Austin American-Statesman 
f
I Review 
I 	Poetry provides 

I 	. 

! 	accompaniment 
for aural ballet 
By DEBI MARTIN 
Specie! to the Amerlcen-Stetesm11n 
People who think all dance is done to music may have been shocked Saturday night at the Per­forming Arts Center. All pieces on the program used verbal material as accompaniment in a var­
iety of ways. 
The guest performers, the Margaret Jenkins Company from California, presented a strikingly theatrical view of how words can be used as ac­companiment. In "Versions by Turning," poetry was spoken by the dancers. In each section, the words and dance expanded on the p0$lbilities of the two mediums in one space. 
As with musical accompaniment, the poetry provided rhythm, a second structural base for the dance, mood and atmosphere. Since the poetry contained lines that were amusing, intimate or gripping, the piece was an outstanding aural and visual experience. 
Yacov Sharlr's premiere piece on the bill, ·•col­lage," was just what its name implies. A voice col­lage accompanied the piece while some of the dancers performed wearing oniy one toe Shoe. Combined, these effects bombarded the senses and provided a montage of Images related In the abstract. 
Jenkins and Sharir have a lot in common cho­reographically. Their motion vocabularies gather eclectically the best of ballet and modem dance. Both choreographers know how to guide the eye all over the stage while dlfferent sequences are 
occurring. 
And both bave the good taste not to tum the stage into a circus. They can use a crowd of dancers and recharge previously bare space with the introduction of the simplest motion. And they allow their dancers to move as a group wbJJe still maintaining their individualism. This is no small 
feat, onstage or off. 


Dance group to open tour in Amarillo 
By Kart Fluegel 
Assistant Editor 

The Sharir Dance Company (SOC), formerly the American Deaf Dance Company (ADDC), wlll open its spring tour with a performance Saturday at 8 p.m. In the Concert Hall Theater. 
Opening night marks the beginning of a new phase of 

, development forthecompany. It Is the first attempt to showcase the talents of both the deaf and the newly-admitted hearing dancers. The company has Included only deaf dancers for the past five years. The preparation for this uni­que mixture ofdancers involved five years of Intensive work with theADDC. ADDC has toured throughout the United States, including per­formances In Washington D.C., Virginia, New York, Arkansas and North Carolina, besides vir­tually every major city in Texas. The company has appeared In joint performances with the Dallas Ballet, the Austin Civic Ballet, Invisible Inc., the Univer­sity of Texas Dance Repertory Theatre, the Hartford Ballet and the San Antonio Ballet. New dancers in the company include performers using varied styles from gymnastics to classical ballet. 
The performance Saturday will begin with a new version ofa company favorite Circles, choreographed by director Yacov Sharir. The performance will include the premiere of David Gordon's Jus' Passln' Through, a humorous piece tailored to the personalltles of the Sharir dancers. and Sharir's Collage, an entirely new work exploring the different move­ments Involved when dancers work with one foot "en pointe" and one foot flat. 

monday, march 28, 1983 

Evening of dance at PAC illustrates contrast between Sharir, Jenkins 
By Stephen lonln 
In a perfonnance Saturday rugh! at the Per· forming Arts Center, Austin's Sharir Dance Com· pany and the MargaretJen.kins Dance Company ofSan Francisco celebrated the joy ofunllmlted creativity and freedom through modem dance. Though uruque in theu styles and personalities, both companies presented spirited, spontane­ous works 
The Sharir Company"spcrformance was pleasantly surprising, the company is more ver· satile than the American DeafDance Company, Crom which it evolved Ul 1982. Yacov Sharir has assembled a talented, dedicated groupofhear· ingand deafdancers who wor.lr sensitively with one another. The energy. enthusiasm and con· viction they put into their work enabled them to surpass the visitingJenkins Company in appeal 
In "Just Passm· Through," the Sharir Company enjoyed bemg carefree, wlumsica! and silly. Danced to a recording ofthe dancers ctalogue (taped while they were rehearsing> which was played alternately wtth Glenn Miller s · In The Mood." the piece W3s exciting, unpredtctable and funny.The 12 dancers showed amazing techrucal skill m the synchronization and synthe­sis ofmultJ-di.rect1onal movement. 
The SDC's second work. '"Collage," choreo­graphed by Sham, blended powerful lighting and music. Dres,;ec.! m black body suits covered with different colored squares. they danced dynami· cally, dep:cung diverse personality types and Sil· 
uations. 

Sharlr's Company displayed unity as we.D as 
individuality. Synunetrical fonnations and rigid 
lines wereassumed 1n an instant, thl?ll erased as 
the dancers continued to move individually. 
They demonstrated flair and variety in their lifts, 
turns and glides. They showed botb inlensity 
and lightheartedness, which were always bal· 
anced byconvictionand expert timing. 
The MargaretJenkins Dance Companypre­
sented an Interesting contrast. Where the SOC 
was wann and expressive, theJenkins Dancers' 
performances seemed curiously marred by their 
professional detachment. The first piece, "Harp." 
set tojazzy music by Sonny Terry and BrowTUE~ 
McGhee, was fun. But the second piece. 'Ver­
sions by Tums" was a disappointment Although 
the company moved well. spotlighting graceful 
dancers. it seemed immune to feeling. One 
dancer would recite abstract poetry while other 
dancers visually expressed emotions in paired 
and solo movements. But the intended effect of 
this synthesis was marred by the dancers' too· 
unimoass1oned recitations. 
Als0 m contrast to theiiharlr dancers, theJen­
kin::. dancers used no symmetrical order In 
space. They openly exploredits infmiteness ­.creating scenes m which tndividuals acted alone. 
A certain unity was missing, theJenkins Compa­
ny didn·1 evoke the communal spint that com· 
plemented Sharir's company. 



dance 

the daily texan arts and entertainment magazine 

.­

-. ~----:-a..-­
-· -..g....-­
-


(' ·­


FANFARE Feb/Morch 1985 Photo AJon Snuth 
Pan 11 


DANCE 

spinsintothelimelight 
Spring continues to be a showcase semester for dance at The University of Texas at Austin. Ballet Austin will per· form in the PAC Concert Hall on March 16 and, on April 9, the Houston Ballet will present its lavishly produced, full· length Swan Lok. 
UT's award-winning student company, Dance Repertory Theatre, and the resi· dent professional company for the College ofFine Arts, the Sharir Dance Company, will perform jointly in the Concert Hall on March 23. Then April Z5-Z7, ORT will cap the season with an exciting debut of four new works. With these special performances upcoming, it's only fitting that this second part of a FANFARE tri· bute to dance focuses on UT's two out· standing companies and the artistic dircc· tors who founded and continue to shape them. 
L.tt:KateFisher,Jol6LulaBva1-'°"'9 
andMkho.aCarioulo•bioaaom• Inthe whlmalcal ~Oanm, one of..,,... llttte ct-In Yacov Shattt'1 Sulle cle OanH. 


Sharir 
Dance Company 
Choreographer Yacov Sharir has given much more than his name to the resident professional company of UT's College of Fine Arts. For the past three years, the Sharir Dance Company has been powered by the seemingly inexhaustible energy of its founder and artistic director. 
Sharir, an Israeli native, is compact only in build. His speech, expressions and gestures are animated, full of Sharir's characteristic humor and charm. Where his company is concerned, though, ·inten· sity is Sharir's most noticeable trait. His young troupe has already established a reputation for professionalism, innovative choreography and exciting collaborations. Its artistic purpose, he says, "is to provide an opportunity for dancers to be involved in the process of becoming an artist and," he adds emphatically, "to be proud ofit." 
Sharir's own introduction to dance came while a student in ceramics and sculpture in Israel. There, he performed for and toured with the Jerusalem Student Folk Dance Company. He then spent eight years as a member of the Batsheva Dance Company and two years with the Efrati Dance Company. During that time he also received training in ballet and mcxlern dance from such notables as Marrha Graham, Anna Sokolow and Jose Lim6n. 
While still in Israel, Sharir began work­ing with deaf dancers, developing an in· ternational sign language for deaf dance. In 1977, he came to Austin to establish the American Deaf Dance Company. That successful project, the first of its kind in the nation, created the opportunity for the deaf to perform, tour and teach in the professional field of dance. 
Although not officiall y in residence, the ADOC rehearsed and performed at 
FANFARE Feb/Morch 1985 

UT where Sharir was, and continues to be, a dance specialist on the faculty of the Department of Drama. In 1982, Sharir decided to form his own company, in part to give some of the many fine dancers in Austin a performing outlet. 
After enlistinJ? three deaf dancers from ADOC, Sharir gathered talent from a variety of sources includ•.1g the Austin Repertory Dancers Company then headed hy Kate Fisher. Fisher is now a dancer with and assoicate artistic director of the Sharir Company. 
For the 1984-85 season, the company includes Vivien Addison, Andrea Beck­ham, Jose Luis Busta-mante, fyiichael Carroccio, Kate Fisher, Susan Leslie Grubb, Marta Matthews, Leticia Rod­riguez, Rosie Serna and Patti Willey, along with apprentices Maurice Dancer, Beth Gore, Gaye Greever and Charles Santos. 
Suzanne Shelton Buckley, a cnlleague of Sharir's on the dance faculty and a contributing editor of Dancemagazine, praises the troupe's conrrihution to the community. The company, she s:iys, "has added a dimension ofcontemporary d:mce to the community. Yacov Sharir is one of the most creative minds I know. He has helped w elevate the taste lof dance audiences!. I've never seen them perform that they didn't perform professionally." 
Part of Sharir's commitment to pmfes­sionalism has been to display the comp:my on par with nationally-known dance troupes. "It wouldn't be worth it," he says, "if I didn't feel that the company could 
make a contribution to dance on a national level. " 
Austin audiences have enjoyed the Sharir company in joint performances with such leading companies as the Hart· forJ Ballet, the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company, the Dallas Ballet, the San An­tonio Ballet, the Deoorah Hay Dance Comp:my and, most recently, the Trisha Bwwn Dance Company. 
Slwrir sees these collaborations as an ohligation t(\ provide artistic stimulation w dancers, choreographers and auJiences. Surprisingly, it is a philosophy not sharcJ by :ill companies. Still, Sharir is adanrnnt ahout the benefits. "It makes us hcttcr artists to interact on the same level with th1-..~e <Htists. If you Jon'r internet with colleagues, then that's the heginning of locking yoursel( in, of retreating." 
The collaborations are e4ually impor· t:tnl. he adJs, "hccau,;c they rroviJc the community with performances "Y the cream 11( 111111.iern J;mce." 
The Sharir rept•rfl•jre is a rich retlecti110 o( that philnsophy, containinl! pieces hy such lc;iJinl! choreol!rnphcrs as Dchomh Hay, David Gordon, Margaret Jenkins and others. It is also a mixture o( styles reflecting the eclectic training of Sharir and his dancers with elements ofmodem, post-modem, ballet, jazz and folk dance and even some acrobatics and gymnastics. Indeed, if there is a trademark ofa Sharir company performance. says Kate Fisher, it is unpredictability. 

