7643 - Vangeline and Jonathan Nosan at Split Bill at Triskelion Arts
March 31 - April 3, 2016
7:30pm
at
Muriel Schulman Theater
106 Calyer Street, Brooklyn
Enter on Banker Street
Tickets:
$16 in advance / $20 at the door
SPLIT BILL
This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE
Friday, April 1: Ali Perkins’ Dance Theatre & Jonathan Nosan and Vangeline
Sunday, April 3: Jonathan Nosan and Vangeline & Kathleen Helm & Dancers
Contortionist extraordinaire Jonathan Nosan and Butoh artist Vangeline create a spectacular new work that will bend your imagination and subvert your expectation at every twist and turn. (April 1 and April 3) .
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Internationally renown contortionist Jonathan Nosan’s flexibility is not natural, he’s simply well trained.
Unable to touch his toes at 22, Nosan changed career paths after an academic Fulbright in Kyoto (where he trained Butoh with Katsura Kan) to circus, theater and and contortionism. With the intent to challenge his body as much as he’d challenged his brain, he trained physical theater and circus in London and then three years as a contortion student of Mr. Lu Yi at the San Francisco Circus Centre.
Jonathan has created a unique life as a performing artist based in New York City of performing and teaching. Recently back from a two year international tour with the spiegeltent circus theater show LIMBO, he balances corporate productions with his company Acroback (acroback.com) and art performances with his avant garde show Bagabones (bagabones.org). His film work includes stunt doubling Jim Carrey in “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” as well as “Cirque du Freak” “The Bounty” “Big Fish” and “The Cell”. His commercial work has taken him to contort in South Africa for an Arabian tea company, run nearly nude for Mercedes in Tokyo, and contort on top of buildings in LA for Hagaar. Stage credits include twisting and moving in monodramas at Lincoln Center, perched as Prometheus unbound at La Mama and two years with Twyla Tharp in her musical “The Times they are a Changin’.” His contorted print work includes: W, Men’s Health, Esquire, Esquire Thailand, Business Week and New York Magazine.
In 2002 Jonathan spent one year creating Mirror Man—5,000 glass mirrors seamlessly mosaic tiled into a Performance Art piece which has traveled the globe for clients including Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior, Lady Gaga, Takashi Murakami, and the NY Festival of Light, Mirror.
Throughout the course of his career, Jonathan has become a highly respected and globally recognized talent in the performing arts industry. He has trained a wide variety of students, including dancers, models, athletes and fitness extremists who have gone on to perform with Cirque du Soleil. In 2009, Jonathan developed CONTORTURE™ – an extreme flexibility workout that incorporates acrobatics and stretching to enhance posture and core strength. The workout is a testament to the 20-plus years he has spent as a trained contortionist – performing, teaching and training with some of the best acrobatic performers in the world. In July 2015, Jonathan released a five- part video series available for download and streaming and featured in The NY Post, The Wall St Journal, Yahoo Health, XOVain, and more.
Vangeline is an award-winning dancer, and choreographer specializing in the Japanese avant-garde movement form, Butoh. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of The Vangeline Theater Inc, and the New York Butoh Institute. Vangeline Theater is an all-female dance company that is committed to honoring the legacy of the art form while moving butoh forward in the 21st century. Vangeline's work has been heralded in publications such as the New York Times (“captivating”), Los Angeles Times, (“moves with the clockwork deliberation of a practiced Japanese Butoh artist”) and LA Weekly to name a few. Time OUT Chicago named Vangeline's, "one of the best Dance Visits of 2011." More recently her 4-star performance of BUTOH BEEETHOVEN received critical acclaim at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2015 and was dubbed ‘Exquisite…a resplendent piece of performance theatre; a true tour de force, literally a feat of strength, within and without.” With her predominantly female dance company, Vangeline’s socially conscious performances question contemporary aspects of environmentalism, ideals of beauty, and what is possible for women in the 21st century. She also explores notions of gender, infusing drag elements into butoh pieces honoring artists such as Klaus Nomi, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Butoh’s founder, Tatsumi Hijikata.
Vangeline is the founder of the 9-year running, award-winning program “Dream a Dream Project", which brings Butoh dance to incarcerated men and women at correctional facilities across New York City. Widely regarded as an expert in her field, Vangeline is a regular guest Butoh teacher atuniversities such as Cornell University, New York University, and Brooklyn College. Recent invitations in 2016 include a Spring semester at CUNY and a 4-months teaching residency at Princeton University (Princeton Atelier).
Vangeline is the winner of the 2015 Gibney Dance's Beth Silverman-Yam Social Action Award recognizing excellence in the field of Community Action. Her Butoh work has been commissioned by Atlantic Records’ Grammy award-winning artist SKRILLEX, and is featured in a major motion picture “The Letter” with James Franco and Winona Ryder. She was recently featured on CNN’s Great Big Story.
The Split Bill program aims to serve emerging and mid-career artists looking for a stepping stone between the showcase format, and full-on evening-length self-production. Unlike many showcases, this series encourages the development of premiere, long-form pieces between 20 and 40 minutes. Split Bill presents all kinds of movement-based work shared over two nights, each night offering two different companies. At least two of the participating artists or companies will be selected for a shared or solo run in the Muriel Schulman Theater as part of Triskelion Arts Presents' 2016-2017 Season.
Photo Credits: Ali Perkins’ Dance Theatre by Conrad Golovac, Jonathan Nosan by Eva Mueller, Vangeline by Geoff Shelton, Ashwini Ramaswamy by Amanulla, Kathleen Helm & Dancers by the artist
106 Calyer Street, Brooklyn, NY 11222
Enter on Banker Street for performances.
info@triskelionarts.org | 718-389-3473
“…Triskelion is a wonderfully old-fashioned, alternative rehearsal and performance space with a long tradition of hosting rising choreographers. There are too few of these spaces left in New York City, places where young companies can afford to self-produce, where choreographers can take a chance.”
– Carrie Stern, The Brooklyn Eagle, February 2012