never forget

Dance With Camera
Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia

Dance with Camera includes works in which dance is a subject, or mode, used to explore broader themes of collaboration, narrative, structure, metaphor and abstraction. These works propose choreography for the camera lens: movement is designed for the area prescribed by the camera’s frame; the ephemerality of live performance is fixed in time. The camera also allows close-ups that bring us in proximity to the dance, or in some cases, performs as a partner in unusual pas de deux. Photographic series freeze time while also expanding the notion of dance as a time-based medium. Editing techniques compress time and space, conjure dances impossible in real time, and even transform relatively static performers into dancers. Finally, the camera is not merely a recording device, but stage and audience simultaneously