"You never know wh:ir you're going to Sl'e," she says. Speaking as a dancer she adds, "You never know what you're going w do. It's always exciting ... Yacov has a saying, that if you're choreographing a movement anJ it's not awkward on your hoJy, then it's not new." 
Challenging his dancers with new movement is a priority with Sharir. It makes for a lively, fluent repertoire, a repertoire of which Sharir says, "Versatility is 111y point." 
A prime example of Sharir's attempt to csc;ipe lahcling as a choreographer is rhe piece Suite de Danse. ChoreographeJ 
Above: Yacov Sharlr (center) and his company pause for a brief tfme-out during a rehearsal. left: Susan Leslie Grubb, Kate Fisher, Marta Matthews and Vivien Addison In lmptWsslons on 
a Folk Dance. 
FANFARE Feb/Morch 1985FANFARE Feb/Morch 1985 

in 1984, Setien Llul.e Dances, as ic is also known, could be considered something of a microcosm of che company's varied re­percoire. The work contains the whimsical Cactus Dance in which three dancers joined by one srriped leotard stretch. unfold and explore in a quizzical sort of cactus blos­soming. There's also the joyous spirit and .deft ensemble work of The Folk Dance. the soft. fluid movements of The Silk Dance, the serene introspection and acro­batic moves of lsamu Noguchi's Garden Dance, and the playful humor of two aris­tocratic dogs prancing and cavorting in 
Lho.so Apso. Yorkshire Terrier -A ConveT­sation Dance. 
Prolific as well as innovacive, the com­
pany is nor one that rests on its repertoire. 
At least one new piece is introduced each 
spring. Sharir's latest work, actually rwo 
pieces citied Four Legs and Twelve Legs 
are scheduled co premiere in che March 23 
performance at the PAC. Sharir describes 
the pieces as "a celebrauon of footwork 
with a lot of gestural material, very much 
influenced by Middle Eastern folk dances." 
Asked about his plans and hopes for che company's future, Sharir answers simply and wichouc hesitation. He wants his company co have, he says, "the opportu· nity to keep going ...and I'm going to make that happen." 

Dance Repertory Theatre 
The history of UTs student company is shore but sweet. In just four years, Dance Repercory Theatre has gained a well-deserved reputation as che rising star of the dance program and as one of the top student dance companies in the na­tion. 
In 1981. the company made its formal debut ar rhe lncemational Modem Dance 
10 FANFARE Feb/Morch 1985 

Festival in Mexico City. A year later, at the first South Central College Dance Festival. ORT was awarded a gold medal for choreographic excellence and a silver for performance. In 1983, ORT brought home a gold in both categories a silver in choreography arid was chosen as one of nine troupes to perform at the Amer­ican College Dance Fesrival ar the Ken­nedy Center in Washington. O.C. In fact, every year in which the company has par­ticipated in the festival, it has been hon­ored for its excellence. 
ORT exiscs largely because ofthe efforcs of its tireless artistic director. Sharon Vas­quez, a member of the dance faculty and an associate chairman oflJrs Oepartmenr of Orama. Vasquez, recipient of a 1982 Teaching Excellence Award, has been in­strumental in making the dance program at UT an exemplary one, especially in modem dance. 
Dance facu lty member Suzanne Shelton Buckley says. "Sharon has put modem dance on the map at The University and has brought distinction co the Oeparcmenr with ORT. .. She has put in many hours co provide a performance outlet for our scudents." 
According to Vasquez, ORT evolved out of her own need to perform and cho­reograph. When she first came co Austin in 1977, Vasquez recruited dancers from the community and The University co present her works. "As I developed a piece," she says, "I would gee a group co work with me, and we would carry that through co a performance." Those perfor­mances were the informal beginning of ORT. As the dance program grew and the caliber of student improved, the deci· sion was made to formalize ORT inco a student troupe with its own performing and touring season. "I took myself out of it as a performer," explains Vasquez, "and started choreographing for chem as a com­pany. le became a wonderful extension of teaching." 
Today, ORT consists of rwo compo­nents. The smaller touring company, usually made up of juniors and seniors, typically 
c A L E N D A R 

A T • T 11 E • l. 

DANCE 


For more information on dance presenta­
tions, call 4 71-1444 unless otherwise noted. 

February 26-27 
Merce C unningham-UT's DanCelebra­
cion continues with the master of modem 
movement and company. 8 p.m. CH. $10, 
$8, $6; $8 and $6 for CECand senior citizens 

March 22 
Sha.rir Dance Company and Dance Re­
pertoryT heatre-UT's professional dance 
troupe joins the students of the ORT co 
perform theirlatest works. 8 p.m. CH. $10, 
$8, $6; $8 and $6 for UTand senior citizens. 


DRAMA 


For information on drama productions, call 471-1444 unless otherwise noced. 
February 18-22, February ZS-March 1 The Importance ofBeing Earnest-Who is Ernest and why arc John and Algernon answering to the name? Oscar Wilde answers che question in witry fashion in one of his most famous works. Presented by UT Drama under thedirection ofPaul Gaffney. 8 p. m. BIP. $6; $5 for UT and senior citizens. 
February 27 and March 1, March 6 and 8 Fanny-Harold Rome's Broadway musical about young men who mustchose becween their love fora woman and their lust for the sea is presented by the UTOperaTheatre, under the direction of Robert DeSimone. 8p.m.. OLT. S8,$6forUTandseniorcicizcns. 
February 27-March 1, March 6-8 and 13-15 Bingo-A fictional chronicle of Shakes­peare's final days displays the Bard in both comedic and tragic light. Directed by Lee Abraham. 8 p.m., TR. $6; $5 for UT and senior citizens. 
~· I \. E R S I T Y 
February 28-March 3 42nd Street-The smash hitfrom Broadwav about an understudy's chance at a starring. 
role settles in Austin for six shows. The 
hummable melodies, wittydialog, and effer­vescent dancing make David Merrick and Gower Champion's showcase a delight for the whole family. 8 p.m., with Z p.m. matinees on March I and 2, CH . $28-$12 with $3 discounts co CEC andsenior citizens. 
March 14-16 Charlotte's Web-E.B. White's lovable tale of friendship between and wily spider and a pig destined for the butcherconcludes 
UT Drama's popular Theatre for Youth sea­son; directed by Coleman Jennings. 6 p. m. on Friday, March 14; 2 and4 p.m. on March 
15 and 16, BIP. $4. 
(continutd on ntxt pagt) 


CORPUS Ct·dl::>n. 7EXAZ Sunoa1• 1':>-, 2 :!130/SC 
BOOKS • 6C MOVIE TIME CLOCK • 9C 





ENTERTAINMENTIARTS 

Modern-dance. instructor has a mission: education 
By Beth Arbum Davia 
Y 
ST.Y.F WRITER 
acov Sharir It an ombudsman, 
of sons. . 
The M~bom lnstruc> 
lor or modem dance and chorc­
oirapby 11 lhc Uni.,.ersily of 
Tc.us is an all)' for audiences wary or or 
befuddled by the 1Yrations and cont~ions 
of1;ontemporary dance. 

':.We are .,.cry scnsiti"e 10 audiences that ha~c not seen much modem dance,• Sharir sa~s. "h's an cduca1ional process really.•· 
He takes his dance and his mission to educate seriously. 
In 1982, Sharir founded lhe Sharir Dance Company. Based in Austin. 1hc group tou11 exclusi.,.ely in Teus. 
The company is funded by lhe National Endowmenl for 1hc Ans. 1he Texas Com­mission on the Ans and various grants and donations, Sharir said. 
Sharir and his 14-membcr company will conduct two mas1cr classes. several work· shops at area schools and aive a public performance during a residency in Corpus Cliristi Thursday lhrough Saturday. The aptiearancc here is sponsored by the Cor­P~.Chrisli Ans Council Dance Alliance. 
J.:J. the public performance. scheduled for 
2:30 p.m. Saturday in Richardson Auditori· um.on the east campus of Del Mar College, Sharir's company will be joined by in1erna­1ionally acclaimed classical suilarls1 Javier Calderon. 

Calderon. a Del Mar facully member, debuted at age 17 in his na1ivc city of La Paz, Bolivia. Since then, he has performed in the United Stales, Europe, Sou1h Ameri­ca and 1hc: Orient 
Sharir, !hough born in Morocco. was reared and educated in Israel. He studied modem dan« with thrtt or lhc mosl well-known and rcspcc1ed people in the lie.Id: Manha Graham. JOK Limon and Je­rome Robbins. 
Though he had nol had formal dan« training un1il age 18, Sharir said he had always danced folk dances. Bui modem dance was a powerful magnet. 
"I'm very allraclcd 10 the fact 1ha1 every­thing is possible in modern d~nce. -he says. 
Ac:lually, modem dance is re~ll) three klnd5 of dance. he said. 
"Modem dance is more comprehensible to the audien«. I chink. It is more conscr­ntive and 1heatrial. Then there is post­modern. which is more gestural. more pe­destrian. After that lhere is nc:" Janee or new wave dance. \\hieh is more eclectic. h has different cncrgie1 10 iL­
The company's public performance in Corpus Christi will include "Suite Chopin.· wilh choreograph)' by Sharir. -ROKS. • chorc:oaraphed by Jose Bustamante: and "Bach." choreographed by Sharir and lxc McCandless. 
D 
The Sherif Dence Company and guitar· lat Jevler Calderon will perform begin· nlng el 2:30 p.m. Saturday In Richardson Auditorium on the east campus of Del Mer College. Tickets are SS lor adults. $3 for atudents or senior citizens, and are available at the Ballet Academy, 3446 S. Alameda; the Corpus Christi Dance Cen· ter, 4234 Ayers; The Dance Co., 1231 Hiie; Munro Sludlos, 5610 Everhart; Cor­pu1 Christi Art• Council, 1S2t N. Chapar­ral; Del Mar College Harvin Center, east campu1; Jewish Community Center, 750 Everhart. To register for the master cles· 111, which will begin at 5 p.m. Friday at the Del Mer College gymnasium, call 883·2717. 

