Katie Workum exploits our common experiences, her own specific memories and the expansive potential of the natural body to form complete and distinct universes for the stage. In each piece ferocious movement, talking and singing, quick scene changing, beautiful formal movement constructions and the emotional remains of being fully alive in this world coalesce into something new. The pieces are at times bold and brash; others quiet as a mouse, they can be straightforward, funny, whimsical, and always shifting like mist. Workum’s training does not reference one technique, but draws on her training in theater, modern dance, music (cello, guitar, voice), athletics and a deep involvement with the natural world to deliver a frankness of sensation, movement and idea. While this all sounds very serious, there is always room for lightness and deep comedy in the work. Things are funny! Exploiting humor in modern dance has been Workum’s constant additions to the form.

Katie began making work in 1997. She still makes it today. She came to dance through theater, music and athletics and this personal history informs how she makes work. She likes to combine the forms, including original sound scores and odd little songs, slipping between each operative, to deliver the idea. The result is a collage of senses, emotions and movement. Workum is very interested in creating a shared evening for both the viewer and the performer. She believes that revealing specific and personal truths about herself and the company members will allow the viewer a place of understanding and empathy. She has created eight full length dance theater events in and around New York City including: Dance Theater Workshop (First Light/Bessie Schönberg commission), Dance New Amsterdam, (commissioned premiere and Artist in Residence), The Kitchen (Works in Process), PS122, Tribeca Performing Arts Center, WAX, Galapagos, and The Philly Fringe Festival. She co-curated and created works for DANCEOFF! a variety dance show, at Joe’s Pub, PS122, Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival and TanzImAugust Festival in Berlin. Katie co-hosted The Bessies in September ’08. She holds a Master’s in Dance education at NYU.

R E P E R T O R Y

We have been doing this forever, a duet for Molly and Eleanor – Observing the bond between Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith, two longtime collaborators and friends, and inspired by their entrance into the first rehearsal: tête-à-tête, inhabiting a private space and language, Workum interprets their specific friendship at this specific moment. Addressing and sourcing this connection, the duet is motivated by the desire to hold time still, preserve youthful intimacies, and knowing how we cannot. The dance follows the two into a personal and precise world that adjusts and travels through instances and eras. Alone, together, life ticking by, time standing still, we have been doing this forever.

Herkimer Diamonds is a nugget of information and sensations about people exploring the boundaries of their bodies and their friends’ bodies, how things fall apart and stick together, layers of structures and lack thereof. Like shifting weather patterns, it is a system of botched intimacy, group behaviors, linking up, getting lost, found or swept up in the connection. OR At some point: everyone’s knees give out, you will be forced to give a wedding speech, hopefully will never see the eye of a hurricane, definitely will get all lost and distracted for a while, herd like a cattle dog, hold on forever and rip off your friend’s moves, us too.

Carlisle is a place where women warp and swarm, goats trot on ancient mountain switchbacks, ghosts shimmer quietly and wolves tear away at fences. Limbs and ideas intermingle with our animal instincts, our sadness and our gladness. The inhabitants live in a both abstract and familiar world of secrets, camaraderie and antlers that make up all our everyday lives. Workum examines our deeply personal idiosyncrasies as well as acknowledges the universality of humanity.

W O R K S H O P S

Katie Workum and company are available to teach residencies and workshops to students and the community at large. We love to work with dancers and non-dancers alike. Ms. Workum holds a Masters of Art in Dance Education at NYU Steinhardt School of Education. She has taught at Williams College, Lehman College, Barnard College, NYU Experimental Theater Wing, as well as for the undergraduate population at NYU.

Technique
The main goal of this class is to develop and harness the innate skills that we, as natural movers, all possess. By discovering and strengthening our pre-existing internal abilities and external conditions we can become grounded, creative, aware performers; working within, then expanding, our fullest functionality. We will work with universal physical principles such as gravity, balance, inertia and weight as well as performance principles of time, space, focus and energy. This rigorous and fun class moves through warm-ups of developmental movement, head-tail connections, modern dance-y standing exercises and strength building. Then challenging our intellects and bodies with phrase work and perhaps some vocal integration, this class will incorporate a creative aspect as well.

The Ready Performer
Performing consists of much more than executing amazing dance moves. We must consider the space, the time, and the message of the piece. This class is similar to the technique class, but we will expand past the body and into these performance concepts. It consists of a rigorous warm-up followed by specific improvisations to awaken the dancer to the world around them.

Ensemble Built Performance
Based on Workum’s Master’s in Education thesis, this workshop introduces all levels of performer to techniques of group and individual improvisations, conscious building towards the creation of a new, group based performance.
With emphasis on ensemble building and the encouraging of using other tools such as voice, and text, the class will explore Viewpoints, a technique of improvisation that provides a vocabulary for thinking about and acting upon movement and gesture, as well as developmental movement. The class will promise to energize and awaken your potential as a freethinking creator and performer. The group will create a new work to be shown at the end of the workshop.

DATE TBA (Fall 2011)		Movement Research @ Judson Church New York, NY
JAN 8, 2012		Pentacle’s Gallery Showcase The Theater at Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School 120 West 46th St (bet 6th and 7th Aves) 7:00 – 10:00 pm Katie Workum Dance Theater: 9:36 pm
APR 18-21 2012		The Chocolate Factory New York, NY http://www.chocolatefactorytheater.org/