Walker Art Center Presents
Beth Gill
Nail Biter
Friday–Saturday, December 8–9, 2023
8:00 pm
McGuire Theater
Nail Biter
In Memoriam
ROSE-MARIE MENES
Choreographer
BETH GILL
Composer
JON MONIACI
Costume Designer
BAILLE YOUNKMAN
Lighting & Scenic Designer
THOMAS DUNN
Associate Lighting Designer
KRISTA SMITH
Production Stage Manager
MADISON ELLIS
Manager
MICHELLE FLETCHER
Performers
MAGGIE CLOUD, MOLLY LIEBER, JORDAN DEMETRIUS LLOYD, MARILYN MAYWALD YAHEL, BETH GILL
Voice
FALU, EMILY EAGEN, JEREMY LYDIC, PETER SCISCIOLI
Thrown Materials
PETER KERLIN, JON MONIACI
Choir
ABBY AHMAD, RAY BARR, FRANK BOLTON, KAREN DE CHABERT, LAYLA COBRINIK, HANNAH FAIRCHILD, LOUISE GUERIN, DAVID LUTHER, DAN MORROW, GABBY SHERBA, NETANIA STEINER
Content and sensory notes: This performance features strobe lights and partial nudity.
Nail Biter is co-commissioned by Walker Art Center, the Fisher Center at Bard and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council.
The development of Nail Biter was supported by funding from the King’s Fountain and by CPR – Center for Performance Research’s Artist-in-Residence Program, which is made possible, in part, through Dance/NYC’s Rehearsal Space Subsidy Program made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the New York State Council on the Arts. This project was supported, in part, by a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Emergency Grant. Beth Gill is fiscally sponsored by the Foundation for Independent Artists, Inc., a non-profit organization administered by Pentacle (DanceWorks, Inc). Pentacle is a non-profit management support organization for the performing arts.
Choreographer's Note
FROM THE CHOREOGRAPHER
My first dance teacher Rose-Marie Menes passed on from this world on September 9th, 2011, while I was in the early stages of dreaming Nail Biter. In her youth, Rose trained under George Mellinoff of the Imperial Ballet and later Madame Maria Swoboda, formerly of the Bolshoi Ballet. She was a principal dancer for the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, under the direction of Leonid Massine, and performed with Chicago Opera Ballet, New York City Opera, and American Festival Ballet.
Rose’s school, Westchester Ballet Center, was my other home growing up in the suburbs outside of NYC. It was a sanctuary space for me and so many girls. On weeknights, we squeezed into the small dressing room above the office to shed our daytime clothes and become ballerinas. We shuffled into the beautiful large dance studio and found our spots at the barre. I can be back there in my mind in an instant…
The wooden floor beneath my slippered feet, worn and polished. The smooth wooden barre under my left hand. The other girls holding the barre, too, in front and behind me. No talking, just preparing. Small adjustments to my tights and leotard. Tuck the laces of my shoes in. Be ready to begin. Rose enters, and everyone watches her. She is the center, the source, the idol, both loved and feared. She inserts a cd into the cd player, presses buttons, and then turns around to face us. Class, our ritual, has begun.
What I think about now as a professional choreographer and teacher is how unwavering Rose’s dedication to dance was. This field is not easy, and yet she always found ways to do more. She ran a company as well as the school and made multiple productions with hand-painted sets and costumes that she hand sewed. She created epic worlds and romantic storylines for us to inhabit. She passed on to us the same traditions and legacy that transformed her as a young girl from Miami, Florida, into a principal ballerina who toured the world.
I was lucky to study with Rose. She gave me dance and so much more: tradition, discipline, professionalism, obsession, creativity, romanticism, grace, power, and self-determination. She set the course of my career and my life. This piece is in honor of her.
—Beth Gill
Special Thanks From Beth Gill
To Philip Bither and Walker Art Center for commissioning Nail Biter and believing in my work. To Wyatt Heatherington Tilka, Jon Kirchhofer, Doug Benidt, Robert Cosgrove and the entire Walker staff and crew for taking such good care of us.
To Sonia Werner and Dance Theater in Westchester for generously loaning us a scenic drop from their repertoire.
To Barbara Pillsbury and King’s Fountain for their uplifting generosity and continued support.
