Click here to purchase tickets for the season. Consider being a part of our Opening Night benefit or purchasing a Backstage Pass to become more intimate with the dancers!

Until next time,
Your Friends at MDT

Note: If you’re not in New York this December, we’ll be livestreaming a couple of the shows. Be sure to keep your eyes peeled for more details.

This March 13th, Wanderlust (directed by Encyclopedia Pictura), will be screened in 3D at Deitch Studios!

Misnomer choreographed the video and two of our dancers (Coco and Brynne) perform in it alongside with Bjork!

We’re excited to officially announce the release date for Bjork’s music video Wanderlust. Attendance for the viewing is first-come, first-serve, so arrive early.

The choreographic and artistic process on this project was very rewarding, and we’re excited to be sharing this work with you. Once the video is released, check our flickr page for a behind the scenes look.

Nearest metro stops are Court Square. Take a look at the Map below for reference :

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Related Links:
Choreographing Bjork’s Music Video

Shooting in 3D

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For those who are participating in the workshop, please feel free to ask questions or leave comments directly on this blog!

For everyone, else, check back here for updates + insights from the workshop!

As you may know, we’ve doing a lot of film and video work, recently collaborating in choreographing a video for Bjork, as well as working with Tronic Studios to create the motion-capture trailer for ResFest, a prominent film festival. We firmly believe that there are lots of interesting ways in which choreographers and film directors can create together, and we hope this Sundance Feature becomes part of this ongoing dialogue.

If you have thoughts or interests in an interdisciplinary project, please let us know.

We have exciting news for you. We did it! Your incredibly inspiring support helped Misnomer win $10k for the Arts. With this amazing gift, we are planning on building tools to bring artists and audiences (that’s you) closer via the web.

You can read the press release from Advanta, the sponsors of IdeaBlob.

Each month, there is a different winner. This month, Misnomer took the prize. IdeaBlob held a reception in New York City to recognize past winners. During the reception, Ami (IdeaBlob’s Chief Innovation Officer) handed Chris a large check – just like I used to see on TV.

We all took the opportunity to take a picture with the check. Check out the full photoset on our flickr page.

UPDATED: You can now read Deborah Jowitt’s article on Ideablob and Misnomer in the Village Voice

Mon, Jan 14th (9 – 9:30 pm)
Ailey Citygroup Theater
405 W. 55th St., btwn 9th and 10th Ave

We have enjoyed performing for you this past year and appreciate all that you’ve shared with us, including your messages, your contributions, your support for our ideaBlob campaign, and your care about our work. This performance and reception is one of our ways of saying thank you! Onwards in 2008!

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She confidently stated that even though it wasn’t very practical, she wanted to come over because she considered it the highlight of her trip. She also had a curious and mysterious answer for Chris when he asked what she thought of her brief glimpse into rehearsal. She seemed to understand the dynamic in the room, almost as if she knew us personally. You can imagine how delightful and touching her visit could be, in the middle of an ordinary day, when all perspective can get lost and we’re just trying to stay focused and slog through rehearsal as best we can.

After she left, we were all a bit inquisitive, so Chris gave us some background. He had set ‘Land Flat’, our women’s quartet from the 2006 season, on some of the
students. When they came in for their first rehearsal, he informed them that for this process they would now be referred to as their character names (the names of the women in the piece) — “Coco” “Brynne” “Jen” and “Dorian”.

I imagined this would help him distill the essence and connectivity of the work, since so much of who we are, as individuals, informs the breadth and body of the piece. This gave me a fresh perspective on how to reinterpret the role if and when it needs to be brought back for touring purposes; that the character, the role of “Jen” with-in the quartet as a whole, is just as important as relearning the movement content. Being ‘myself’, or ‘Jen’ as I am now would not be the same as relearning the “Jen” who has a character and specific dimension with-in the context of the piece.

It dawned on me that it functioned much more like a play than like a traditional dance– and Chris as much of a playwright as a choreographer– writing and shaping human characters. Our building process allows the work to move far beyond just a series of interesting movements strung together, and it creates this emotional,
yet abstracted; and personal, yet universal work.

Chris talks a lot about giving the audience “handles” in the work– a map to read it by if you will. This capacity to ‘humanize’ the process makes the process of learning a work of Misnomer’s much more difficult, but also that much more rewarding. Dancing and learning this work not only hones and displays copious movement skills, it really does make one a better thinker as well.

People ask me, as a founding member, why I have chosen to dance with this company so long, why I haven’t chosen to move on to another company or to other projects. Well, this is why. Nothing beats the thinking around here…. and the movement ain’t so shabby either.

If you haven’t already, you can vote for this idea on IdeaBlob. If you have voted, Thank you! Your votes and support are fantastic and inspiring. Take a moment to email this post to friends, or digg this article.

For those of you who haven’t checked out Arin’s work, go now! Check out their great movie, Four Eyed Monsters

Dance Magazine’s December 2007 issue featured an article by Kina Poon called Whirled Wide Web. Kina interviewed Chris Elam, Misnomer’s artistic director, for the feature which focused on how dance companies like Misnomer and others are using the web.

Chris came up with the idea of recording the conversation with Kina so that you could hear some of the thoughts that could not make its way into the article. I took the video of Chris talking on the phone and placed past choreography and experiments on top of the conversation to give the conversation more context. I hope this supplemental material gives you additional insight into Dance Magazine’s great article.

Related Links:
Visit Dance Magazine
Read the Article

An interesting note – the entire production for Wanderlust was shot in 3D, in a relatively new process. The production also featured a great deal of technology on set. Isaiah, the music video director, explains all the different components:

“There are a number of different elements shot, or created in post [production], that all have to be combined, There is a large-scale, pre-human Yak-puppet, about 7-feet long and 7-feet tall, then there is Björk, then there is a version of Björk that she wears on her backpack played by [Coco Karol] a professional dancer, a large river god/transcendental beast, the landscapes shot in miniature and the CG [computer graphics] river. So each of those elements were manifested in a completely different environment and shot differently. “

For a detailed explanation of the process, read the full article on StudioDaily: http://www.studiodaily.com/main/technique/casestudies/8811.html

Check back here for pictures, videos, and more…Until then, enjoy watching Bjork’s latest video by Michel Gondry, “Declare Independence” [found via Create Digital Motion]