William Forsythe's Baroque Counterculture Dance at Venice Biennale

William Forsythe's 'A Quiet Evening of Dance', presented by Sadler's Wells at Teatro Grande di Brescia and Teatro Valli di Reggio Emilia, will be featured in the next Venice Biennale Danza (June 21-30). The program, a collage of old and new pieces, combines plural choreographic and musical situations, including opposites, harmonized only by an intermission. The first part demands intense concentration, while the second part is more disseminated. The work is described as Calvinist and purgatorial, with a total absence of erotic motifs and a neutralization of hierarchies in classical vocabulary. Dancers wear sneakers, simple work clothes, and colorful socks and gloves. The choreography includes 'Prologue', 'Catalogue' (a duo with Jill Johnson and Christopher Roman), 'Epilogue' with music by Morton Feldman and featuring Rauf 'RubberLegz' Yasit, and 'Dialogue'. The second part, 'Seventeen/Twenty One', is dominated by music of Jean Philippe Rameau and baroque imagery, blending liquid arabesques, parodied bows, caravaggesque shadows, and acrobatic hip hop. The finale is influenced by Jerome Robbins' 'Goldberg Variations' (1971), intertwining baroque past with postmodern present.