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DANCE EXCHANGE
LIZ LERMAN'S
THE MATTER OF ORIGINS
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The universe is explored through physics, poetry, and faith-based beliefs in the audience-engaged, multimedia dance, The Matter of Origins by Dance Exchange. This new work, created by acclaimed choreographer Liz Lerman, is described as a performance, conversation, and game show and is presented in two acts, moving the audience from the theater to the MCA's second-floor atrium for an interactive tea party and audience discussion. The Matter of Origins is co-presented by the MCA Stage and the Chicago Humanities Festival (CHF) at the MCA Stage on November 10-13, 2011.
Act One takes place on stage in the MCA Theater and travels from Madame Curie's lab - the pioneering scientist famous for her research on radioactivity - to the Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator, then through the Hubble Space Telescope to the edges of the expanding universe. Provacative interviews with scientists, ethicists, and philosophers are integrated on three large-scale video projections. Fast music accompanies the dance.
For Act Two, the audience moves to the MCA's second-floor atrium for a unique experience of dance, media, tea, chocolate cake, and conversation. Artists, scientists, and other thinkers serve as "provocateurs" at each of the 30 tables to facilitate conversations with audience members. Community dancers act as servers for the tea party. The chocolate cake served at the tea is the original recipe of Edith Warner, the Los Alamos local who opened a small roadhouse restaurant in her home that was the site of weekly conversations among by J. Robert Oppenheimer and other physicists who developed the first atomic bomb during World War II at the Los Alamos laboratory.
FULL MEDIA RELEASE AND HI-RES IMAGES
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TICKET INFO
The Matter of Origins takes place Thursday, November 10 - Sunday, November 13, at 7:30 pm at the MCA Stage, 220 East Chicago Avenue. Tickets are $28 and a limited quantity of $10 student tickets is available. The MCA Box Office is at 312.397.4010 or www.mcachicago.org. One free museum admission is granted with an MCA Stage ticket stub, valid up to seven days after the performance. Running time is 115 minutes with intermission.
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ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Dance Exchange is an intergenerational company of artists, whose ages span five decades, that creates dance projects and serves as an incubator for creative research through collaborations with artists, thinkers, and designers. Dance Exchange breaks boundaries between stage and audience, theater and community, movement and language, tradition and the unexplored. Founded in 1976 by Liz Lerman and now under the artistic direction of Cassie Meador, Dance Exchange works through local, national, international, and online projects to gather and create community to contribute to a healthy and more sustainable environment. Dance Exchange performed Ferocious Beauty: Genome at the MCA Stage in 2006.
Liz Lerman is an award-winning choreographer, performer, writer, educator, and speaker who has created works that have been seen throughout the United States and abroad. Her aesthetic approach ranges from abstract to personal to political, while her working process emphasizes research, translation between artistic media, and intensive collaboration with dancers and communities.
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| | | email: ebaldwin@mcachicago.org
voice: 312.397.3828
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