CORPUS CHRISTI. TEXAS 
Friday, Nov 7, 1986/3A 

The Yacov Sharir Dance Compa­Sharir, tb:e Morocx:o-oom instruc­ir Dilicc Company. Bisct:f in Aus­ny will pcrfonn beginning at 2:30 tor of modem dance and choreogra­tin, the group tours exclusively in 
p.m. Saturday in Richardson Audi· phy at the University of Texas, is Texas. 
torium on the Del Mar College cast an ally for audiences wary of or The company is funded by the 
campus. befuddled by the gyrations and con­National Endowment for the Arts, 

The dancers will be joined by tortions of contemporary dance. the Texas Commission on the Arts classical guiwist and Del Mar Col­"We are very sensitive to audi· and various grants and donations, qe profCssor Javier Calderon. cnces that have not seen much Sharir said. 
The company's appearance is modem dance," Sharir says. "It's an Calderon debuted at age 17 in his sponsored by the Corpus Christi educational process really." native city of la Paz. Boli\'ia. Since Arts Council Dance Alliance. In 1982, Sharir founded the Shar-then, he has performed in the Unit-
Dance master shows how it's done 
Yacov Shanr, founder of the Shanr Dance Compa­ny of the University of Texas at Austin, cond11cted 
• 	a master class yesterday at Del Mar College for sixtn-grade students from Chula Vista and Wind· sor Park elemen•~ry sci 1ools. Sharir was invited by the Corpus Christi Arts Council Dance Alliance. 
Cd States, Europe. Souili America and the Orient .. 
The company's public perfor­mance in Corpus Christi will in­clude "Suite Chopin," with choreography by Sharir; "ROKS," choreographed by Jose Bustamante: and "Bach," choreographed by Sharir and Dec McCandless. 
Tickets for the pcrfonnance arc $5 for Mlults and U t<>r children. Tickets are available at the door and at Ballet Academy, 3446 S. Ala­meda; Corpus Christi Dance Cen· ter, 4234 Aycn: The Dance Co., 1231 Nile; Munro Studios. S6IO Everhart; Corpus Christi Arts Council. 1521 N. Chaparral; Del Mar College Harvin Center, casf campus; Jewish Community Cen­ter, 750 Everhart. 
SHARIA DANCE COMPANY PRESENTS 
WHAT 
WHY 
HOW 
BUTCH HANCOCK & ~ 
lcHRY~ALIS REPERTORY DANCE COMPANY In performance with THE SHARIA DANCE COMPANY and guest ar11S1s DIANA PRECHTER and ROXANNE SAENZ Thursday-Saturday April 23 -25 1 987 8 pm Capitol City Playhouse ' 214 West 4th St 472-2966 Tickets S8; $6/ senior citizens and students 
The Au,tin <hronkk April IO, 1987 JI 
• 


October 
1987 


Photo by David Kennedy 
8, 9 & 1 0 Sharir Dance Company in a joint perfonnance with Jose Luis Bustamante, Jimmy Turner and Diana Prechter. Sharir Co. will perfonn Ame Z.ane's "Freedom of Information," Bustamante's "Beyond the Pale" and "Two," choreographed by Yacov Sharir and perfonned by Sharir and Jimmy Turner. Diana Prechter's new work, "The Sleepwalker's Dream," will be perfonned by Prechter and the Texas National Dance Theatre with guests Leticia Rodriguez and Pat Stone. Capitol City Playhouse. 8 PM For reservations, 472-2966. 

~HA•I• DANCE COMPAN~ opt!ns tht'lr 1cx al 1987-'88 )<'aloOn "11h collaborauve "'emng' Thu·!>.U Oct 8 10 a11hl' <.ap110: City Pl.tyhouw at 8pm This'' one vt'<Y hard working comp.lny. I I honk 1hev probably tra\el around 1he '"ltt' lO perform mon• th.ln any otht'f loCdl comp.iny This prom"es co be a '"<Y strong progr.im. 
w11h the Sharir Comp.>ny repn..ng lheor e~cclk-nl rend,. toon 01 the 8111 T Jo~Arntl' ZJne DJn< 1• Comp.in)~' / ro~•lom vi /nlormJl•Qn. P<1r1 Ill I hi\ wa, qu111· a 'tun· n1n11.1nd drm.1nding dJntl' \\h1•n lh\• 'up(•r Jont'vZJn•• Company ix•rformed the full t•v..nlnK Jt th1• lht•n PAC Vvt...n 1ht• ~h.mr Comp.my ptrlorml'd 1l .111h1 P,irJ mount 1•1'1 'P""R· I "a' 1m111t°1>''>d hy 1h1· autht'n11nl\' and 011g1nal1ty 01 th<'" tlt•hwry tn an ongoing polor) 1ha1 g1>•'S the alt<'adv well·ro.i:id•'Cf ~haror Com11.111)' more ch<Jllenge-, d1tieren1 ca'IS will ddnet• on ditrt'r~m n i;hh I \a" 'fa<ov c;haror and Kalt' foht•r Jl('rtorm bt'ton . 111 malt> >U•t' to,,.... An<lr.•., S.-Clham land I lw hP I~· Lu» 8L1Slilm.mtel perform 1n 1he t'nsemble th,. go-.uound A new "ork chorPOgraphtod by B.,ga­m•nl•• Bt'Yond tht' Pale " II rt'< t'•H' "' premiere wll music 'IX"C•ally (0'111J<N'<.I by Mochdt?l Kapoul;i' I m '' 'Y 1n1ere~ted lo~~acov'~ flt'\\ dut>I tor h1mwH lmd Jlmmylurner ''T\\O." \\tlh vocdh hythP rndom11 uhl) orogondl rmJ M.l"'h Completon~ ,,.,.. holl i.s ilnothN rn11c1ng SQUnd1ng numbf•r Cdllt'Cl Thr !>le<'1n~.ilk1•r"s (lrmm t hore0graphed by OidOJ P1rd1wr on m1>mlll',,; 111 th1• T1·~.1> N .. uonal Danrl' Th1•,11rr " oln gu•''' Mto~I' Prit \ tone dnd Lehna Rodnguc.-r. f'w "'rv m111 hen­1owd S1un1••, and Rodnguez• f""""u' pertorni.mw of. f, rrng,. (both are choreogra11hers in theu own nshcs) .and am a1so loo~rngfoM..rd to ht'arong th<' commt~!Moncd 
'!o{Ore by \1101 mu>ocoan!composer Chari<~ Oi110 r~e ~enlhe CC.PH Slwnr '1\°"s sdl out so ti you want a good ~<"di don I get lhl'I? .11 the I.HI mmult' l 1eh1~art• S7 S& for rev•rvallOnS c;ill CCPH al 47 l -2%& 
GltA ND llESU•llECTION ofTEXA~ /\.~11011/~L DANCE 
THEATllE SCHOOL, ~t·Sun OC1 l 4 Ne\\°""'"' dire< tor 01 TNDT 1> Londa 01v1n, 1oun<il"r ol tfw 1 larlrng"n Ballt-t l:l'nll'I and HJrhngen Cont<'lt IJ,lllel D1v1n h." 5lu1hed v.tth Boll 'l.1Jtton Vi'<ounl. Su\Jnn,1 Bt•nJ"dt''· 
./1 fht Austin Chronicle Octuhu 2, 1987 
. 

The Sharlr Dance Company uses performers from Austin. 
Austin American-Statesman 
ThlJ'Sday, October 8, 1987 
Choreographer invites audiences 






to laugh at ' 
By Jerry Young 
Special to the American-Statesman 
It has become more difficult to draw 
clear lines between the arts. Dancer/chor­
eographer Senta Driver knew that what 
she was doing did not fit snugly into the 
classification of dance, and rather than 
leave her audience struggling with a name 
for what she does, she made up her own ­harry. 

"If you call it harry," Driver said, "they 
don't look for ballet line and traditional 
modern dance values. It was an irreverent 
and memorable and simple name, and peo­
ple can laugh -and they always do laugh 
at what I do. They are invited to." 

Lately Driver has been incorporating 
video into her work. She and her company
will perform Video 5000 on a jointprogram 
Jan. 22 and 23 with the Yacov Sharir 
Dance Company. The work, which shepre­
miered two years ago in San Antonio, is a 
collaboration with video artist Dennis 
Diamond. 

While many contemporary artists are at­
tractedto the dazzling effects possible with 
the electronic medium, Driver said it al­
lows her anotherway to bring people into a 
performance. "When I use video," she said, 
"I don'tshow you scenery, I don't showyou 
countrysides or objects -I want to show 
you more kinds of people in more kinds of 
ways." , 

In Video 5000, recorded images of faces. 
legs and arms are projected onto a scrim at 
the front ofthe stage. Driver said the silent 
film takes the place of a musical score. 
"The normal atmosphere that music can 
give is given in this piece by a film of fig­
ures swimming on a scrim in front of the 
stage through which you see the live danc­
ing. It gives the effect of angels haunting 
the stage. The dancers are beating out a 
rhythm that is quite audible -it's like 
barefoot tap dance." 

