Leopold Group

une elephante (2011)

une elephante, premiered in 2011 in Chicago, at The Drucker Center’s Fasseas White Box Theater. It is a duet accompanied by composer John Adams’ John’s Book of Alleged Dances, exploring ideas of duration and endurance, borrowing inspiration from portraiture. For dance, an art that is so defined by its ephemerality, une elephante works to challenge both the dancers and the audience to sit with a single (movement) idea for many minutes. Task-based choreography works to animate the still, painted relationship, finding emotion innate to the movement and the body/bodies themselves. The work’s title, borrowed from the inside of a bathroom stall (and gendered incorrectly), references the phrase “an elephant in the room.” When two bodies meet, within a picture frame or on the stage, what is left unsaid is often the loudest conversation in the room.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: John Adams’ John’s Book of Alleged Dances
Lighting: Joshua Paul Weckesser
Dancer: Melissa Bloch & Nicole Romano Uribarri

Videography: Matthew Hughes

Lips of Their Fingers (2011)

Lips of Their Fingers, premiered in 2011 in Chicago, at The Drucker Center’s Fasseas White Box Theater. It grews out of the historic tradition of pantomime as a part of dance. With a musical score by the Beastie Boys, Lips brings new meaning to the phrase “body language.” Gradually peeling off layers of clothing, the cast of five pits intensely physical movement against the most inanimate of objects to pose questions of embodied communication. Lips brings to light the questions that constantly plague modern dance – Is it possible to see the body separate from the dance? And more simply, what does it mean? – asking the audience to accept this repurposing of body parts as “they try to make lips of their fingers.”

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: various selections by the Beastie Boys
Lighting: Joshua Paul Weckesser
Dancer: Melissa Bloch, Natalia Negron, Jordan Newmark, Nicole Romano Uribarri, Laura Vinci de Vanegas

Videography: Matthew Hughes

Lips of Their Fingers Rehearsal (2011)

Lips of Their Fingers, premiered in 2011 in Chicago, at The Drucker Center’s Fasseas White Box Theater. It grews out of the historic tradition of pantomime as a part of dance. With a musical score by the Beastie Boys, Lips brings new meaning to the phrase “body language.” Gradually peeling off layers of clothing, the cast of five pits intensely physical movement against the most inanimate of objects to pose questions of embodied communication. Lips brings to light the questions that constantly plague modern dance – Is it possible to see the body separate from the dance? And more simply, what does it mean? – asking the audience to accept this repurposing of body parts as “they try to make lips of their fingers.”

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: various selections by the Beastie Boys
Dancer: Melissa Bloch, Natalia Negron, Jordan Newmark, Nicole Romano Uribarri, Laura Vinci de Vanegas

Voyager (excerpt), Bach solo 2011

Voyager, premiered in 2011 in Chicago, at Stage 773. It is an evening length dance work inspired by Carl Sagan’s famous Golden Record time capsule. In 1977, Sagan and NASA launched two Voyager spacecrafts, affixing each with a gold-coated copper phonograph record as a “message to possible extraterrestrial civilizations.” Each record contains 90 minutes of “the world’s greatest music,” an audio essay entitled “The Sounds of Earth,” and greetings in nearly 60 human languages (and one whale language). Mr. Sagan’s musical selections provide a potent score for tackling these persisting questions of communication, humanity, longevity and future.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: Gavotte en Rondeaux by J.S. Bach
Dancer: Nicole Romano Uribarri
Lighting: Josh Weckesser

Rite of Spring sketch (final movement) 2010

Rite of Spring sketch, premiered in 2010 in Brooklyn, NY as a part of a Wax Works works-in-progress showing at Triskelion Arts Center. This video is a first glimpse into what hopes to be a fully realized Rite of Spring in the coming years. In order to interrogate the intersection of art and commerce, historically and theoretically, this Rite of Spring begins the looking at the repeated choreographies of this singular, yet prolific, work.

In looking at this piece, I hope to establish a “constant” in my variable-ridden research. This work – with its complicated and studied past – has inevitably influenced much of the current dance world, both in relation to bank accounts and stages. My question is, in short, how does commerce affect art? Can a choreography become a commodity without sacrificing a great deal of itself and its intent? Are artistic intent and financial obligation mutually exclusive? And, how are these issues manifest in the over 200 known productions of the Rite of Spring?

The video marks the beginning of my embodied research.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: Le Sacre du Printemps by Igor Stravinsky
Dancers: Xan Burley & Alex Springer

Brahms String Quintet (final movement excerpt) 2007

Brahms String Quintet, premiered in 2007 in Chicago, is a music visualization set to a simply, gorgeous work of classical music. The work moves through, with and along side the sweeping melodies with ease, energy and athleticism.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: String Quintet No. 5 by Brahms
Dancers: Melissa Bloch, Xan Burley, Stefanie Karlin, Lizzie Leopold, Jordan Newmark, Nicole Romano Uribarri

Septet for Four (excerpt) 2010

Septet for Four was commissioned by the Northbrook Symphony Orchestra as a part of their 2010 season. The choreography follows the twists, turns and quirks of this beautifully contradictory piece.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: Septet for Piano, Trumpet and Strings, Op. 65 by Saint-Saens
Performed by the Northbrook Symphony Orchestra, conductor Lawrence Rapchak
Dancers: Melissa Bloch, Natalia Negron, Jordan Newmark, Nicole Romano Uribarri

Brahms String Quintet (solo excerpt) 2007

Brahms String Quintet, premiered in 2007 in Chicago, is a music visualization set to a simply, gorgeous work of classical music. The work moves through, with and along side the sweeping melodies with ease, energy and athleticism.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: String Quintet No. 5 by Brahms
Dancer: Melissa Bloch

Visiting Hours (excerpt) 2007

Visiting Hours was premiered in 2007 in Chicago. It asks how well we really know the people that we “know best.” At the end of life, which half of your better half was truly better and how can one ever negotiate being left with things unsaid, questions unanswered and secrets forever kept.

Choreography: Lizzie Leopold
Music: Chrisitian Matjias (performed live)
Dancers: Melissa Bloch & Lizzie Leopold