Alex Theatre

DANCE REVIEW
Celebrate Dance 2008
The showcase’s mostly L.A.-area choreographers have no fear in pushing toward the future of the art.

By Lewis Segal
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
Border crossings dominated Jamie Nichols’ Celebrate Dance 2008 at the Alex Theatre on Saturday, the latest installment in an annual showcase of mostly local choreographers and companies. No matter how the eight pieces began — whatever vocabularies or idioms represented home base — you could predict that they’d soon head into uncharted territory.

Some works used virtuosity to keep you watching. They were experiments disguised as showpieces. Others simply assumed that the audience craved exploration, wherever it led.

The easiest to describe is the oldest: Marie de la Palme’s familiar “Le Coeur Illuminé” (to Ravel) from 1999. Fusing balletic pointe technique with gymnastics, it showed Melissa Sandvig unwinding from one long skein of crimson fabric only to embrace and climb another, stretching and spinning high above the stage.

Lyrical, dreamlike, metaphoric, the solo provided balm to the eyes even as it tested the dancer’s upper body strength as few ballerina vehicles ever have.

Bradley Michaud’s “Claudia” (done to remixed Orbital), one of the six premieres on the program, turned hyper-physical, take-no-prisoners movement inside out, using it for confessional psychodrama. Harrowing solos for Michaud, Nicole Cox and Jessica Harper, plus a more conventional (and less satisfying) final trio, became expressions of pain — raw evidence of how people can be torn apart by their emotions.

We’re used to this kind of subject in conventional modern dance, but not with the kind of fearless athlete-dancers usually intent on displaying limitless prowess.

A similar mission made Bay Area choreographer Viktor Kabaniaev stray far from the Russian classicism of his heritage toward ultimate stylistic transparency in the complex solo “Episodes of . . . ,” to an original score by Kabaniaev and Nicolas Van Krijdt.

As Irene Liu moved from liquid horizontal passages into edgier, more assaultive sections, the whole question of techniques and training systems dissolved.

Ultimately, you knew only that Kabaniaev had in his creative arsenal everything he needed to tell this story about a woman’s deepest feelings.

With his brilliant quintet “Metanoia,” Jacob “Kujo” Lyons took his radically reconceptualized street-dance style into the realm of the spiritual, slowing down B-boy maneuvers and gymnastics until they became a perfect if unlikely complement to Arvo Pärt’s agonized “Credo.”

At one point, Lyons choreographed a trio that amplified the cantilevered balances he was exploring at that moment in a duet with Sarah Moser, a sequence as daring structurally as it was physically — and drop-dead awesome in its millennial bravura.

In their unsparing male sextet “Dar Es Salaam,” Esther Baker-Tarpaga and Olivier Tarpaga used exotic music (mostly live) and a forceful, individual brand of movement theater to depict the unbearably brutal physical labor, individual suffering and moments of brotherly solidarity of a lifestyle scarcely ever evoked on dance stages.

We never learned who these workers were (miners? factory hands? convicts?), but their intensity proved unforgettable.

Lillian Barbeito’s “Da Vinder,” set to a compendium of contemporary recordings accented and overlaid with live cello, took four women in the opposite direction: from restless searching to acceptance and affirmation.

Fresh and skillful, it ended with a solo with nothing in mind other than Tina Finkelman Berkett’s playful and almost childlike interaction with cellist Emily Corwin. And that was more than enough.

Looking backdated among the evening’s more ambitious offerings, Ana Maria Alvarez’s spirited “Mundo Plastico” (mostly to Willie Colon and Rubin Blades) subjected Latino ballroom dancing to rudimentary analysis via slow-motion and other structural strategies — though the final sequence kept her cast clustered upstage for too long to make much impact.

And Jennifer Backhaus’ fluid octet “Arrive” (performed to Mogwai and Explosions in the Sky) simply reiterated what the local dance community already knew about her sophistication and refinement without asking her excellent dancers for anything they hadn’t done before. Nice work, but a mite disappointing in an evening focused on the future of the art.

lewis.segal@latimes.com

Columns
FROM THE MARGINS:
Filling a big void with the arts

By PATRICK AZADIAN
Glendale News Press

My friend Elissa Glickman, the director of marketing and resource development for the Alex Theatre, asked me the age-old question: “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?”
She went on to make an analogy to the arts by asking: “If you create art and no one comes to see your work, is it still art?”

I personally think it is.

The more complicated question is that if you are the last human being on earth, will you be motivated to create art? And if you do, and there is no one there to judge it, is it still art? The same question can be posed to many other social situations.

If you like red Ferraris, and if you had the chance, would you drive one on a deserted island with no chance of escape and zero possibility of being seen? Would you still ride in the Italian masterpiece driving around the island at high speeds claiming you were doing this for yourself, and no one else? And would you still take a shower in the morning before getting into the car and nowhere to go?

Human beings are social animals. By this, I don’t mean we like to have big weddings or participate in poker nights now and then. But our existence is meaningless without the society around us. And many of the things we do — breathing, eating and bowel movements excluded — are a products of our social environment.

