Kyle Abraham on Sharing the Stage and Recognizing His Inspirations
Professor Kyle Abraham is a 2016 Doris Duke Artist Award recipient, a 2015 City Center Choreographer in residence, and a 2013 MacArthur Fellow. His dance company, Abraham.In.Motion, will be performing at the Joyce Theater in New York this May. Abraham spoke with The Village Voice about his work, his inspiration, and his experience teaching at UCLA.
"About the week-long Abraham.In.Motion season starting at the Joyce Theater on May 1, there’s much to be excited [about]: two New York–exclusive mixed bills; introspective solo work by artistic director Kyle Abraham; and a new official company name, A.I.M. Abraham shares the program with three other important choreographers, nodding to the multigenerational influences that have shaped him and his collaborators.
The Voice recently caught up with Abraham — whose enthusiasm for and pride in A.I.M’s dancers was contagious throughout the meeting — to discuss his process and how the season came together.
The Joyce has commissioned INDY, a solo — something we haven’t seen you perform in nearly a decade. What compelled you to carve out space for solo work?
When Abraham.In.Motion first performed at the Joyce in 2015, it was kind of bittersweet for me. While it was such a dream of mine to have my company perform there, it was also kind of sad because I didn’t really get to dance in that program. I had a brief cameo in one dance — maybe a minute and thirty seconds in total — and I did a short prelude to the show to have more time to perform. So, this time, I was really hungry for an opportunity to perform on the Joyce stage, which led to INDY.
Another major component was this thought that I’ve been giving so much time and attention to the work I was making for my company and other companies that I wasn’t actually able to focus on myself. So much so, that I think it manifested in how I was looking at my life. I wasn’t carving out space for me. Also, these notions of change, growth, and reflection are part of it — what kept me inspired during the process were thoughts about when I first started dancing or about times when I was dealing with insecurities in my dancing and was trying to gain confidence in that respect.
How has your position at UCLA’s department of world arts and cultures/dance informed your work? Has your choreographic process changed?
One of the great things about the position is that it created a little more space in that I’m able to step back a little bit from the work. It has changed the way I interact with the dancers and collaborators, as I’m not always in the studio with them. Plus, related to this particular program, I was given a creative residency on the UCLA campus to work on the choreography for INDY, and I’m so grateful to UCLA for that. Going forward, I want to see how the A.I.M company dancers can work with the school because I think it would be a great way for the UCLA dance students to learn and grow. I hope that’s something we can make happen in the coming years."— Brittney Feit, Apr. 17, 2018
This post is an excerpt, read the full article on the The Village Voice website.
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