UW Endowed Artists-in-Residence David Dorfman Dance to Perform Sept. 10

The award-winning New York-based David Dorfman Dance (DDD) company will perform at 2 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 10, in the University of Wyoming College of Arts and Sciences auditorium.

Tickets are $16 for the public, $13 for senior citizens and $8 for students and children age five and older, plus a nominal processing fee. To purchase tickets, visit the Buchanan Center for the Performing Arts box office, call (307) 766-6666 or go online at www.tix.com/ticket-sales/uwyo/6984. UW’s Department of Theatre and Dance, and the Neltje Center for Excellence in Creativity and the Arts present the gala performance.

DDD, UW’s 2023-24 Endowed Artists-in-Residence, will present workshops and master classes to UW students, as well as engage in two public events:

-- Thursday, Sept. 7, 4-5:30 p.m., Wyoming Union East Ballroom: UW faculty member Nevin Aiken, Dorfman and members of the company will engage in an interactive conversation exploring the power of movement and the arts to encourage peace through building empathy, understanding and human connection as a counter to division, polarization and violence. The discussion will reflect on DDD’s longstanding commitment to “kinetic diplomacy” and inspiring social change through community outreach and engagement in the U.S. and globally.

-- Saturday, Sept. 9, 9 a.m., Performing Arts studio B: The dance company members will hold a free public movement workshop.

The weeklong residency will culminate in the gala performance titled “A (Way) Out of My Body.” The work uses an “out-of-body” experience as a metaphor for current times and body politic. Dancers propel themselves through space and time, attempting to pass the barrier of reality and plight into the realm of positivity and growth. The performance includes an original score composed by DDD’s four-person band.

A 30-minute question-and-answer session follows the performance with company members and also UW Department of Theatre and Dance faculty members Aiken, Matt Daly and Cat Kamrath-Monson.

The residency is supported, in part, by UW’s Office of the President; School of Politics, Public Affairs and International Studies; College of Arts and Sciences; Honors College; Student Affairs; Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; departments of Visual Arts and English; Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research; and the Wyoming Arts Council.

For more information, email Kathy Kirkaldie, UW Fine Arts coordinator, at kirisk@uwyo.edu.

About David Dorfman Dance Company

DDD has created movement that seeks to destigmatize the notion of accessibility and interaction in postmodern dance by embracing audiences with visceral, meaningful dance, music and text. By sustaining a vision to create innovative, inclusive and movement-based performance that is radically humanistic, DDD maintains a core commitment to examine and unearth issues and ideas that enliven, incite and excite audiences in dialogue and debate about social change and myriad other topics.

In advocating his mission “to get the whole world dancing,” Dorfman’s work has enjoyed broad and diverse audiences nationally and internationally.

DDD has performed extensively throughout North and South America, Great Britain, Europe and Central Asia. The dance company has regularly performed in New York City at major venues including the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the Joyce Theater, the Kitchen, Danspace Project/St. Mark’s Church, La MaMa Theater, the Duke on 42nd Street, the Met Breuer and the 92nd Street “Y”/Harkness Dance Festival.

Dorfman, the dance company and their artistic collaborators have been honored with eight New York Dance and Performance (Bessie) Awards.