hall. The program was also a first for the 88-year-old Cunningham. Never before had his company, founded in 1953, performed in multiple sites in a single evening.

DEMOCRACY IN ACTION, THAT'S CUNNINGHAM
New York City, NY (April 10, 2007) - By Alastair Macaulay, The New York Times          

Merce Cunningham turned 88 on Monday. In recent years he has routinely been described as the world’s greatest choreographer. This doesn’t mean, though, that he is just the oldest choreographer who has been great in the past. The dances he has made this millennium suggest, amazingly, that no choreographer alive is more concerned with continuing to extend his range. The New York Times:  Highlighting Merce Cunningham's current and historic artistic achievements through the presentation of "History Matters."  The ongoing series is a showcase containing excerpts of pivotal works, highlighted by a distinguished panel. The most recent panelists include Merce Cunningham, Carolyn Brown, David Vaughan, David Behrman, and Robert Swinston.

WHEN THE CHOREOGRAPHER IS OUT OF THE PICTURE
New York City, NY (Janurary 7, 2007) - By Diane Solway, The New York Times

Like so much else in American dance, it all began with Martha Graham. When the mother of modern dance died in 1991 at the age of 96, she bequeathed control of her work to her friend Ronald Protas. But in a bitter and very public legal battle, the Martha Graham Center claimed that it, and not Ms. Graham, owned the rights to her dances and that they were not hers to give away. The New York Times: Pinnacle choreographers of our time and the question of what will happen to their choreography once they are gone. “What will become of Merce Cunningham’s work when he is gone? Or Paul Taylor’s? The Fight over Martha Graham’s"

LUKE JENNINGS ARTICLE IN GUARDIAN CRITICS
United Kingdom (Janurary 5, 2007) - By Luke Jennings, The Observer Critics Review 2006

Merce Cunningham’s Ocean, ranked number four in the top five. In the contemporary arena, Rambert mounted Merce Cunningham's Pond Way to great acclaim and Cunningham attended the enthralling performances of Ocean which opened the Dance Umbrella Festival. Phoenix Dance Company saw a change of leadership from Darshan Singh Bhuller to Javier de Frutos - no loss of theatricality there, it's safe to predict - and Rafael Bonachela left Rambert to start his own company, taking muse Amy Hollingsworth with him and mounting an ambitious programme on the South Bank.