Driver considers the sound of that an audience. The great tap dance compa­have an art form where you can reach peo­
"barefoot tap dance" a central part ofwhat nies that I watch do the mostsophisticated ple easily and also give them the most com· harry is all about. "You can hear my danc­stuff, but because it is so rhythmically in­plicated and interesting and rich notions, ing," Driver said. "Why would you want to fectious, nobody says 'I don't understand then you've won something.'' 
include music in dance if you do not in­it.' People fmd it perfectly easy to follow Rhvthm is a concern to Driver, even clude r:hythm? It's an extra way ofreaching and care about and remember. When you when'she is coming up with a title. It ex­


Tuesday, January 12, 1988 Austin American-Statesman 

Austin American-Statesman Tuesday, January 12, 1988 
Dance 

plains why there is no 'and' between 'Avner' and 'Rena' in Avner, Rena, Bud and Roxie, Lillian and Sam, which is also on the program. "A friend wanted to know why there is no ampersand in there," Driv­er said. "She thinks that one of the couples has to grow up in order to qualify for an 1and.' I keep saying that she has no sense of scansion. You can't say 'Avner and Rena, Bud and Roxie, Lillian and Sam.' If I had wanted an 'and' in there I would have had to caJl it Dov and BeUa, Bud and Roxie, Lil· lian and Sam." 
Born in Greenwich, Conn., and raised in the suburbs ofBoston, New York and Phil­adelphia, the 45-year·old Driver studied Latin in college. Before she started a dance career that included six years with the Paul Taylor Dance Company and now 13 years with her own company, she considered working in politics. It was that interest and a well-worn subscription to the Texas Ob­server that makes Driver keenly aware of Texas politics. 
She developed a special fondness for San Antonio progressive Maury Maverick Jr., and when she performed there two years ago a meeting was arranged. "He influ· enced my thinking through what he stood for and others like him stood for. He came to the performance and he came backstage. I said, 'You must think I'm crazy, but I re· member what you did in the Legislature in the '60s. It mattered and I care and the things you stood for influenced what I think should be done.' He was someone I found memorable because of the way he was written about." 
She also cites Willie Morris' North 
T oward Home es sparking her interest. "I 
was very affected by that book. He wrote in 
terms of locations and people and intense 
connections to r,lnres. I can'taccount for it 
but I know n lot about Austin. 1 know 
about the Armadillo W1>rkl Headquarters 
-1go back. 1 think I know what Austin is 
going to look like.'' 
Driver is being brought t-0 Austin by Ya­
. 
cov Sharir, who has been acquiring reper­toire for his company from some pretty impressive folks, like Merce Cunningham, Nina Weiner, Bill T. Jones and Amie Zane. Sharir is also commissioning Driver for a piece slated for a 1990 premiere. The two companies will share a program this week­end at the Opera Lab Theater at the Per­forming Arts Complex, with Sharir and his company premiering HoTTIOlle to Amie Zane, choreographed by Sharir, and Wise Heart, choreographed by Jose Luis Busta­mante. Performances are at 8 p.m. Jan. 22 and 23. 
Last weekend at the Synergy Studio, Deborah Hay gave performances of solos from two major works of the last few yea.rs, The Well and The Man Who Grew Common in Wisdom. At any presentation by local performers, one fmds a sizable contingent of friends. Because there are many who very deeply share Hay's notions about movement and life, I sometimes feel that I am visiting a church of which I am not a member. But in spite of these strong ap· prehensions, I always come away feeling as though I have experienced something new and worth experiencing. 
Early in The Well Hay stands silently with her head covered by a cloth. The room becomes so hushed that you can hear stomachs growling from the other side of the room. The audience becomes absorbed in what would otherwise be inconsequen­tial details. like the slight movement of a toe, or the forcing of her body to the edge of losing balance. 
By eliminating virtuosity, Hay's "atten­
tion" and sense of "being there" as a per­
former become the focus of her work; the 
distinctions between dance and therapy 
blur in the process. Thie requires consider­
able consent and participation from the 
audience, and the unwary may fmd them­
selves in strange and deep water. 
We may reach a point where audiences 
come to feel the need for and expect this 
kind of encounter at a buy-your-ticket­
and-take-your-seat performance; but as 
Hay is quick to admit, it is unlikely that 
her art is soon to be embraced by a broad 
audience. 

Sharir presents outstanding 
collaborative dance program 

By Ann M ccutchan 
Special to lhe Amerlc11n-S1111esman 
On stage: Two women in over­sized blazere writhe in and out of vinyl chairs, pronouncing diches from Nijinsky's diary ("I asked God to help me, and he told me not to go to bed . . . "). 
Two others wearing nightgowns waft about in a stupor, cooling themselves with pastel hand fans. Another figure, in white, observes the scene passively from a cornerof the stage, while a dancer wearing a shiny red dress dances, rocks and weaves continuously in t.ortured, warped counterpoint to the rest of the scene. 
So goes the second part ofdanc­er-choreographer Diana Prechter's The Sleepwalker's Dream, per­formed last weekend at Capitol City Playhouse. In many ways, this is a dance to be seen up close. The way a performer's eyes follow the line ofherhand as it drags through space, even the languorous stretch of a leg are keys to Prechter's art. And no gesture is ever wasted. Ar­tistic economv underlies the whole, as in 8 finely wrought tapestry that portrays a detailed picture within the limits of a wall. The dance is 
stunning. Sleepwalke1 was one of four 
works presented in a provocative program that featured the Sharir Dance Company, Prechter, and dancer-choreographer Jose Luis Bustamente. 
Opening the evening was Amie Zane's Freedom of Information, Part Ill, an angular, tense work that. begins to the scraping sounds of electronic keyboard scales. Bod­ies are rigidly controlled. move­ments are often abrupt, like responses t.t> electric shocks. T here is a complex set of rhythms driving the whole work -each dancer seems rooted to a grid whose pat­tern he or she is compelled to ex­press. Flirtatious humor in the 
Review 

faces and small touches likl1 wig· gling fingers relie\'e the high­strung, super-jointed postures.The performance Saturday night was first-rate. 
Following Freedom was Three, described as ''a surreal interchange between composer, dam·er and choreographer.'' As executed by Tina Marsh, Jimmy Turner, and Yacov Sharir, the work dramatical­ly explores the give-and-take rela­tionship between three artists. The trio first stands in a triangle, with 
the dancer (.Jimmy Turner) at the apex. The singer croons a dusky ballad, then segues to syllabic \'O· calizing, while the dancer. who is deaf, responds with the quick stamping of bare feet and wild, • frustrated, screams. The choreog­rapher's movement!! are RUbtle, rit· ualistic. He wields a short tree branch, offers it to the dancer, at.­taches it to the back curtain, holds it to his mouth as if it is a muskal instrument. Perhaps it symbolizes an inner voice. T he dancer is calmed by drawing a rod around the edges ofa great crystal bowl set in front of him. He (•an feel the vi· brations. The others hum in unison with the sound of the bowl. 
From that symbiosis bursts new 
mu~ic, new movement.s that are spontaneous and fresh. The work is disturbing and attractive, although the rit ualislic structure ring"' a bit dated. 
But there are more levels here, I suspect, than can be experienced in a first encounter. Something in the performanC"e flpproat·h needs loos­ening up --o we can t>em;e more 01 the layers within. 
Jose Luis Bustamente's Be;>orzd the l'ale i.: ns cool and sattsfying as a M<.·~art symphony. formally so­phisticated and languid. The com­ings and goings of dancers and their various ;;tylized groupings are unpreclict11blc. But in the end, the abstract patterns add up to the nat­ural, i;ensible beauty of a snow­flake. Here, the Sharir company gave an especially elegant perfor­mance. closing an evening that was simply oubtanding. 
Austin American-Statesman 
Monday, Ociober 12, 1987 .. 
Sharir's fifth season 
features added works 

By Jerry Young 
Spec:lm to the Atn4WIC8n·Stateaman 
After four seasons of perfor­mance, Yacov Sharir's dances are changing, but many of his ideas re­main the same. 
The Sharir Dance Company, which begins its fifth season to­night at Capitol City Playhouse, has become a meeting ground for Austin's diverse dance and music makers, a function that is impor­tant to Sharir. He likes to use Aus­tin talent. "I feel very strongly that the opportunity to work makes you better. We are presenting artists on the national level and it's hypo· critical to avoid the kind ofincl'edi­ble talent Austin has." 
Sharir's criteria: "Ifa person has something to offer and he's a seri­ous person, I'll do it." 
This weekend's program in· cludes a repeat ofFreedom ofInfor· mation, a work by Bill T. Jones that the company added to its rep­ertory last year. 
With the help of rehearsal direc­
tor Woody McGriff, Sharir has 
scaled the work for the intimate 
confines of the Capitol City Play­
house. Sharir thinks the hyperac­
tive piece will work well in closer 
quarters. "In a setup like the Capi­
tol City Playhouse, the audience is 
so close they will be able to really 
have the effect of the intensity of 
the piece." 
Sharir also will premiere one of 
his own new works, Two. which he 
describes as "a surreal piece, an in­
teraction between composer, danc­
er and choreorgrapher." Tina 
Marsh is the composer/vocalist:
Sharir is the choreographer; and 
Jim.my Turner, a deaf dan~r and 
Sharir Company veteran. ts the 
dancer. "We are set up in a triangle 
and we are looking at each other," 
said Sharir. "What's very interest­
ing is that we have used Jimmy 
Turner's voice to stimulate Tina 
Ma.rah'& sound." 
Turner makes sounds with his 
voice and by rubbing a stick across 
the rim ofa Tibetan ceystal bowl, a 
sound similar to that made by rub­
bing your finger around the rim of a 
crystal wine glass. "l felt we had 
matured to the kind of relationship 
THE SHARIA DANCE 
COMPANY When: Tonight through Satur­day, 8 p.m.Where: Capitol City Playhouse Tlcket1: $6 and $7 Information: 472-2966 
where I can ask him to produce sound and he won't feel awkward. When he produces that kind of sound with his voice, Tina Marsh can pick up on it and with her abili­ty to improvise and experiment she can rebound it in any direction." 
Jose Luis Bustamante, who bas worked with Sharir for the past several years, will premiere bis new work, Beyond the Pale. Unlike last seasons's Bla-Bla-Bla Ballet, the work draws its influence from headier stuff than Charlie Chaplin films. "It is influenced by quantum mechanics,'' Bustamante said. "When you dig into it you find that there are implications about the way we perceive reality." 
Bustamante says the title comes from the notion that there are things, both in physics and in life, that are not reversible, and for Bustamante, taking the quantum leap from concept to performance is one that is principally uncertain. "It's a very interesting piece for me because it set some problems for me to solve," he said. "I don't know if I succeeded: I will need to see it on stage." 
The program also includes a new 
group piece by Austin choreogra­
pher Diana Prechter. The Sleep­
walker's Dream uses members of 
the Texas National Dance Theatre 
and guest artists Pat Stone and Le­
ticia Rodriguez. 
American-Statesman 
AUStin ~ 