To Lili Chopra, Shana Crawford, and LMCC for supporting the first iteration of Nail Biter. To Gideon Lester and Caleb Hammons at Bard Fisher Center for co-commissioning and championing my work so completely.
To Alexandra Rosenberg, Anna Muselmann, and the Center For Performance Research for providing a nurturing workspace for the dancers and me.
To Michelle Fletcher for making everything possible even when it feels impossible.
To Thomas Dunn for bringing grand vision. To Baille Younkman for her incomparable taste and open heart. To Jon Moniaci, for decades of working together, pushing each other and always making the work feel right. To Jennifer Lafferty for her powerful creation of the original version of her role. To Krista Smith and Madison Ellis for joining our team this month and diving in with grace.
To my remarkably talented dancers Jordan, Maggie, Marilyn and Molly for holding and caring for these tender imaginings with such focus and dedication. You inspire and make this work possible.
Learn More
The performance on Friday, December 8, will be followed by a Q&A with Beth Gill.
Living Land Acknowledgement
The McGuire Theatre and Walker Art Center are located on the contemporary, traditional, and ancestral homelands of the Dakota people. Situated near Bde Maka Ska and Wíta Tópa Bde, or Lake of the Isles, on what was once an expanse of marshland and meadow, this site holds meaning for Dakota, Ojibwe, and Indigenous people from other Native nations, who still live in the community today.
We acknowledge the discrimination and violence inflicted on Indigenous peoples in Minnesota and the Americas, including forced removal from ancestral lands, the deliberate destruction of communities and culture, deceptive treaties, war, and genocide. We recognize that, as a museum in the United States, we have a colonial history and are beneficiaries of this land and its resources. We acknowledge the history of Native displacement that allowed for the founding of the Walker. By remembering this dark past, we recognize its continuing harm in the present and resolve to work toward reconciliation, systemic change, and healing in support of Dakota people and the land itself.
We honor Native people and their relatives, past, present, and future. As a cultural organization, the Walker works toward building relationships with Native communities through artistic and educational programs, curatorial and community partnerships, and the presentation of new work.
Accessibility Notes
Content and sensory notes: This performance features strobe lights and partial nudity.
For more information about accessibility at the Walker, visit our Access page.
About the Artists
BETH GILL is an award-winning choreographer based in New York City since 2005. Her multidisciplinary works are captivating, cinematic timescapes, the product of long-term collaborations with celebrated artists. Gill is the proud recipient of the Herb Alpert, Doris Duke Impact, Foundation for Contemporary Art, and two “Bessie” awards. She has toured nationally and internationally and been honored with (among others): Guggenheim Fellowship, NEFA’s National Dance Project grant, Princeton’s Hodder Fellowship, and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council’s Extended Life Artist in Residence.
Gill’s dances are serious, slow-moving, and chiseled, meditative experiences poised between performance and visual art. They feel like pressurized objects sustaining tension and seeking release. Paradoxically her work is both intimate and alienated, sensual and ascetic. She dreams and visualizes her dances, transforming her unconscious into iconographic choreography.
JON MONIACI is a composer, performer, and computer programmer. Interested in improvisation and live electro-acoustic performance, he has collaborated extensively with dance and performance makers. A frequent collaborator of choreographer Beth Gill, his score for her dance Electric Midwife received a 2011 Bessie New York Dance and Performance Award. He has also worked with Chase Granoff, Andrew Dinwiddie, Jeff Larson, Peter Kerlin, Anna Sperber, Marissa Perel, Alex Escalante, Mark Jarecke, Dean Moss, and Peter Jacobs. He plays music with Stephen Rush and Chris Peck in their project Crystal Mooncone.