I understand where Elissa was going with her line of philosophical questioning. Because of her position she has an interest in promoting and championing the arts in our community. Her questions were leading to the plight of artists in our city. Glendale is rich with people who are dedicated to the many aspects of the arts. We have painters, visual artists, dancers, singers and many more. Yet, few people know about this talent. Many take their trade and exhibitions outside the borders of Glendale, where people are more receptive and conditions more favorable for growth and appreciation of the arts.

There has always been talk of a void in our city about supporting the arts. As in any other aspects of life, unless there is a movement or an organization driving a qualitative change in our lives, conditions are more
likely to remain unchanged.

But if the void is real and genuine, it is a matter of time before someone or something fills it.

According to Elissa, the Alex Theatre has plans to become a new nonprofit arts organization that will spread the word about local artists and their work. This new organization, the Glendale Arts Alliance, will be making its case at the Glendale Redevelopment Agency meeting in mid-April. Should the new organization get the blessing of the city, it will begin its new life as early as July 2008.

The arts alliance has pledged to work with artists, art organizations, businesses and the city to provide resources to help promote of their work. The organization will continue to manage and operate the Alex Theatre on behalf of the city.

In addition, the arts alliance plans to promote programs and activities, including workshops, concerts, lectures, exhibits, readings, performances and marketplaces. It will aim to generate support of the arts among financial stakeholders including donors, foundations, local businesses, corporate sponsors, educators, government agencies and residents.

The arts alliance will also aim to encourage collaboration of artists and arts organizations to take advantage of the scarce resources for the arts. The organization will collaborate with local educational institutions to
integrate the arts into student’s educational experience.

My uncle Ruben Amirian, a local artist and architect, always addresses this void regarding the arts whenever I run into him. I often ask myself how I can help fill this void, but as French-Algerian author and Nobel prize
winner Albert Campus said: “All great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning. Great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant’s revolving door.”

The arts alliance can be that beginning. I am looking forward to seeing the void filled.

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PATRICK AZADIAN is a writer and the creative director of a local marketing and graphic design studio living in Glendale. He may be reached at respond@fromthemargins.net.

Attendance is up, but theater still reports loss
Executive director at the Alex says its challenge is to find ways to use venue during the week.

By Jason Wells

Glendale News Press
March 1, 2008

DOWNTOWN — Second-quarter financial data released Friday for the Alex Theatre reflected signs of a strengthening client base, a key indicator of how successful its role as an independent venue will be seven years from now when city subsidies dry up, officials said.

While its year-to-date loss had increased $42,000 to more than $247,700 over the same period last year, activity at the landmark theater had increased nearly 24%, bumping attendance up 4.8%, according to the report.

The report, which will be presented Tuesday to the Redevelopment Agency, cited higher maintenance and staff costs and increased insurance premiums for the loss, but touted a 9.1% increase in net rental revenue — the theater’s main source of revenue outside of city funds.

“We’re very happy that attendance is back on the upswing,” Executive Director Barry McComb. “For us, the challenge has always been to try and find ways to utilize the theater during the week.”

That challenge may be easier to overcome if the City Council — which props up theater operations with an annual $415,000 subsidy — approves a proposed overhaul of the theater’s management structure.

Since the city purchased the struggling theater in 1992, the nonprofit Alex Regional Theatre Board has managed operations there, but McComb is looking to change that with the proposed Arts Alliance — a new oversight group with a broader mission to expand the venue’s reach.

Instead of relying on film shoots to plug rental scheduling holes during the week, the theater has begun hosting more receptions in the foyer, which brings in less cash but attracts future business, McComb said.

And if the Arts Alliance is approved, an outside sales manager would be brought in to attract more business from outlying areas, he said.

“Certainly, making that move is a big piece of the strategy for how we’re going to reduce our reliance on the city,” he said.

Much of that profit growth will need to take root ahead of 2015, when city subsidies will end with the sunset of the Central Glendale Redevelopment Area.

Those subsidies have played a key role in the theater’s financial solvability, city officials said. The city’s $415,000 transfer this year wiped away the theater’s $247,700 deficit, leaving a $167,300 surplus, according to the report.

But it’s easy to get caught up in the drama of dollar figures and overlook the equally important growth in attendance and activities — an indication that efforts to increase awareness and tailor programming to community tastes are paying off, said Arman Kayvanian, who serves on the city Arts & Culture Commission.

In the second quarter, 57,627 people attended events at the Alex, a 4.8% increase over the same period last year, according to the report. And more of those events were performance-based, which filled in the 66.7% drop in film and TV shoots.

Over the past month, hundreds of stakeholders have attended theater-sponsored community input meetings on how the proposed Arts Alliance can better serve Glendale, while giving broader assessments of the challenges current artists face here.

And in January, the arts commission established a subcommittee to facilitate more intense strategic arts planning between the city and public.

“It’s finally paying off for us, I guess,” Kayvanian said.

The Redevelopment Agency, which is also expected to authorize $16,250 for ongoing capital improvements at the theater, meets at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday in City Council Chambers, 613 E. Broadway.

JASON WELLS covers City Hall. He may be reached at (818) 637-3235 or by e-mail at jason.wells@latimes.com.