Section G 
Austin American-Statesman Thursday, January 21, 1988 
l 
Barb Mai­berger and Mi­chael Si­mon of the dance company Harry at Opera Lab Theatre 
Photo by Jonan Elbers 



FRIDAY 
Absolutely the very newest. An evening of modern, post-modern and new dance will be presented by the Sharir Dance Company and Harry, a company led by New York's Senta Driver. Driver's group will interact wHh a film in 
Video 5000, as well as work on the physical and cerebral levels in Avner, Rena, Bud and Roxy, Lillian and Sam. A work by emerging choreographer Jose Luis Bustamante and an homage to New York dancer Arnie Zane are on tap for the Sharlr Dance Company. The show begins at 8 p.m. in UT's Opera Lab Theatre: 
tickets are $8, with discounts for students, children and senior citizens. The performance will be repeated Saturday. 
Piano man. Andre Watts, one of the most 
famous American-born pianists, performs with 
the Austin Symphony Orchestra at 8 p.m. in 
UT's Arts Complex Concert Hall. The program 
includes Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 1 in D 
minor, and Beethoven's Turkish March and 

DANCE 
Evening of dance 
An exciting merglng ot Auslln end New York wlll kick off the new year when the Sharir Dance Company performs with one of the 819 Apple's most talked­aboul ensembles, Senta Driver, at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday In the Arts Complex Lab Theatre. Tickets are $6 for UT stu­dents and senior citizens. and $8 for oth­ers. Call 477-6060 for lick~ts. 
SHAP,IP, DANCE COMPANY Pf\ES E NTS 
SHARIR DANCE COMPANY AND RICARDO GARCIA 
WITH GUEST Ar<.TIST DIANA PrfCHTEr<. 
PARAMOUNT THEATRE MARCH 11 & 12, 1988 at 8PM 
PrfMIEr<.ING J WOI\KS: 
"INLETS 2" DY MEr<.CE CUNNINGHNv\ 
"SUf\SUM" DY r<.ICHARDO GAr<.CIA 

"PEl\CUSSION CONCEl\TO" [}Y YACOV SHAP.IR 
TICKETS· $1 0 Public and $8 for Sr C1rizens and Srudenrs $5 Srudenr r\ush beginning or 7pm Avorloble 01 UTTM Ourlers and Poromounr Theorre Oox Office For more 1nformonon coll 472-5411 
5TH ANNIVEf\SARY S E A S 0 N 
1 he \u,tin ( hronid~ I t-hruar~ 2<l, I98K 
LAFF STOI': rdt :n-211· Vi< I ft·nl•'Y lufin ,\l,Hi..' C Im' Roonu 1, ( hr1.. 8onnQ uur t.1..h·"I rii-l!'lH h~.11 t nm1<' <ovlcl h•• \~.)r<-h I h j.1l K.m1" Rol'I Bro\\n D.11c­l111h.•; \tm. ~ c). J.1 lot'" f.:p..1ho CJMrh•.. trWt1 n ,md ,\,',in 
Donn"' \~<'" ()rl.•.1n,1 
RP~111nmg \1n11 M.uc h .,~ ht n•i.:.ht 01 Funn1t•,1 Pr·t...on 10 .\u..trn l<1ntP..1. "h1fh lor thP tmw ht•.ng \\Ill rt'j1l.n , .. oJlPn m1kt• n1~h1 .. nn "-'1oml.,\.'... f•U th•· 1•,nl~ fOlHl<f"i ,1dm1,,l()rl i-, fff'('k­
[h1• l,1u \hUf 1u•rl0Jftl!t 1f'Ylflr•t\t"-1t1on t onit·1 I~ on I I h ~'-1111 .11 ;· H .,, ,,,., I •>Ung.• OJ lhl' t.111 ''"P· Sho.,.time-; T Th~ !>on •1p111, ');,;q f '8 ~ JO l!lp•n S.. :lP 8120 Rtt1ttf· W h ( \ndtfrtipnn '" J: 1rn rt"\'f\',1lu~n". 
c.111 4h• ll 13 
WYLIE~COMEDY NICHT " ,.,.,.,\ \\t'<fnt"d3~ mJlhl .11 
'I 1u .a.t hth ~ Tnnih f •11 ·.1n... 01 'urrwc.lv \\ ht)rl I.kt-' -.n111;-1h1n~ .1 10111 1 c ln,t·r It> tt'll' • •1 nlt1 r 1>1 cown 1h,, 1n1~ht ht• JU'I rh,. thtn~. ( nmt'ti1,m., mu..t ...,~o up tw•foreh,tnfl ...u 1.,,lll 47.!-3712 fur mofl' tnlel ( u011nM, !tonn i.. th•• mH" h b.1llvhnot'd h\· 1lw1t puhln. 1.. 1 ( l)rtH•dv'r11u1 \\i• ll tm.-1 out uu ow-...•·I' t'•.tw '" 1h11 OH<.htl1 1 n1 M.1 10th 
,\I.It< h '"cl l>U'+'\ month''" t11t.,lf ti,lm t' r omf)Jflw.. Ii" 
r/11• rnomh 01 :\f,lf< J1 01~·11• Jfl' nti Jt'\H·t rh.m 111 t•\t'""' 
th.it '\u-.t11 r/.uu 1 uJc/"lllf , .. c.vi t '100..., ltc>m 

RECOMMENDED: ******* 
YOSJ 111<0 < 111 ,_,, \ ,, rm )C/ll>uL <>F 11.·IRD i.;Nc x ,,~ 
v.·111 pt•rlorrn Tht Bl)':, />u tutt• ,,t tlw P~r..tmount lht><l1<-•t, 
8pm l'r1 -S.1t, fl'b lo·2.7 Tick(•!' .m· S15, $1 ~ ~ S9 w1ch 
di-.c.ount' lot "E'Oil>r-. .1nd ...1udpnt-, 
Chuma \\HI ,11..o bt• cunductrng.:i \\Or~'t"'r>"hit h '"II 
~nru, un r(;'lax~1hon .1hgnmt1 n1 voc,.1l ... k11f, ootnd ••,11o.(l ot 
mowml'nl. Tht'l\·orl.sh"P"~.\t. ~~11 271rom I0.1m-m>11n 
,11 1lw D<.>uRhl!rt~ Art-CPnl\'r. 1110 B.rrcon Sprll'I!-• Rd 
C.1ll 1lw 0.1m " UmbrPllJ 32:!{1117. 101 mnn 1n1u 
DANCE REPERTO/lY THEATEil •nd THf UTJAZZ ENSEMBlE , omh111e tor .t "ngle prrform.incp o" I 11 M.11< h 4 in th•• ·\n' Com pl"' Cun<<'rl I l.11, lti. ,how //ol ).lll ( ,~,/ /J,1m 1• "ill e;"l"1u.tCP th•· >Octi ·\nn""'" "'"''or rh.. Coll••ll" nf f 1n1• Arb .11 !hr l nilt'NtV fr,;1urt'<I \\Ill I,<! thl' m1N< of the J.tn O rdw,1r,1 .ind d.inu•', hort>1)1':1aphed l>1• So'1drJ lom.-. and W00th \k{;rtll lom,I\, l\holf•,1cht>'>rfdnl'l'dl UI, "'II pr<-.<'nl r/1,1<1 ,, """ work w1 to tht• mu~•· or rh.. lat<' Th.11l Jone.., Mt Gnfr h.1> Lho11·ogr.ipht•d \l1nm' four F<t·t1P(ltrm.. m 1.1~u J11r/ /J.H1, ,, a '"or~ ~t to J "'''' "cur1• hv Au,11n comre"''' Rick La" n \\ho" .,1,., tlw h•"•d or th<-J,17.1 [ n ..Pmhlf' L..w.'1 s itlur rn<ht~m1·n1 work clr.1w' 
SHARIR DANCE COMPANl'w1ll sh.ir" th<' ,f,1gL• "11h D lfiJ Pnoe:ht(.lr m t.1 'hO\\. .1t rht.• P.11.11nount 1 h1-'atrt· nn In ~nc l\,\,rrdi 11 12 .11 8pm . The ,flrm "1ll 1 ... 1tun• ·' n""' work 111 che ~O< "'l><'rlOIV, lnl"" .! chor<'olo(r.11,lwd hv Mc•rce C unmngli.1111 w11h mu"l hv lohn <...•Jo:<'. ,\I,., on rlw pro1o:r.1m ".1 nt'\\ \\Olk hv Sh.1111 c.tllPd r1•(( "''tOn (()Ill t'lfO \.'o { ...<..110 mu'.c-h\ Pt11il \.a(zr<io . (ht' \\·Ork 1 .. lh<• lhtrd Ul 11 tr1ln'I(~ Of fWtlU'''°" \\'l)tli\.. th•.H Sh•.tr1r k.h thnr•..o~rdphr.cl The 1ir...1 rn lh•• 
1h1•·" ""' "'' 1>11tn,..t1.u11ord llo1ll~1 10 1<F<1 .incl "" : w.1~ wl 011 8.111('1 Au,ltn 1n 1<J6 I 
\l,o on rlw prf>llr.tm ''a pn;·m11'rt' wor~ hv Ri(.lrdo G.rr< ~· ..n11cl..d ~""'"" ,\\\Or~ b,N•1l on 1lw lilt> 111 ll'\o\) 't'Ulptor El1>dhl'I "'''I wuh P•dMJ Pll'< h1t•1 portr.1vmg lhf' .drtbt Tht' work,.,,,., ht lllU'-IC h, b_,.,, 
\\,1gnttt Mld i\;\ilt (lrfJ 

