Support Immateriality!

One reason I became interested in Yves Klein is because of his interest in energy, rather than material as a medium for art making.

Klein is well known for selling and displaying space in galleries, which has been “stabilized” by his artistic recognition. As a dancer Klein’s work to “stabilize zones of pictorial sensibility” strikes me as both amusing and familiar.

Dance is an ephemeral art form, and while the visual arts went through an explosive movement rooted in dematerializing artwork in the 1950s, dance has been creating art through energy for hundreds of years. Klein’s sales of “immaterial pictorial stability,” in which he asked for pure gold leaf in exchange for each zone, were elaborate, witnessed rituals in which half of the gold was thrown into a natural body of water and the receipt was burnt, so as to consecrate an exchange that was completely immaterial.

Fundraisers for dance companies are similar events. We ask you to support something that can change lives, but at the same time doesn’t exist in any solid form. Dance is not synonymous with the gross body. Nor can it be defined or caught in recorded movements. To me, dance is a means of communication that exists only in the moment of transference between the performers and the audience.

In order for that communication to be effective however, dance companies need immense material support. Hours of rehearsal, sweat, and practice go into each new work. This labor-intensive physical work is supported in performance by sets, costumes, music, etc all of which require labor, materials, and support.

The Theater of the Void Fundraiser Party will preview the immaterial and material work of ten Seattle-based artists. I hope you will support this collaborative work, unlike Klein we take cash, checks, and credit cards- and we will even let you keep your receipt for tax deduction purposes!

Tickets are available via Brown Paper Tickets:
Theater of the Void Fundraiser Party Tickets

If you can’t make the party, please consider supporting the work via Catherine Cabeen and Company’s click and pledge site:
Support Catherine Cabeen and Company
Catherine Cabeen and Company is an Associated Program of Shunpike.

Thank you.

COLLABORATION

“COLLABORATION. Consider the etymology of the word. To collaborate is to work in common on the same project. The project for which I propose collaboration is Art.”
-Yves Klein at a discussion of Tinguely’s exhibition in Düsseldorf January 1959.

Klein envisioned a way forward in the world of art and ideas, which was free from ownership and signature. He often worked in collaboration with other artists and was driven in those relationships to create objects, experiences, and movements that were greater than what any one artist could create on his own.
This optimistic view of working with others as a way to create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts is also the philosophy that underlies CCC’s mission statement.
I am interested in working with artists in a variety of mediums because I am dedicated to learning about the creative process in its many forms. Interdisciplinary work reveals the specificity of my own practice and inspires me to look at the act of choreographing in new ways. It also allows CCC to create work that resonates with many viewers because the work itself is the repository of multiple voices. I am honored to be working with an incredible Seattle based creative team on Into the Void. Click on the collaborators names below to find out more about them.

Michael Cepress
Kane Mathis
Tivon Rice
Susan Robb
Connie Yun

I am also extremely fortunate to be working with Tonya Lockyer and Jay McAleer as Dramaturgs.

The other key collaborator on this project is On the Boards. Without OtB’s incredible support of regional programming, this work would not be possible.

Klein’s patented color, International Klein Blue (IKB) is actually not paint but a resin in which whole grains of pigment are suspended. IKB was Klein’s solution to the problem that the radiance of aquamarine blue was diminished when the pigment was ground into oil. I am captivated by this idea of simultaneous individuality and connection to a whole. It appears physically in IKB Monochromes, and conceptually in Klein’s ideas about collaboration.

Each artist working on Into the Void is creating a whole work within the piece, but the contributions of each artist will eventually radiate together in a singular luminous whole.

In my choreography I work to give my dancers a similar opportunity to be both individual selves, and connected to something much larger than any of us. I am thrilled to be working with these incredible dancers on this production:
Germaul Barnes, Karena Birk, Echo Gustafson, Matt Henley, Sarah Lustbader, Ella Mahler, and Chelsea Williams

If you want to meet these artists and support all of the collaborations involved in the creation of Into the Void, please join us December 12, 7-10pm at Havana Social Club in Seattle, WA for a festive Fundraiser.

If you can't make the party, please donate on-line through our click and pledge site:
https://co.clickandpledge.com/sp/d1/default.aspx?wid=33231
Catherine Cabeen and Company is an associated program of Shunpike. All donations are tax deductible.