About Movement Research Festivals:

Movement Research Festivals, curated by a team of artists, explore contemporary dance forms through performances, classes, workshops, and discursive events. MR Festivals allow for a varied investigation and exploration into current artistic concerns and reflect Movement Research’s mission of valuing artists, their creative process, and their vital role within society. The Fall Festival centers around performances at our long-time festival home, Danspace Project.

Upcoming

Coming Together: Nurture, Nourish, Sustain is a series of in-person and online events that will take place progressively during the 2021/2022 season. How do we come together in the midst of ongoing changes? What does it mean for us to be together? What are the conditions and agreements of our togetherness? Come! Be part of this and future festival events and explore/experiment with us these and other emerging curiosities.

Learn more about Festival 2021/2022 Events >>

Past Festivals

Like many events happening this year, Movement Research's Festival looks a bit different. Rather than condensing a series of in-person experiences into a five day period in December, various events will be scheduled throughout the coming months. We hope you'll join us in exploring this new format, and connect with artists around the globe.

Learn More about the Festival 2020-2021 Events >>

ComeUnion was an invitation to explore the intersectionality of somatic practices and social justice, community building and care, and trauma informed frameworks for pedagogy and performance. The curators invited artists, somatic practitioners, activists, and healers whose practices are led by deep inquiries into these matters. Learn from our archives about this exploration and celebration of the somatics of subversion, the embodiment of resistance, and the poetics of revolution. Learn more here >>

Movement Research Fall 2018 Festival honored the journey—of creative processes, artists’ trajectories, and the past forty years of Movement Research itself. On the eve of MR’s homecoming to its first-ever long-term home at 122 Community Center, the Fall Festival offers a moment to reflect on the past decades of trusting the integrity of the ride - vitality, change, movement. More info...

Curated by Jonathan Gonzalez, Zavé Martohardjono, and EmmaGrace Skove-Epes. November 27 – December 3, 2017. More info...

Curated by Laurie Berg, Monstah Black, and Amy Khoshbin. May 31 – June 6, 2017. More info...

Curated by Carolyn Hall, Omagbitse Omagbemi and Kayvon Pourazar, November 28 – December 3, 2016. More info...

History

The Movement Research Fall Festival finds its roots in the Improvisation Festival New York (IFNY), initiated in 1992 by Sondra Loring (a Movement Research Artist-in-Residence at the time) and Julie Carr. From 1999-2003, Movement Research hosted the IFNY as one of its programs, under the curation of Programming Director Amanda Loulaki. In 2004, Movement Research created an artist-curator format, birthing artist-team curated festivals Improvisation is Hard (2004) and Open Source (2005). Since 2007, Movement Research has invited two to three artists to curate the Fall Festival:

2008: Sidewinder curated by Jennifer Monson and Zeena Parkins
2009: What Does Dance Have to Say? curated by Charles Atlas and Lucy Sexton
2010: truly madly deeply curated by John Jeserun and Jon Kinzel
2011: DEVOTION/RIGOR/SUSTAINABILITY curated by K.J. Holmes and Sondra Loring
2012: back to basic curated by Juliette Mapp and Jen Rosenblit
2013 Le Song Ya?! curated by Adrienne Truscott and Jibz Cameron (Dynasty Handbag)
2014: M A T T E R I N G curated by Rebecca Brooks and Daria Fain
2015: Vanishing Points curated by Beth Gill and Cori Olinghouse
2016: unthreading the filter curated by Carolyn Hall, Omagbitse Omagbemi and Kayvon Pourazar

Spring 2007, REVERENCE (IRREVERENCE), curated by Rebecca Brooks, Beth Gill, Erika Hand and Isabel Lewis

Spring 2008, Somewhere Out There, curated by Milka Djordjevich, Jeff Larson, Chris Peck and Anna Sperber

Spring 2009, Roll Call, curated by Megan Byrne, Michael Mahalchick, Will Rawls and Regina Rocke

Spring 2010, HARDCORPS, curated by Walter Dundervill, Melanie Maar, Aki Sasamoto and A.L. Steiner

Spring 2011, FESTIVAL!*, curated by Chase Granoff, Clarinda Mac Low, Larissa Velez-Jackson and FACADE/FASAD aka Gabriel Rivera

Spring 2012, Push It. Real. Good. curated by Eleanor Hullihan, Neal Medlyn, Marissa Perel, and Enrico Wey

Spring 2013, ALTERNATE/SHELTER, curated by Vanessa Anspaugh, Hilary Clark, Mina Nishimura and Antonio Ramos

Spring 2014, fallow time, curated by Elliott Maltby, Jennifer Monson, Alicia Ohs, and Tatyana Tenenbaum

Spring 2015, LEGIBLE/ILLEGIBLE: opening beyond the space of identities, curated by Layla Childs, Jaamil Olawale Kosoko, and Samita Sinha

Spring 2016, HAND WRITTEN NOTE(S), curated by Aretha Aoki, Elliott Jenetopulos, Eleanor Smith, and Tara Aisha Willis

Spring 2017, surprise! surprise (!) surprise/! surprise, curated by Laurie Berg, Monstah Black, and Amy Khoshbin


About the Program

Read more about this program, including related artists, events and supporters.

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