The Sharir Dance Company 

Five Years After: 
Glancing Back, Gazing Forward 

by Sarah Wimer 
Never the flushest of art forms, dance on a national level has definitely hit hard times. Between AIDS, the economic downturn that causes many to decide that entertainment and art are luxuries-not necessities-and the widespread cutback in federal and state funding, dance "spon­sors (everywhere] are devastated," as Yacov Sharir puts it For a dance com­pany to survive five years, as his Sharir Dance Company has here in Austin, is a remarkable achievement; forone to flour­ish, as SDC gives every indication of continuing to do, is simply phenomenal. 
How does Yacov do it? It's admittedly challenging, but Yacov Sharir has devel­oped the smartest strategies for giving his already excellent and still improving dancers opportunities as good as those of any company anywhere, short of a hand­ful of internationally acclaimed troupes. Rather than just presenting his own chore­ography and that ofpromising co-resident choreographer Jose Luis Bustamante, Yacov seeks out work by the best chore­ographers around the country for his company to perform. Already SDC has performed works by David Gordon and Bill T. Jones/Amie Zane of NYC and Margaret Jenkins of San Francisco. In addition to ex posing his dancers to other's works through doing them, the Sharir Dance Company regularly presents other companies (both local and national) on its bills, a boon for both S DC and Austin dance fans, who have thus had the pleas­ure of viewing such luminaries as the Hartford Ballet. the Trisha Brown Dance Company, the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company, Nina Wiener and Dancers, and most recently Senta Driver's HARRY: Dance and Other Works. Yacov's is the only company he knows of committed to this strategy of co-presenting. 
Locals will have the chance to view Yacov' s latest artistic coup this month, on Friday and Saturday, March 11-12 at the Paramount, when the Sharir Dance Com­pany performs a revival of Merce Cunningham's Inlets 2, at the same time that Cunningham's company performs the work in their New York City season. Among the elite few companies with Cunningham choreography in their reper­toire are the Paris Opera Ballet, American Ballet Theatre and the Pennsylvania Bal­let. Also offered on SDC's fifth anniver­sary program will be a new ballet by tal­ented Austinite Ricardo Garcia about the life of woman-ahead-of-her-times, Ger­man-Texan sculptress Elisabet Ney, with the lead performed by guest Teuton Diana Prechter. A thoroughly researched por­trayal of the fascinating and prolific Ney, this piece will be unusual because it calls for a modem dance company to perform 

ballet, an out-of-the-ordinary occurrence, but one which will surely further stretch Yacov's dozen able dancers. 
More exciting opportunities lie ahead for the Sharir Dance Company (who are performing in Monterrey, Mexico as this is written). Next year, Merce Cunni,ng­ham himself will create a new piece for SDC to be performed at the Arts Complex in January. The following year, Senta Driver and Yacov will choreograph a large work on both companies to be pre­miered here; then SDC will journey to New York to join HARRY in performing the new piece in its season there, in SDC's first appearance in the dance capitol ofthe world, but they have already been regu­larly trekking around the state under the auspices of the Texas Commission on the Arts towing program). 
Successfully managing any dance company requires artistic discrimination, lots ofsavvy and way-ahead planning, all qualities Yacov fully possesses. He com­pares the process of snagging commit­ments from leading lights of the choreo­graphic sphere to that of negotiating with a lover. He is committed to the Austin dance scene, one he calls a "little Manhat­tan." Wisely, he avoids boring audiences in his local base with too much of his choreography. preferring rather to con­centrate on creating a couple of quality works a year, letting "one work trigger the next." After a successfuJ international performing career with Israel's Batsheva Dance Company, he's glad he chose Austin as his artistic base. He sees Austin as an exceptional place to "concentrate on developing" in an environment that offers stimulation and "interaction with col­leagues of first class quality on a national level." He looks lo the future, and keeps dancing. 
U • MARCii 198& 

The Sharir Dance Company 

Five Years After: 
Glancing Back, Gazing Forward 

by Sarah Wimer 
Never lhe flushest of an forms, dance on a national level has definitely hll bard times. Between AIDS, the economic downtwn that causes many lO decide that entenainmem and an are luxuries-not necessities-and the widespread cutback in federal and state funding, dance "spon­sors [everywhere] are devastated," as Yacov Sharir pulS iL For a dance com­pany to survive five years, as his Sharir Dance Company has here in Austin, is a remarkable achievement; for one toflour­ish, as SOC gives every indication of continuing to do. is simply phenomenal 
How does Yacov do it? It's admittedly challenging, but Yacov Sharir has devel­oped the smartest strategies for giving his already excellent and still improving dancers opportunities as good as thoseof any company anywhere, shon ofa hand­ful of internationally acclaimed troupes. Ralherthanjustprcsentinghisownchore­ographyand that ofpromising co-resident choreographer Jose Luis Bustamante, Y acov seeks out work by the best chore­ographers around the country for his company to perform. Already SOC has performed works by David Gordon and Bill T. Jones/Amie Zane of NYC and Margaret Jenkins of San Francisco. In addition toexposing his dancers toolher's works through doing them, the Sharir Dance Company regularly presents olher companies (both local and national) on its bills, a boon for both SDC and Austin dance fans, who have thus had the pleas­ure of viewing such luminaries as the Hanford Ballet, the Trisha Brown Dance Company, the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company. Nina Wiener and Dancers, and most recently Senta Driver's HARRY: Dance and Other Works. Yacov's is the only company he knows ofcommitted to this strategy of co-presenting. 
Locals will have the chance to view Yacov's latest artistic coup this month.on Friday and Saturday, March l l-12 at the Paramount, when the Sbarir Dance Com­pany performs a revival of Mcree Cunningham's/nle1s 2, at I.he same time I.hat Cunningham's company performs the work in their New York City season. Among the elite few companies with Cunningham choreography in their reper­toire are the Paris Opera Ballet, American Ballet Theatre and lite Pennsylvania Bal­let Also offered on soc·s fifth anniver­sary program will be a new ballet by tal­ented Austinite Ricardo Garcia about the life of woman-ahead-of-her-times, Ger­man-Texan sculptress Elisabet Ney, with lite lead performed by guest Teuton Diana Prechter. A thoroughly researched por­trayal of the fascinating and prolific Ney, this piece will be unusual because it calls for a modem dance company lO perform ballet, an ou1-of-lbe-0rdinary occurrence, but one which will surely funher stretch Yacov's dozen able dancers. 

More exciting opportunities lie ahead for the Sharir Dance Company (who are performing in Monterrey, Mexico as this is written). Next year, Meece Cunning­ham himself will create a new piece for SDC to be performed at the AnsComplex in January. The following year, Senta Driver and Yacov will choreograph a large work on both com panics to be pre-­miered here; then SOC will journey lO New YorJc 10 join HARRY in performing the new piece in its season there,inSOC's first appearance in thedance capitol ofthe world, but they have already been regu­larly trekking around the state under the auspices ofthe Texas Commission on the Ans touring program). 
Successfully managing any dance company requires artistic discrimination, lots ofsavvyand way-ahead planning, all qualities Yacov fully possesses. He com­pares the process of snagging commit­ments from leading lights of I.he choreo­graphic sphere to that ofnegotiating wilh a lover. He is committed to the Austin dance scene, one becallsa "little Manhat­tan." Wisely, be avoids boring audiences in his local base with too much of his choreography, preferring rather to con­centrate on creating a couple of quality works a year, letting "one work trigger the next" After a successful international performing career with Israel's Batsheva Dance Company, he's glad he chose Austin as his artistic base. He sees Austin as an exceptional place to "concentrateon developing" in an environment thatoffeis stimulation and "interaction with col­leagues offirstclass quality on a national level." He looks 10 lhe future, and keeps dancing. 


Sharir to receive endowment 

The Sharir Dance Company has been selected by the Nation­al Endowment for the Arts to participate in its Advancement Program, a program designed to help emerging arts organiza­tions of the highest artistic ex­cellence with the development. of multi-year plans tailored to their needs. 
Among the areas of technical assistance provided by the En­dowment are board develop­ment, financial systems. public relations, marketing, personnel management, fund raising and program development. 
The Advancement Program consists of two phases. The first is a 15-month period, during which the Endowment provides each participant with a consul­tant to deliver technical assistance. 
Following the completion of the planning/technical assis­tance phase, participants are el­igible to apply for an Advance­ment grant of up to $75,000, to be matched 3-to-1 by the recipi­ents over a 30-month grant period. 
Sharir Dance Company was one of 37 organizations chosen from 110 applicants in seven ar­tistic disciplines. 
Yacov Sharir, founder and ar­tistic director of the Sharir Dance Company, said thi.S was the assistance the company needed for major organizational growth and development. 
Section F 

Sharir to receive endowment 

The Sharir Dance Company has been selected by the Nation­al Endowment for the Arts to participate in its Advancement Program, a program designed to help emerging arts organiza­tions of the highest artistic ex­cellence with the development of multi-year plans tailored to their needs. 
Among the areas of technical assistance provided by the En­dowment are board develop­ment, financial systems, public relations, marketing, personnel management, fund raising and program development. 
The Advancement Program consists of two phases. The first is a 15-month period. duriniz which 1he Endowment nrovidei: each participant with a consul­tant to deliver technical assistance. 
Following the completion of the planning/technical assis­tance phase, participants are el­igible to apply for an Advance­ment grant of up to $75,000, to be matched 3-to-1 by the recipi­ents over a 30-month grant period. 
Sharir Dance Company was one of 37 organizations chosen from 110 applicants in seven ar­tistic disciplines. 
Yacov Sharir, founder and ar­tistic director of the Sharir Dance Company, said this was the assistance the company needed for major organizational !!l'Owth and development. 





