From Blog Director Jill Randall:

Lately, I have been thinking about dance writing and dance publicity. How do we share/invite/entice/preview a work for our potential audience members? Bay Area artist Claudia Hubiak and I are playing with this idea for the 7 days leading up to her show, Point of Dissolve, at the ODC Theater in San Francisco from October 19-21.

I loved experiencing the show last night (October 19). Please read below for the compilation of ideas from the past week, and purchase your tickets here.

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5 words or phrases to describe the work:

• Abstract and form driven
• Packed full… spilling over
• Searching for contrast of rigor and release within each thought
• Interdependent – relying on one another in space and time without addressing relationship
• Seeking for balance and alignment within chaos

“Dream of the audience” – Who do you hope will join you on this journey?

I hope that the dance community will be drawn to see the work, of course. Along those lines, I hope that the Buddhist community will join us, and truly anyone interested in mindfulness practice. I love it when I get to be someone’s first foray into contemporary dance; new dance audiences have some incredible takes on what they experience. Lastly, it’s always a huge compliment when people come back over the years….so here’s to the artists, the newbies, the inspired and the discerning! All are invited!

Why ODC? While the work is not site-specific per se, did the vision of showing the work at ODC play into the making of the dance? What do you love about this space?

So many reasons! This is actually my first time presenting my Home Season at ODC. This theater is a San Francisco hub and renowned institution. It has the technical needs I have envisioned including a light plot to make my long-time designer/collaborator Michael Michalske happy and creative! The theater provides a feeling of intimate closeness, while still allowing for a seating capacity that expands our audience. ODC has cultivated a wonderful community steeped in dance and education that immediately invites a new audience into the work.

On risk, rigor, and vulnerability with the work….dancer Mallory Markham reflects and shares:

Moving in abstraction and reflecting on your own sense of ease, effort, time and space with an almost mathematical sense of precision is a much more vulnerable way of being since it requires a direct relationship to self. It’s easier to be vulnerable with someone else. A human that can relate back to you, giving you feedback as you follow impulse as it leads into movement. Point of Dissolve requires us to see ourselves through a more subjective, internal lens, putting relationship aside in favor of our individual spectrum of effort and ease without sacrificing the intricacies and tactility of the partnering work. The rigor in Point of Dissolve is the commitment to coming back to precision. What does it mean to be precise and what is the physicality of precision? How can we be intentional, precise, and also easy? Does being precise mean we also have to give into physical rigor, or perhaps it’s mostly mental or spacial precision. This piece, while it is less relational than works done in the past, has a more profound sense of self and how each individual’s willingness to be present, to be precise, and to take risks affects the whole.

Why live art, now?

Live art lives in the moment! It is part of The Anata Project’s mission to bring people into the present moment through dance. I believe in the value of coming together in the theater to still the mind and experience art. Regardless of whether the work hits home or not, this is a gift that we can give to people!

On risk, rigor, and vulnerability with the work….dancer Jessica Egbert reflects and shares:

The exciting part of Claudia's new work is the level of risk and trust that it demands from each of us as dancers. It pushes us to be clear with intent and execution in each individual movement, depending on one another to fully embody the work. Through the process, it holds us each accountable to sustain the integrity of the work as individuals contributing to a greater whole.

How is Point of Dissolve similar and different from your last project?

My work has become more abstract over the years. Point of Dissolve addresses the continuum of precision and release through energy, weight, points in space and the range of effort. In POD, I have been more interested in form rather than relationships. In the past my work has been more about connection and intimacy. While I think that my interest in partnering includes these elements inherently, the prompts this year have actually been to not connect or make eye contact, but rather to consider each being as energy and part of the space, part of the greater whole.

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The Anata Project

Point of Dissolve

ODC Theater

3153 17th St, San Francisco

Thursday, October 19 @ 8pm

Friday, October 20 @ 8pm

Saturday, October 21 @ 8pm

Tickets: https://odc.secure.force.com/ticket#details_a0S0a000005ZRgCEAW

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