When Jennifer Hart founded Performa/Dance in 2014 with Ballet Austin dancer Edward Carr, she wanted a platform not only to show her own work, but to feature work by other local artists, as well as innovative national choreographers....
Frustrated by the awkward process of giving and receiving critical artistic feedback, dance/theater legend and MacArthur Fellow Liz Lerman developed her own system in the early 1990s, her Critical Response Process — an approach based on the principle that the best possible outcome from a response session is for the maker to want to get back to work....
You may be hard-pressed to explain what ZZ Top, Eva Longoria, Willie Nelson and Walter Cronkite have in common, but for the Texas Cultural Trust, the answer is simple: Texas....
Even if you’re never seen Pilobolus in concert before, you’re probably familiar with the acrobatic dance troupe’s work. After starring in a Ford commercial over a decade ago, in which the dancers’ silhouetted bodies became the car, the commercial opportunities kept coming: a high-flying performance at the 79th annual Academy Awards, appearances on Sesame Street, Oprah, Ellen, The Today Show, Late Night with Conan O’Brien and more....
Convention is not a part of Allison Orr’s vocabulary. The Forklift Danceworks artistic director has carved out a particular niche in the site-specific performance world of Texas—one that draws attention to the people and systems that keep our communities ticking, often without thanks or notice. This is Orr’s specialty: bringing the invisible to the forefront....
In traditional versions of Giselle, the worlds of the living and the dead are separated by an intermission, each confined to its own act. In Houston Ballet’s brand new version, at Wortham Theater Center by Artistic Director Stanton Welch, the worldly and the ethereal overlap to come full circle....
Even if you’re unfamiliar with Graham Reynolds’ name, you’ve probably heard his work — he is, after all, the quintessential modern-day composer, working across a diverse array of mediums that include dance, theater, television and film....
The Sleeping Beauty is one of the classical ballet’s most technically difficult yet visually dynamic works — a ballet by which ballet companies are judged....
Claire Christine Spera grew up dancing ballet, modern, and Spanish flamenco. A graduate of the arts journalism program at the University of Southern California Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism, she has been a freelance dance and theater critic for the Austin American-Statesman and other publications since moving to the capital city in fall 2010.