SHARIR 
Dance Company 
By Robert Bryce 
Performances and lots of them are an essen­1 ial ingrcdicni in Yacov Sham', lormula 1-.1r hi~ dance cnnmpan~. "The way y11u gel llcl· 1cr i' by pcrformin!,!., he <;aid...Y11u pcrh•rm your \\Mk, y1111 bcc1lmc heller." 
flm a11i1udc ha' led lhe Sharir Dani:c C11111pany (SOC) to incrca\c ii\ pcrl"irm;incc \Chcdulc C\(~ry year. Nim in ii'> li11h 'ca,1in, 1hc comp;iny ha~ murc 1han 30 pcrlorm;mcc\ ,1a1ed. And 1>n Mard1 11·12, S()(. \1ill pr~·­micrc a nc,1, \cry impor1an1, addi1i1111 111 jr, rcpcrhir} -a "''rk b) Mcr\.'c Cunningham. l.'ven more impor1an1i'1hc rcccni a11111•11nl·c· 111en1 tha1 rhc Mcree Cunningham Dance Cnmpany "ill be in Au\I in t11r a threl' IH'd. u.•,idcnc)' nc\I Janu:1r~, during '' hich Cun­ningham 1\ill crca1c a 111~" \\11rk, 11111\.'11 "ill then be r>rcmicred here at 1hc Ari' Complc\. 
The signilicancc 11f Ihc'c dcvclupmc11" can not be rakcn lighrly. Mcree Cunningham i<. cun<.idcrcd the rarher 111 rhc ..poJ.t 11111dl'rn'' nwvcmcm in dance and i\ wi1lwu1 a dn11b1 lhl' n111,1 \ignificanr ch11rc11grapher in Aml'rican modern dance ~I ill working t1lda~. Hi' col­lub11ra1i11ns "ilh mu<,ician J11hn (. ugc and arr­hrs like Jasper fohn' and R11bcr1 Rau"hen­bcrg have changed I he lnok 111 1111idcrn dam:c in Amerii:a and the 11orld. The "'e 111 ulea· 1mic mu~ic (1\hich j, arrived al b~ U\ing dtanw, like 1hn1"inJ! dicl') :md alcarMic dance '>rep,, 1hre1\ a 1Hench in 1hc 1radi1innal not i1\fl'-111 what dance could \lr i.lwuld be. 
The addition t>I a Cunningham "nrk 111 thc rcpcr111ry 111 SDC i' quire an acc11mpli,h111en1 ft!r Sharir: pan icularly "hen ym1 C•lll\ider that 1rnly three 111her companic' in rhc U.S. ha\C a Cunningham \\llrk in their repcr111ric' -American Ballet Thcarer, Cnni:crr Dance C.'i•mpan~ in 811~11111 and rhc Nc1\ Dance En,cmhlc in Minncapt11i" -all ol "hich hav..­hcen in e,i,ll:m:c fm a ""m'idcrnhly l11n!!er time than SDC. 
S<> h11" did all rhi' c11mc ahm11? hidcntl) the prindpal laclLH ha' been rhe pcr'i'rcnce or Yal.'O\' Sharir. Ari Bccof>ky, l"\CClllhc DircctM 111 the Cunningham Dance h1unda­1i.111 , '"Y~ <>I Sharir, "I admire Yac111 •, tenacity in all 111 thi' bccau<.c it i' n111 ca\) 111 manage a \truggling cnmpany and l.ccp I 11111.l ­rni\ing going and Iced y1111r rcpcrror) "11 h nc11 w11rks. Fmdin~ the m1111cv and the energy l•l th1 ii " e\hau,ring and I 1hml. he ha' d\lne a ".mdcrt ul j\lb at ir .'' 
Bcc11f\ky \1cn1 1111 l•> e~r>lain h111\ 1hc deci­si1m wai. made 111 sci a Cunningham \\11r!.. nn SD( anti rite s11b,cq11cn1 dcci>ion 111 '.:hcdulc a rc\idency 11i1h 1he cmire c\lmpan~ ar UT. "The 1ni1ial in1crc\1 came fnim Yac1w a~l.ing ab11111 ha11ing 1mc 111 Mcree\ \\nrl.' in rhcir repcrrnr)o. What \1a\ ir11crc\1ing in dealing" irh Yac11\ i' 1lrn1 \\C were l1111king l\1r a"'" l11r <1 lar!!cr Cunningham involvcmcnr in A11\l ll1. The idea' 1ha1 we came up \\ith included the giving 11r a piece 11f dwrcography "' well ll' \111rl.. i11g t11ge1 her Im 1 he Cunningham C11111­ran} '"come 111Austin1\ilh grcarer rcgul;iril~. 
The Austin Chronicle March 11. 1988 

We "niched a vide111arc or 1 he c11111rany and rhrough the vidc111af)c we were ahle '''decide 1ha1 ye' indeed the c1>mpany was ready. l·mm discu~'i1m\ with Yaco' and Mcree, 11c \\Cre able 111 pick a worl. thar Wllllld be rig.hr lor rhe cnmf)art) rhat \\111ild be currcm and rcprC'oenl • arive ol Mcree'' 11urlc 11 als11 had 10 he ~1 ptl'Cc 1 hat wa' challengin~ but ah11c1111ld he 11\si111i­la1cd properly in rhc period nl time 1ha1 11c had. lnll'tS l ""~ choi.cn, and Imm cvcry11nl·', rCf)tlrt , 1 he dancers fl)SC 111 1 he ,iccasi1 in." 
"We arc really C\circd ab11111 all ol 1hb anti wc arc h11ping 1ha1 \IC arc pa\I the planning \tagc~." ~aid Bccof~k\. He cnn1in11ed, "The Cunningham Fnundat i1m i<. c11-\1wn,1mng the Austin re~idcncy (wir h a granr fr11111 the NEA and help fr11m rhc College nf Fine Arts and 1hc Art<. Complc\) and rhc plan im:ludc' a return ,j~ir Cl'Cr) 111her )ear f'L1r 1hc llC\t le" vears and 1har a Texas Trilogy 111 1hrcc "'""' IH>uld be created. This "ay all rfllC' 111' 1hings could happen crearivcly fllr Mcree and af\11 lnr Yac11v'l> dani:crs. Al\t1, rhcre \\1niltl he" irn1,ing aflinit) f11r his dam:cr~ rcgard111g rhc Cunmngham technique -"hkh rc4uirC' a much different u'c 111 rhc b11d~ rhan hallet 11r 11lhcr modern dance lCclllliquC\ -and l,1r rhc Cunningham acsthcric." 
Prescn1 ing and 'haring program' 11 i1 h 01 her chorc11g.raphcr' aml dance c11111panic' Ii;" been a g11al of Shar1r's ln11n the 1llll\l'L. In January, he rirc,entcd Cicnta Dri1cr anu hc-r c11mpany, Harry. l.;N year ir \\tl\ Nma Wienl·r and belt1n: that \ fargarcr Jeni.in\ ilnd fri\l1<1 Bm\\n. This prac11cc 11<1\ all1111cd the Slwrir dant·cr\ 10 interact 11i1h \11111c nl Ilic 111•"' 1alc111cd pc11ple in th~ir ricltl. But Sharir'' 

