In collaboration with the Rubin Museum of Art, Pentacle curated an exciting series of site-specific dance in the museum’s galleries. This initiative provided performance opportunities for our dance artists to reach new audiences from the visual arts field, forge relationships with a museum, and explore the artistic possibilities of creating site-specific work in a visual art setting.
For the pilot season Suspending Time, Pentacle selected four artists from our pool of constituents: Zvi Gotheiner/ZviDance, Beth Gill, nora chipaumire, and Raja Feather Kelly | the feath3r theory. Each artist created a 20 min site-specific dance in one of the museum’s galleries responding to the museum’s 2018 theme, “The Future.” Suspending Time was a success with sold out performances, prominent features in publications like the New Yorker, and an influx of new visitors to the Rubin.
Pentacle was thrilled to be invited by the Rubin Museum to curate another dance series in 2019, with the theme of “POWER.” Pentacle selected three new artists (Davalois Fearon, Antonio Ramos, and Francesca Harper) and one repeat artist (Zvi Gotheiner) for the series from a pool of over 250 artists for whom Pentacle currently provides services to and who have expressed interest in site-specific, multidisciplinary work. Furthermore, in an effort to address systemic inequalities in the arts ecosystem, Pentacle’s priority is to support artists of color. An additional Educational Component of the series was offered to engage NYC public school students and their families. The artists visited partner schools and gave talks at the museum about their creative process. Students went on docent led tours, and had opportunities to engage in conversation with the artist over lunch in the museum café. To conclude the experience, all the students and their families were invited back to the museum for a special afternoon performance series of the artists’ final works. We were very excited to engage young people in this multidisciplinary and multisensory experience that we believe enlivened their learning experience and raised their interest in and appreciation for the arts.
Pentacle’s Dance Series at the Rubin Museum of Art is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Pentacle receives private support for its Dance Series at the Rubin Museum of Art from the Mertz Gilmore Foundation and the Howard Gilman Foundation.