CONTEMPORARY ART CIRCLE
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Trip to Beacon, New York
$50 (includes roundtrip bus transportation, museum entrance, and ticket to Merce Cunningham Dance Performance)
Sign up for an exclusive, remarkable day with artist GEORGE TRAKAS; dancer/choreographer MERCE CUNNINGHAM; filmmaker TACITA DEAN; photographer AN-MY LE; and curator LYNNE COOKE.
(Call 413-545-1176 or efierst@art.umass.edu for cost and details.)
TRIP ITINERARY:
8:00am : Bus departure.
11:00 am - 12:00 pm : BEACON LANDING
George Trakas takes us on a guided tour of his new "Beacon Landing" project on the Hudson River. Internationally lauded installation artist George Trakas will discuss his latest environmental art project "Beacon Landing", unveiled last fall. In his installation, Trakas renovated an eroded abandoned railroad landing in Beacon on the Hudson River, allowing for previously unavailable public access to the waterfront.
DIA:BEACON
Lunch at Dia Beacon (on your own)
Merce Cunningham Dance Performance
Known for his compelling collaborations with both visual artists and composers, Merce Cunningham will choreograph eight signature, site-specific Beacon Events within the vast spaces of the museum. Each weekend’s performance by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, staged in individual galleries of Dia:Beacon, will be coupled with specifically developed scores for Beacon Events. The May 18th Beacon Event will engage Bruce Nauman’s work. In signature Cunningham style, public performances will be the first and only time the musicians and dancers come together.
Premiere screening of new documentary film on Merce Cunningham, titled Stillness in Two Movements, by British artist Tacita Dean (winner of the 2006 Hugo Boss Prize and Turner Prize nominee). The work was choreographed by Merce Cunningham to John Cage’s 4’33”. Dean brought a three-person crew to the Merce Cunningham Studio and, using multiple cameras, filmed six takes of Merce performing the piece.
Meet Lynne Cooke, Curator of Dia Art Foundation, who will talk about Dia and the new exhibition of photographs by An-My Le (Visiting Professor of Writing and Photography at Bard College) whose work will be shown at the University Gallery in Fall 2008, in an exhibition Of People and Places.
Visit Robert Irwin gardens, permanent collection, bookstore (on your own)
6:00 pm : Bus departure.
