Dear Friends,
We count on artists to investigate the currents of our time and give us a glimpse of the future. Contemporary performing artists not only reflect the world we inhabit in unimagined, inspired ways, but they are increasingly pushing art forms in new, hybrid configurations, transforming traditional notions of live performing art and blurring the lines between visual, media, theatrical, literary, musical, and movement disciplines with abandon.
In 2007-2008, the Walkers performing arts season is filled with events that layer the social with the observational, the live with the digital, the conversational with the performative. Our five-event In: Site/Out series features artists who are expanding and redefining the nature of theatrical space and the lines between audience and performer. The New World Jazz thread explores the pairing of chamber and experimental music with centuries-old folk and classical traditions from Tunisia, India, and Norway. And the Walkers monthlong festival Out There celebrates its 20th anniversary by looking ahead to the next generation of trailblazers who are new to the Walker and to Minnesota.
Of course, established masters continue to teach and inspire us. In 2008, we commission interdisciplinary wizard Meredith Monk to create a new music-movement-theater work with visual artist Ann Hamilton, and we celebrate the pioneering dance, visual art, conceptual, and site-specific work of choreographer Trisha Brown. We are also thrilled to offer major productions by two of Europes most important innovators Belgiums Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker remounting one of her early dance masterpieces (in an exclusive U.S. engagement), and Italys radical theater visionary Romeo Castellucci presenting his stunning large-scale work to Minnesota for the first time.
We hope you can join us on many of these adventures. I look forward to seeing you at the Walker this season.
Philip Bither
McGuire Senior Curator for Performing Arts
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