Oct. 14, 2015 – A world premiere by choreographer/filmmaker Alex Ketley opens the 2015-2016 season of New Stages at The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, Florida. On November 6-7, the San Francisco-based Ketley and his company of dancers present Deep South, an exploration of America’s rural south as told through live dance and documentary film.
“The Ringling is very proud and honored to present this intriguing and engaging new work,” said The Ringling’s Curator of Performance Dwight Currie. “Alex Ketley is masterful in showing us how dance is often the form of communication through which we discover what unites seemingly disparate groups.”
Deep South is the final work in a trilogy by Ketley that illuminates what dance means to the people in rural America where exposure to live productions of contemporary performance is limited. The previous installment of the trilogy, No Hero, focused on the American West and was presented at The Ringling in 2014. As a result, The Ringling’s Art of Performance curatorial division worked with the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography at Florida State University to secure a Princess Grace Foundation grant that would enable Ketley to complete the trilogy in the southeastern U.S.
“I was motivated to explore the south because it is a part of the country with which I have had almost no interaction,” said Ketley. “It felt like a very foreign culture to me.” What he found was a place filled with vast richness, complication, beauty and ever-shifting contradictions. Over the course of weeks, he engaged strangers in conversations about dance and frequently offered impromptu performances in the RV parks, restaurants, town squares and homes in which the encounters occurred. “What we discovered,” said Ketley, “is that these discussions and performances often prompted people to share the personal stories that collectively became a unique and compelling portrait of a people and a place.” The result is celebration in film and dance of the many complexities and verities of the nation’s Deep South.
Deep South is being staged at The Ringling’s Historic Asolo Theater as the first in The Ringling’s four-part Art of Making Dance series about what informs, shapes, defines and animates diverse and dynamic new creations of contemporary dance.
The series continues with a site-specific world premiere by the Dušan Týnek Dance Theatre on Dec 18-19, and then resumes with Kate Weare Company on Feb 12-13, 2016, and David Neumann’s Advanced Beginner Group on March 11-12, 2016.
NEW STAGES Ticket prices and Schedule:
$30, $25 / $27, $22.50 for Members
To purchase tickets:
(941) 360-7399 or order online at ringling.org.
PERFORMANCES
Deep South
Alex Ketley/The Foundry
Nov. 6 and 7, 7:30 p.m.
Historic Asolo Theater
Joseph’s Coat
Dušan Týnek Dance Theatre
Dec. 18 and 19, 5 p.m.
James Turrell Skyspace
UNSTRUCK
Kate Weare Company
Feb. 12 and 13, 7:30 p.m.
Historic Asolo Theater
I Understand Everything Better
David Neumann/ Advanced Beginner Group
March 11 and 12, 7:30 p.m.
Historic Asolo Theater
RELATED PROGRAMS
CONVERSATIONS
Saturdays, 2 p.m.
Free program; ticket is required
Alex Ketley/The Foundry
Nov. 7
Historic Asolo Theater
Dušan Týnek Dance Theatre
Dec. 19
James Turrell Skyspace
Kate Weare Company
Feb. 13
Historic Asolo Theater
David Neumann/ Advanced Beginner Group
March 12
Historic Asolo Theater
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The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Florida State University, is the state art museum of Florida and one of the largest museum/university centers in the nation. It preserves the legacy of John and Mable Ringling, educating and enabling a large and diverse audience to experience and take delight in a world-renowned collection of fine art; Ca’ d’Zan, the Ringlings’ winter residence; the Circus Museum; the Historic Asolo Theater; and historic architecture, courtyard, gardens and grounds overlooking Sarasota Bay.