THOMAS DUNN designs lighting internationally, treating it as both a sculptural medium and a facet of stage design. Previous works with Beth Gill include Brand New Sidewalk, Catacomb, and New Work for the Desert. Recent credits with other artists include Difficult Grace with Seth Parker Woods; Mud/Drowning with JoAnne Akalaitis and Philip Glass; Most Happy in Concert with Daniel Fish; Epochal Songs with Muna Tseng and (posthumously) Keith Haring; Ocean Filibuster with Katie Pearl and Lisa D’Amour, and Is This A Room with Tina Satter. Other credits include works with: Jonathan Bepler, Wally Cardona, Steve Cosson, Annie Dorsen, DD Dorvillier, Trajal Harrell, Ted Hearne, Jennifer Lacey, Noémie Lafrance, David Levine, Molly Lieber, Ong Keng Sen, Zeena Parkins, Jay Scheib, and Eleanor Smith. Thomas is the recipient of a Kevin Kline Award for Outstanding Lighting Design as well as a Bessie Design Award for Outstanding Visual Design.
KRISTA SMITH is a Philadelphia based Lighting Designer and Artist. Krista’s designs have been seen in New York at venues including: La MaMa, Ars Nova, New York Theater Workshop, and The Public Theater. Regionally includes: Dorset Theatre, Arden Theatre Co , Hartford Stage, Triad Stage, California Shakespeare Theater, and Yale Repertory Theater. Company Member of KrymovLab NYC. Krista received her MFA from Yale School of Drama and is a proud member of USA 829. www.KristaSmithLD.com
BAILLE YOUNKMAN is an artist, designer, and educator from Columbus, Ohio. After having studied fashion design and sculpture, Baille received her B.F.A from the Savannah College of Art and Design. She currently lives in Columbus, OH, where she is building her eco-art practice. Baille is an advocate for creative thinking, emotional intelligence, and slowing down to spend more time outside.
MADISON ELLIS is a freelance Stage Manager and is thrilled to be working with Beth Gill on this project! Selected recent credits include Carmina Burana and Serenade with Nevada Ballet Theatre, Fall for Dance Festival at New York City Center, Jazz in July at 92NY, and touring with the Gibney Company across the United States and abroad. Madison has served as the Production Manager at SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Dance where she also earned her BFA in Design Technology.
JORDAN DEMETRIUS LLOYD is a dance artist based in Brooklyn, NY. He studied at The College at Brockport after growing up in Albany, NY. He has collaborated with and performed for Karl Rogers, Beth Gill, Netta Yerushalmy, Monica Bill Barnes, Joanna Kotze, Tammy Carrasco, Catherine Galasso, Ambika Raina, and David Dorfman Dance. He is currently teaching at Rutgers University and his work has been produced by: New York Live Arts, BRIC, ISSUE Project Room, Baryshnikov Arts Center, BAAD!, Movement Research at Judson Memorial Church, and The Center for Performance Research. Recently he received the 2021–23 Jerome Hill Artist Fellowship. For more, please head to jordandlloyd.com.
MARILYN MAYWALD YAHEL is a dance artist and Feldenkrais teacher based in New York City. She has worked with Maggie Bennett, Milka Djordjevich, Beth Gill, Melanie Maar, Yin Mei, Steven Reker, Melinda Ring, Vicky Shick, and Katie Workum. She has presented her own works-in-progress and short-form solos throughout NYC. Marilyn is originally from Nashville, TN, and attended Arizona State University. She lives with her family in Putnam Valley, NY.
MAGGIE CLOUD is a performer and acupuncturist based in New York City. She has been seen in the choreographic work of Moriah Evans, Beth Gill, John Jasperse, Neal Medlyn, Sarah Michelson, Pam Tanowitz, Gillian Walsh, the Merce Cunningham Trust, and The Metropolitan Opera. Maggie has taught at Chen Dance Center, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, and at the University of the Arts.
MOLLY LIEBER received a 2016 “Bessie” Award for Outstanding Performer and a cover article in Dance Magazine. She recently performed in works by luciana achugar, Antonio Ramos, Donna Uchizono, Keely Garfield, Wally Cardona, Maria Hassabi, Neil Greenberg, and Brian Rogers. Awarded a 2022/2023 Distinguished Graduate Fellowship and a 2023/2024 Women and Gender Studies Research Award at UWM, she works as an IBCLC and is teaching at Sarah Lawrence. Molly co-choreographed with Eleanor Smith Zero Station (River-to-River 2023), Gloria (Abrons 2021, NYLA 2022), and Body Comes Apart (NYLA 2019, archived in The NY Public Library). The upcoming Oxford Handbook on Dance and Memory includes a chapter on her work with Eleanor Smith.
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