The Kun-Yang Lin/Dancers, the internationally active Philadelphia-based dance company, will perform the world premiere of a work inspired by the Pulse Nightclub shootings in a show called “Sanctuary.”
The show features “SANTUARIO,” a new work choreographed by Kun-Yang Lin with his ensemble, created in response to last summer’s tragic shooting at the LGBT club in Orlando. The work explores themes of alienation, gender identity, race relations, gun violence and demonization of “the other.” The piece will be accompanied by a score designed by Cory Neale and excerpts from Jameson Fitzpatrick’s “Poem for Pulse.”
The out Lin, who founded the company with his partner and executive director Kurt Metzner, is known internationally for his choreography, which is influenced by his Buddhist and Taoist world views. He also draws inspiration from the many Eastern arts he has practiced, including tai chi, chi gong, calligraphy and meditation, filtered through a broad range of contemporary dance techniques and improvisation practices.
Lin said the Pulse tragedy was especially disturbing for him and Metzner, and both felt like they had to address the tragedy in their art.
“Both of us are LGBT community members and there was something [about the Pulse shooting] that really bothered me,” he said. “It’s a fear that hit me so close to that sense of home. I create a world called home and this situation is really where you feel like something has been taken away. Pulse was really an attack on the queer community and many other labels in our society. I just wanted to do something that was more empowering, and yet, something that is so simple and small can resonate with some people. That was the seed that gave me the impulse to make this work.”
The Kun-Yang Lin Dancers are donating $5 of every ticket sold to New Sanctuary Movement of Philadelphia, William Way LGBT Community Center and Interfaith Center of Greater Philadelphia.
Metzner said he and Lin were inspired to support these local organizations after a visit to Orlando.
“We traveled to the Pulse Nightclub as part of the research for the work,” he said. “It’s very unlike a lot of memorials because it is interactive. They have candles and paper and poster board and magic markers and ribbons and ways for people to engage with the memorial so that those lives that were taken can continue to have an impact in the world. One of the things that the families of those who were lost and those associated with the survivors have specifically requested at the memorial is that you please create something of beauty. That’s a request from the victims, and they have a box of ribbons there at the memorial with a sign that says, ‘Please take a ribbon and photograph yourself doing something happy.’ We brought back a bunch of ribbons to our studio and we feel that is a way of honoring that request, by creating something of beauty, of introspection, of healing in keeping with that request of the survivors’ families.”
“SANTUARIO” is being performed alongside an acclaimed and revised Kun-Yang Lin piece, “ONE: Immortal Game,” a meditation on the journey from external division to internal oneness.
“I paired it with this piece particularly because of our political climate,” Lin said. “Everything right now isn’t for our self-interest; we are living in a time where everything is threatened and we are under attack. So I thought I’d pair these two pieces because they are about our own political division. But the works search that reflective and mindful consciousness and integrity in that division. It’s really about love and humanity. One proceeds from an embodied exploration of some of the more obvious parallels between chess and dance to an examination, via the dancing body, of the less apparent but compelling resonances I see, including the utility of both chess and dance as holistic vehicles for the development of an integrated human being, and chess as an art and a practice for living, which is how I conceive of dance. Just as chess includes, and is not limited to, the pieces, the chessboard and the way the pieces are moved on the board, so, too, dance is not confined merely to the shapes, the forms, the space and the bodies that make them. The totality of each of them is much more than that. It includes the stories communicated or explored on the board/in the space, the personal processes of the players/dancers. The dynamics among them, the politico-historical context in which the game/dance plays out, and ultimately, in my view, the relationship of all of this to our common humanity.”
Lin said that, while the two pieces that make up “Sanctuary” deal with the tragedies and the politics of our turbulent times, they aren’t necessarily exploring those issues directly, as Lin prefers to express what he wants to say in an abstract fashion.
“Dance cannot really tell a story but dance has the ability to bring people a feeling,” he said. “You can deeply feel what is going on. Sometimes we feel sympathy. Sometimes we feel shock. But even though these are abstractions, we can all feel them. Right now, this society feels that sense of brokenness and maybe it’s our responsibility to contribute art to try to make our way to repair or rebuild this wounded society. These two works are touching on a lot of issues. We’re talking about gun violence, health care, hatred, bullying and polarizing division in our country. I think people will associate with both of the pieces deeply because of what is happening in our world right now.”
Kun-Yang Lin/Dancers presents “Sanctuary” April 27-29 at Prince Theater, 1412 Chestnut St. For more information or tickets, call 215-422-4580 or visit www.kyld.org or http://bit.ly/KYLDPrince2017.