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Dramaturgy in Motion
At Work on Dance and Movement Performance
Katherine Profeta

Studies in Dance History
Published under the auspices of the Society of Dance History Scholars

“Finally an answer to that vexed question, ‘What is dance dramaturgy?’ This is a brilliantly nuanced account of a new role in contemporary performance, drawing on an extended collaboration but relevant for the entire field.”
—Susan Manning, Northwestern University

Dramaturgy in Motion innovatively examines the work of the dramaturg in contemporary dance and movement performance. Katherine Profeta, a working dramaturg for more than fifteen years, shifts the focus from asking “Who is the dramaturg?” to “What does the dramaturg think about?”

Profeta explores five arenas for the dramaturg’s attention—text and language, research, audience, movement, and interculturalism. Drawing on her extended collaboration with choreographer and visual artist Ralph Lemon, she grounds her thinking in actual rehearsal-room examples and situates practice within theoretical discourse about contemporary dramaturgy. Moving between theory and practice, word and movement, question and answer until these distinctions blur, she develops the foundational concept of dramaturgical labor as a quality of motion.

Dramaturgy in Motion will be invaluable to practitioners and scholars interested in the processes of creating contemporary dance and movement performance—particularly artists wondering what it might be like to collaborate with a dramaturg and dramaturgs wondering what it might be like to collaborate on movement performance. The book will also appeal to those intrigued by the work of Lemon and his collaborators, to which Profeta turns repeatedly to unfold the thorny questions and rich benefits of dramaturgical labor.

 

 

Author. Photo credit, Name Katherine Profeta is an assistant professor in the Department of Drama, Theatre and Dance at Queens College of the City University of New York. She has been the dramaturg for choreographer and visual artist Ralph Lemon since 1997, as well as for numerous other choreographers and theater companies. She is also a founding member and choreographer with the theater company Elevator Repair Service.

 

 


 

Praise

“Finally an answer to that vexed question, ‘What is dance dramaturgy?’ This is a brilliantly nuanced account of a new role in contemporary performance, drawing on an extended collaboration but relevant for the entire field.”
—Susan Manning, Northwestern University

“Compellingly narrates the urgent craft of dramaturgical creativity in dance with this graceful account of a decades-long collaboration with multi-modal artist Ralph Lemon. Essential reading for understanding how art is made, and why it matters.”
—Thomas F. DeFrantz, Duke University

“In five compelling chapters—text and language, research, audience, movement, interculturality—Dramaturgy in Motion provides a practical resource, equally valuable for theatre dramaturgs and devisers as it will be for dance dramaturgs and choreographers.”
—DD Kugler, Simon Fraser University

“Draws theater and dance, dramaturgical practice and theory into exhilarating new relationships. By creating these partnerships and patterns for our elusive field, Profeta has enriched the way I think about, discuss, and, indeed, go about my own work.”
—Catherine Sheehy, Yale School of Drama and Yale Repertory Theater

Dramaturgy in Motion should be read by everyone with a stake in this gorgeously troublesome endeavor we call performance. On every page of this deeply generous work there is something to provoke, to reassure, to challenge, to question—and always, to savor.”
—Claudia La Rocco, School of Visual Arts, New York City

 

 

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Composing while Dancing
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Melinda Buckwalter


Larger images

December 2015
LC: 2015009229 GV
284 pp.   6 x 9
31 b/w illus.

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Paper $26.95 a
ISBN 978-0-299-30594-9
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