Out North goes to PAC!

Out North Contemporary Art House has brought New York City-based Bridgman/Packer Dance to Anchorage for two performances at the PAC’s Discovery Theatre, part of Out North’s Live Art Series.

The New Yorker called Bridgman/Packer “witty, sexy, and surreal,” and the Boston Globe described it as “the most thrilling dance work this reviewer has seen in recent memory…flat-out exhilarating.” Choreographer/performers Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer, along with a multitude of their video counterparts, blend live camera, animation, and prerecorded urban projected settings in a highly-charged alchemy of the live and the virtual.

This is not only a spectacular show, but it’s also a family-friendly one.  And, as Out North reminds us,

because we’re still not quite out of the hole that grant pull put us in, attending Bridgman/Packer Dance is the next best thing to making a donation.

Need a refresher about the hole Out North is in?  We wrote about it last November: a national funder representing one-third of Out North’s annual budget “changed direction,” and Out North continues to need our help to give us all the top-notch stuff they’ve been giving us for the past 25 years.  So please help out — and enjoy a spectacular show while you’re at it!

• Date/time: Friday, April 29 at 7:30 PM; Saturday, April 30 at 7:30 PM.  Update: Per CenterTix, start time for both the Friday and Saturday shows have been revised to a half hour later than originally scheduled. Theatre doors will now open at 7:30 PM, and the curtain will rise at 8:00 PM.
• Cost of admission: $35 general admission; $25 select seats, 60+ and Military; $10 youth 18 and under. Discounted tickets are available at CenterTix.net
• Further info:: See the Facebook event page, the event page at Out North, or the story in the Anchorage Daily News.

About the show

Co-commissioned by Out North, the show’s first act, Double Expose, makes use of two concepts developed by Bridgman/Packer: video partnering, the total integration of live performance and video technology; and technological cubism, the “live filming of different angles of the performers that are then simultaneously projected back onto their real selves, creating a displacement of body parts and adding a distorted sensuality to the partnering.” As described at Bridgman/Packer’s website, Double Expose is

a fantastical, raucous, sensual exploration of identity, relationship, and the human psyche. With a nod to classical cinema, choreographer/performers Art Bridgman and Myrna Packer, along with a multitude of their video counterparts, embody a range of archetypal personae. Blending live camera, animation, and prerecorded urban settings, Bridgman and Packer create multi-layered perspectives and surreal mindscapes amid a highly-charged alchemy of the live and the virtual.

Watch excerpts of “Double Expose,” filmed at its March 2010 premiere at the Baryshnikov Arts Center, New York City:

In the show’s second act, Under the Skin,

the performers’ bodies and costumes become projection screens creating a morphing and redefining of identities and the revealing of hidden psychological depths. The duet form explodes into a magically populated stage as Bridgman and Packer interchange with their ever multiplying virtual selves.

Here’s a video composite from Under the Skin, which premiered in March 2005 at The Duke on 42nd Street, NYC as part of the 92nd Street Y Harkness Dance Festival.

Keep track of this and other events in LGBTQ Alaska at Bent Alaska’s new & improved events calendar.