For the Moment: Rourou Ye, Marýa Wethers, and Paul Singh + Jack Blackmon

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For the Moment, a program curated by Eva Yaa Asantewaa, presents evenings of short, theme-based solo improvisations that celebrate creative response to the changing textures and energies of outer and inner worlds. The Spring 2022 theme is Other Discoveries Made on The Moon, inspired by the color lithograph by Leopoldo Galluzzo. View the print and read more about it and the Great Moon Hoax here.

Rourou Ye

Rourou Ye (b. 1989, Wenzhou, China; lives in the USA) is an independent choreographer who works with movement, shadow puppetry, and technology to devise performances that defy reality. She finds inspiration from the unexpected, using a practice of observation and play: repurposing items from her immediate surroundings and discovering hidden perspectives revealed through still and moving images and the lenses of the camera. Her works highlight the creation of illusory, transformative, and cinematic sceneries through shadow and projection in live and digital performances where she “lives” and dances through to reveal urgent narratives of struggle.

Marýa Wethers

Marýa Wethers (she/her) has lived and worked in Lenapehoking (NYC) since 1997. She is a Black, queer, woman dance artist and independent creative producer & curator. As a dancer, Marýa received a 2017 NY Dance & Performance (“Bessie”) Award for Outstanding Performance with the Skeleton Architecture collective. As a curator, she conceived and created the three-week performance series Gathering Place: Black Queer Land(ing) at Gibney and curated for Mount Tremper Arts Watershed Lab Residency (2019 & 2018), Queer NY International Arts Festival (2016 & 2015), and Out of Space @ BRIC Studio series for Danspace Project (2003-2007). Her writings have been published in Configurations in Motion: Performance Curation and Communities of Color (2016 & 2015) organized by Thomas F. DeFrantz at Duke University and the Movement Research Performance Journal 25th Anniversary Issue #27/28 (Spring 2005). She graduated from Mount Holyoke College with a BA in Dance, minor in African-American Studies, 1997.

Paul Singh

Paul Singh earned his BFA in Dance from the University of Illinois, USA. He has danced for Gerald Casel, Risa Jaroslow, Phantom Limb Company, Stephanie Batten Bland, Douglas Dunn, Christopher Williams, Kathy Westwater, Faye Driscoll, and was featured in the inaugural cast of Punchdrunk’s American debut of Sleep No More. While abroad, he was a dancer in Peter Sellars’ opera The Indian Queen (Madrid) as well as Peter Pleyer’s large-scale improvisation work Visible Undercurrent (Berlin). Paul has had his own work shown at multiple venues in NYC, Berlin, and in 2004 his solo piece Stutter was presented at the Kennedy Center. Paul has taught contact improvisation around the world, leading intensives and advanced workshops for teacher training purposes and beginner studies. He currently teaches varied technique classes (partnering, floor work, contemporary technique, contact improvisation) for Movement Research, Sarah Lawrence College, and The Juilliard School. In 2021, he began his role as Artistic Associate at Baryshnikov Arts Center.

Jack Blackmon

Jack Blackmon is a performer, choreographer, and massage therapist in training originally from Tahoe City, California. They received their formative training at NYU before going on to perform for choreographers throughout New York including Sean Curran, Paul Singh/Singh and Dance, Emily Schoen, Nicole Wolcott, Christopher Williams, Jordan Lloyd, and others. Jack performed in Punchdrunk’s Sleep No More for nearly 2 years before the pandemic. They believe in the power of touch and intimacy to enrich performance both for audience and performer alike.

COVID-19 SAFETY POLICIES

Audience members must adhere to Gibney Center’s COVID-19 policies.
Review the full policy here: https://gibneydance.org/plan-your-visit/

For the Moment, a program curated by Senior Curation & Editorial Director Eva Yaa Asantewaa, presents evenings of short, theme-based solo improvisations that celebrate creative response to the changing textures and energies of outer and inner worlds.

Image Description: Collage of four photos. First Photo: Two Rourou look at each other. Second Photo: Marýa, a brown-skinned Black woman, looks directly at the camera with a warm smile. She has wavy black hair with white-gray streaks and a part in the middle. She is wearing a red t-shirt. Third photo: Paul has a shaved head, brown skin, and large eyes. He is wearing a burgundy long-sleeve shirt and looking off to the side. Fourth Photo: Jack, a bald gender-nonconforming performer, stares softly towards their right shoulder at the camera. Their dark, scraggly beard is strongly contrasted by the lavender background behind them.

Rourou Ye by Xiaojie Jin, Marýa Wethers by Marci Blackman, Paul Sing by Andrew Jordan, Jack Blackmon by Spencer James Weidie.