Dzul Dance Performs Danzon Nov. 6
Chelsea Morrison Theater, Milllbrook, N.Y.
By: Ariel Petrova - Oct 27, 2010
Dzul Dance founder and artistic director, Javier Dzul, was awarded a prestigious commission in the fall of 2009 by the Consejo Nacional para Cultura y las Artes (CONACULTA) of Mexico and el Gobierno del Estado de Campeche for bringing international awareness to Mayan culture. For this honor, conferred once each decade, Dzul was awarded full funding to create a dance company, La Compania de Contemporanea del Estado de Campeche, and to create and direct its premiere production, Danzon. The choreography received its world premiere at the Festival Internacional del Centro Historico in Mexico in November 2009. The choreography was then restaged for Dzul Dance and presented by Baruch Performing Arts Center in New York City last February.
Danzon features performances by Javier Dzul and guest aerialists Chelsea Bacon and Jordann Baker, along with Ivanova Aguilar, So Young An, Kyla Ernst Alper, Ji-Hyuen Bang, Chellamar Bernard, Cornelius Brown, Robin Taylor Dzul, Jason Jordan, Nicole Lichau, Christopher Fishburne, Matthew Sparks and lighting design by Benjamin Briones.
Dzul’s Danzon, which refers to a type of music and stylized dance that originated in Mexico’s nightclub salons in the 1930s and ‘40s, follows the story of a mythical angel who chooses to become mortal in order to experience human love. Lured from the heavens, the angel falls to Earth in a tragic tale of mystic romanticism.
Dzul, who was born and raised in a Mayan tribal community in Mexico, portrays the collision of Mayan mythology with modern-day values and beliefs. His choreographies depict the often unconscious impact of overpowering archetypal issues: birth, sacrifice, redemption and death. In his romanticized tales of struggle and salvation, Dzul and his dancers invoke the powerful totems of ancient Mayan culture, which eerily haunt the lives of his modern protagonists.
The performance will take place at Chelsea Morrison Theater (at Millbrook School), School Road, Millbrook, New York, 12545 on Saturday, November 6 at 8:00 PM, All tickets are $15 and may be purchased online at www.theatermania.com or by calling (866) 811-4111.
For more information please visit: www.dzuldance.com For directions: www.millbrook.org
About Dzul Dance: Founded in 2003 by Javier Dzul, the Dzul Dance Company fuses contemporary dance with aerial arts as a means to communicate pre-Hispanic and Mexican culture. Dzul and his culturally diverse company of dancers and aerialists have been presented throughout New York and Mexico and in South America, Europe, Asia and the Virgin Islands garnering reviews along the way that hail Dzul’s “acrobatic wizardry” (Attitude: The Dancer’s Magazine) and his ability to turn his dancers of “remarkable elasticity” into “creatures of the air as well as of the earth” (The New York Times). His choreographies have been described as “electrifying” by Magazine.Art, “sophisticated and eloquent” by Attitude: The Dancers’ Magazine and “beautiful…extremely effective” by
The New York Times.
Dzul Dance’s intense physicality and creative appeal have won them invitations nationally and internationally to perform on a variety of stages that include El Museo Del Barrio, the United Nations, Bard College SummerScape, Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College, Tribeca Performing Arts Center, Mexico Now Festival, Festival Internacional Cervantino (Mexico), Dixon Place’s Crossing Boundaries Festival, Performing the World Conference and New York’s National Dance Week. In addition to performing, Javier has brought the artistry and vocabulary of Dzul Dance to others through professional workshops and youth outreach programs in Mexico, Brazil, Switzerland, New York and the Virgin Islands.
About Javier Dzul: Javier Dzul grew up in the Yucatan Peninsula performing the ritual dances of his Mayan tribal community until the age of 16. He then began his professional career as a principal dancer with Ballet Nacional de Mexico and Ballet Folklorico de Mexico. In 1995 Fondo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes of Mexico awarded Javier a scholarship to pursue his dance career in the United States at the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance. He has since danced professionally with the Martha Graham Dance Company, Pearl Lang Dance Theater, Alvin Ailey Repertory Ensemble, American Indian Dance Theater and Acroback.
http://www.youtube.com/DzulDance