The mixed bill comprises works of three contemporary dance innovators, ranking among the most globally renowned, extremely gifted choreographers of the present time, all of them inventors of new, singular movement idioms.
**The Second Detail**
Choreography: ***William Forsythe***
William Forsythe is a towering figure of contemporary global dance. Blending ballet and visual arts, and displaying both abstraction and forceful theatricality, his vision of choreography as an organisational practice has inspired him to produce numerous installations, films, as well as computer-based creations, incorporating the spoken word and experimental music.
The Second Detail is simultaneously playful and rigorous, set to an aggressively percussive score by Forsythe’s frequent collaborator, the Dutch composer Thom Willems. Created for the National Ballet of Canada in 1991, the choreography, characterised by the neo-classical symmetry of ensemble formations, is unceasingly challenging. Forsythe plays with tempo, group dynamics and off-axis lines executed at speed.
**Handman**
Choreography: ***Edward Clug***
In 2016 Clug created for Nederlands Dans Theater 2 (NDT 2) the choreography Handman, for which in 2017 he receiveda nomination for the coveted Benois de la danse prize. Edward Clug, currently serving as the artistic director of the Slovene National Theatre in Maribor, gained international acclaim as a choreographer with Radio and Juliet in 2005. A sought-after artist, he has created works for the Nederlands Dans Theater, Ballett Zürich, Royal Ballet of Flanders, Stuttgarter Ballett, Latvian Ballet, Les Grand Ballet Canadiens, Wiener Staatsoper, West Australian Ballet, Companhia Nacional de Bailado in Lisbon, Aalto Ballet Essen, Ballett Augsburg, among others.
**Eden / Eden**
Choreography: ***Wayne McGregor***
The award-winning British choreographer and stage director Wayne McGregor is internationally renowned for trailblazing innovations in performance, integrating dance, film, visual arts, digital technologies and natural sciences. In Eden / Eden, he focuses on the impact of technology on the aesthetics of the environment and the human body alike. The work is set to Steve Reich’s spoken libretto/music score for the third act of his video opera Three Tales, devised by Reich and his wife, the filmmaker Beryl Korot. Dolly, a cloned sheep, pits scientists against one another in a thoughtful debate about the ethics of cloning.
State Opera Orchestra
Premiere - October 14, 2021
