On Wednesday, 31 July, the Museum of Art in Łódź (ms2) is going to celebrate Anna Halprin’s legacywith two films: Returning Home featuring Halprin’s choreography, followed by Unisono by JustynaCalińska featuring Aleksandra Borys and Marysia Zimpel. The latter is coming in advance of theperformance of UNISONO re//mix Anna Halprin, produced by komuna // warszawa, to take place on 3August (7 pm) at the museum. Returning home is the effect of Anna Halprin’s search for existing mythsand rituals using dance as a means of making a connection with nature, while Unisono explores Halprin’sideas on how a dancer’s body may harmoniously exist in an open space, away from a studio or stage.The screenings start at 6 pm.
Anna Halprin is undoubtedly a pioneer of contemporary dance. In 1955-65 she ran the Dancers’Workshops in San Francisco, which turned out to play a pivotal role for such dancers/choreographers asSimone Forti, Trisha Brown or Yvonne Rainer. Halprin focused on joint experimenting and searchinginstead of the standard teacher-student relation. With her students she studied anatomy as the basis ofmovement, engaged in experience-building improvisation, and invited collaboration from painters,sculptors and musicians, doing away with boundaries between different disciplines of art. In 1978Halprin set up Tamalps Institute (http://www.tamalpa.org/), which provided the institutional base for hereducational and artistic activity. In 1981 she began a project aiming to explore existing myths and ritualsusing dance as a means of making a connection with nature. The film Returning home is the outcome ofthese explorations.
Anna Halprin Returning home (2003) 45 min.
Director: Andy Abraham Wilson
Cinematography & Editing: Andy Abraham Wilson
Body art: Eeo Stubblefield
Original music: Fred Frith
Find out more about the events of the exhibition Przyjdźcie, pokażemy Wam, co robimy. Oimprowizacji tańca [Come, we’ll show you what we do].
About dance improvisation] at the website ofthe Museum of Art in Łódź:
http://msl.org.pl/pl/wydarzenia/przyjdzcie-pokazemy-wam-co-robimy-o-improwizacji-t/