The Rustin Chronicle March 1t 1989 
activity a' a pr.mh1ter 11f d:rnce in /\lhllll j, :1 benefit 111 Au\tin ;ind U f -"hkh ha' hccn Sharir'\ ba!<>e for 1hc 10 ycilr\ 'inec he cmnc J.> 1hi' t:ountry lrnm 111' nall\'C hracl. 
Au,lin benefi" fmm 'ccing dance In>m Ne\\ York 1ha1 111 her1li\C "111ild pr.1hahl~· 11111 he 'K.'Cn here. The Univer\it~· benclih ht.'\:au'c the~ don't have 11) :.1chcrti\e 11r pr,1d111.·c the \IH'" al the PAC -11hkh h:h hccn J,1,111g money ''" 11111~1 111 it<. dance c1·ct11' 1,1r tht.· p<hl \Cveral year\. F11r ~harir, the rca,11ning. behind hi~ ac1ivit) "' a pfllm••tcr ;~ '11npk. "The be~I place in 1he1111rld 111 \Cl' dann• i' 111 Nc" Y11rk, b111 ii rlw he,1 danl'Cr' lr.•111 Ne" Y11rk come here. 1 hen A11'1 in hcc111nc' 1he bc\I place 111 \CC dance. Phi', \IC hrnd11 a' a c11111p:111). If you 11an1 11) hr hc11cr. ~,>11 "''ri.. with Ifie be~t pc11plc in your licld." 
Robert Will' i\ the Dc:m 1>1 1hc ( ,1lkgc >I Fine Arh al UT. I le 'aid 111 Sharir', pr,m1"­t1on, "Thal i\ 11nc 111 the thinp 1ha11111ng11cd U\ fr11m 1hc ~lar1 -the llo\\ 111arti'"1hr.111g.h the c111111111111i1y. Sharir \\anted "' pr,>dm:c other arti\I' here 111 Aw.1111 -11hik the~ arc here they 11 ill g.ile 11m,1c1 da,,e, and 1ha1 "a benefit 10 ,>ur \ludcnt\. fhe n1hcr atharuag.c \\I having a c11mpan1 in re,idenct.• 1' 1ha1 ·'IH \tudenr\ ge1 h> 11ork d1>,cly \\ith them. Sharir dance'> c1 cry yenr "11 h 1•11r '111tk111 c11mp;1ny, Dance Repertnn Theater -\\hn.:h b l;!lhld h1r ••lir \t11dcn1,." 
Sharir i' quick to ackn.mlcclg.c 1hc r,•lc "t thr Uni\er~ity in 1he \Ul.'ce" 1h;11 hi-. l.'111nr•1111 has had. UT pnw1clcs SD( 11 ii h rcl11.~aN1' ~pace :md \hares in the pr,11il\ \\hene,cr Shanr rerl11nns <111 campus. Slwrir ,;11<.I. "I cl•, fot:e it. I \1<1tildn' 1be 11' ahe;1d a' I mu "i1h.1111 the !!ener11\11~ 1•1 the Uni\\:rs11y. 11 "'>uld be h~p;u:ritic;il h> ':tY it" 1111111111lh. II j, very much." 
rcrhar' 1th1rt' crucial in 1 he 'llCl"l'\\ , d Sharir'' c111npan~· IHI\ hl'l'll ht\ ;ihih11 •·• rc­1<1in dancer,. The key i11 any clam:c c.11npa111 i~ .:1mtinui1y. Wi1l11rn1 c•1n1inui1~, ,1 ""rk in repertory can changi.: dr;i-11t:ally lr.1111 ycm ,,, 
year and 1hc hwk 1lf thcc11111ra11y i' 111~\'ll'>I'· 1c111 a'> the d:inccrs h:t1l' h• i;c1 11\cd I<' nc1' laces, "'ylc:., and repcrt \irtC\. 
In the five year' ,jni.:e Sharir l1•11ndcd SDC, he has losl ~i' dam.:cr:--1,111r ,11' 1hc111 left du,• h> rregnancy. C11111para1ht.•h, Balkt Austin 11 Inch llil\ the \it1nc n11111hcr ,11 dancer,, 1,,,, hall ,11 it\ dani.:ers la~1 year. Ciran1c<.1, the h<1lk1 \\1•rlti 1s a bit m1•re 1rans1e111, hul 11 ,, ;111 i11d1c:.l1M 111 1hc 'uc:ce'.'<\ <>harir ha' hall in keeping his d;mcers 1111Hiva1cd and ha11p~. 1 k ,;ud. "I \\1\11ld be crushed ii 111~ da111.:c" kit ever1 1ear. Then I 1\\>11kl h:11·c 111 1cad1 them a llC\\ rcperi.>ry c1ery yc:u. 11 is 11111d1 l':lsll't h) kccr 1he .,;1111c pe.1ple. A l11t 1•1 111~ c11t.·rg~ I\ <.pc111 l'•lllC:Cntraltng 1111 \\hat 1h1"C :lrll\I\ 11cc.d ''' make it hcrl'. Thl· 1\Jll~ rc:b.•rt 111y dancer' \la~· \\ilh me i' helauw the~ pcrf,•r111 and the~ \\1•r". The tt1<>rt.· lhl·~ rcrl1•rr11. 1hc 11111re Ihey get paid. (The '\DC u<llll't.'r' :irt.• paid 1•11 ~1 per pcrf.1rmancc h<t'i,.) 111t111!, 1ha1 i' "ha1 ar1i''' want -they \\;1111 "' prcw111 
1hcir \\11rk." 
F11r J1•\l' B11,1;1111an1c, "h.' 11;1, Ix-en tl,t11l·i1tl:! and dmre»graph111g 111 SI)( 1. >r 1.1111 ~car,, 'fllY in~ 1111 h Sharir i' al\.' due 1,' 1 hl' \illlal i"11 in A11\lin. He 'aid, "fht: dancer' hH' hl·n· and they're h;ippy. 11 ha' ~1 h11 '" J, \\Ith the ~itua1111n in Au,1i11 -there arc 111>11ha1111;1111 1lpfl<>rtu1111ics t.1 dance hcrt.·. B111, the rn.11;1 reas11n " ii ~1•11 arc ;ir1i~11cally \ati,ricd. ~"" 't:n. II Y•'ll lcel like y1111 Hfl' !'l<'\\i11i;. ~·'II -.111~. I 1h1ni.. 1hh i\ true l1>r ,1ll 1y1x•, ,11 'i111a­ti1m\, 11<11 j11~1 danl·c c.1111pa11ics." 
B11\tama111e c11111i1111cd, "It d.'l''n'1 m;llll't 11 y1m arc 1lllh thl' he~r d;mcc l'•1111pa11~ 111 thl· "'>rid, ii Y<lll d1111'1feel1ha1 y1•11 a1c g.r,111111g. Y•ltl \\ill cvenrually q1111. A1',1. 11c arc c••mb-1­entl~ 111v,1lve<.I in ne11 pr111cc1\ and Yac1>1 1' intcrc\led in bring.inv, in ,11hcr dh•rc,>grapher,, \\hich make\ 11 1cry appealing t.1 a dancer." 
Nt'\I year i\ g<1ing. '·'he a11 i111p,>rtan1 »Ill' l<>r SI)(; 111•1 "nl~ hccatl\C .•I the ( 111111in!'­ha111 re,idenl'~, hut al,,' hcca11!>C the c.>111ri;111~ ha\ hecn 'clec1 ed hy 1he N;11i.111.1I l nd"'' 111c1u 
I..r 1 he An' as a c:111dida1c 111 1hl AJ, an..:l'· men1 rr.1gra111 1d11ch \\;!\ dc,ii;ncd ,,, hl·lp emerging. arh •>r!!m1i1a1i.''""iih 1he de\ cl.•r­ment ,11 multi-year pr11i:ram,, Tiu' pr.•gram 111af..:c, SD(' :1 c:indid;11c 1,1r 111,1rc c"mi,1e111 lunding, :11 .1 lughcr h:1cl, lr.•111 tile Nh\ 111 the l111ure. Mml ,If 1ha1 p1•tl·111ial l1111ch11i; "Ill require .;;De "' pr11\ idc 111a1d1111g l1111d.... 
\\hil:h \\ill TICCC\\italc 111,irc inlCll\l\C l.·~··11 lundrnising. 1r 1hi11g' 111rn ,1111 the""~ <;l1;111r h11pe,, 1 he hud!!el l,1r ';;I)( "ill g,> pa<.1 the currl'nl $160,000 '"ii pr,•kctl'd $250.000. 
Al lcr tltc Cunnini;ha111 c1•rnr:u1y lc.1\l''· <;I)( \\ill \hare a pcrl,1r111a11i:e \11th aqm Jitpane\c dancer' Fik•• illli.l 1\11111<1. Alter 1 hat, d11•rc,1g.raphcr Da\ 1d C"•nl,111 "111 set .1 1111rf..: ..:allcd "I'd~ r,,11..,.. 1>11 <;DC \\htd1 
''"~ m;idc P•"~iblt-h: a11,>il1cr f'.l A i.:1;1111. 
S11 f,1r the ne\I IR 11111111h,, Yitl•'' Slt.1nr '' g.•rng 111 he hu:-.y, apph ing all hi' c.111\lucrahk• p1n1crs »r .•rgani1a1nrn <111d rcrs11a,i.>11. lie \\tll be 11r11111g gram pr.ip.•,al' "' 1hl' NI !\. h,>\I Ill!! ••t her dancer,, rai,ing Ill. 'IH:~ oll •d running hi' 1•1111 c1 •mran). 11 1hinl:!'1.:.•11111111l' !!•'Ill!' \H'll lnr Sharir and 111' C••fllPilll). l"•'k f,•r them 1.1 im:rca'l' ~ct ag.lin 1hc 1111111h1:r ,>l pcrl.1rm;11Kcs the~ 'lltedulc. \\'h,• J..11.•1". rhe: 111a~ even ,,.Jrt t.>uring ,•11h1dc 1hl' ,1,11~·. 
Section D Austin American-Statesman Saturday, March 12, 1988 
Inlets 2 by the national mast.er of modern dance Merce Cunnin1ham, Sur1>um, a modern ballet by Ricardo Garcia based on the life of sculptor ElisRbet Ney, and "Percussion Com~er. to No. :r• by Yacov Sharir are on the program. Tickets are $8 and $10. 


First steps 
The ~re~ier~ of three choreogra­phies WJU h1ghhght the 5th Anniversa­ry Gala of the Sharir Dance Company. on s~ge at the Paramount Theatre at
8 tonight. 

.. 
Saturday, March 12. 1988 Austin American-Statesman 








STATE 

Sunday, March 13, 1988 Austin American-Statesman 
Review 


Density gives 
dance show 

•

excitement 

By Ann McCutchan 
Special to the Amerlcan-Statesman 
One of the most satisfying fea­tures of Yacov Sharir's choreogra­phy is its tight organization, a sizzling density that excites and propels. The first two movements of his Percussion Concerto #3 cer­tainly contain this formal energy, BB rendered by the Sharir Dance Company at the Paramount The­atre on Friday evening. 
Creating a fresh, new dance against a primarily rhythmic score 1s tricky. Consistent sound pat­terns can seduce the choreographer ~nto following the beat, mimicking ;physically what is heard. Strong irhythms can also inspire a more re­bellious muse to go against the grain so completely that the rela­tionship between music and move­ment becomes irrelevant or even silly. 
Balance is hard to get. Sharir achieves it, partly via blurred beams and overlapping gestures. Hie dancers may articulate a some­what rigid pattern overall, but fast­changing groupings and beautiful, arching body phrases soften the ~tructure. We are compelled to wat.ch because predictability and surprise are so well-matched. 
Merce Cunningham's lnkts 2 is danced to a composition by John Cage that might be titled "Chinese Water Torture." At first, the ran­dom sounds of water dripping into a jug provide a resonant, sensuous backdrop for the rectangular poses 
and stances ofalienation that mark 
Cunningham'a work. But about 
two-thirds of the way through, the 
drips seem to become crawly and 
initating, and a subtle shift occurs. 
The sensual element is transferred 
from ear to eye; the slide of a foot, 
the drape of an arm, the point of a 
toe become significant. The viewer 
finds relief in small, lovely motions, 
just BB be or she once craved the 
delicate water plops. 
Narrative ballet might be the 
moat difficult sort of dance to pull 
off, but Ricardo Garcia's Sursum, a 
somewhat melodramatic interpre­
tation ofthe lifeofsculptress Elisa­
bet Ney, succeeds in many 
respects. Much ofthe credit Friday 
was due to guest artist Diana 
Prechter, who portrayed Ney light­
ly and vividly, and to the excellent 
Sharir company, particularly Ste­
phen Marcello (Edmund, Ney's 
beat friend) and Kate Fisher (Cen­
ci, the faithful housekeeper). 
Fiftb Anniversary Finds Sharir Dance Company 
Taking Risks and Breaking New Ground 

review by Jerry Young 
The Sharir Dance Company celebrated its fifth anniversary with a pair of per­formances on March 12and 13. The three works-a dance by an internationally recognized artist. a piece by a guest cho­reographer with a guest soloist, and an example of Sharir's own work-gave a good representation ofwhat the company has been all about 
Jnlets2, which Mcree Cunningham has revived for his company, has changed since its premiere, both in that Cunning­ham has substituted a female dancer in his fonner place, and that Morris Graves' stage design, which included a large and slow-moving blue disc, is now absent The score by John Cage features the closely miked sound of water coursing through conch shells, and the constant bubbling and flowing has a certain unde­niable diuretic effect. An irony is that Cage's lasting influence, which has probably been more strongly felt the non­musical ans, has been in letting chance play a role in making art. He rails against periodicity, but there is a natural repeti­tiveness in this music that is beyond his control. or his lack ofit. 
U • APRIL1"8 
While we can still see Petipa or Balan­chine choreography, much modern dance is lost Now and then someone makes a project of reconstructing a Ted Shawn or a Ruth SL Denis work, but much modern choreography dies with its choreogra­pher, and this sort of enterprise may teU whether Cunningham's choreography will survive him by gaining a foothold in companies like Sharir's. 
The element of "interpretation" of choreography is not the same for modem dance as it is for music. For example, you can choose from as many as seven differ­ent recordings of Cage's SonaJas and Interludes. This was an exciting and rare opportunity to see how much of Cunningham's dance is Cunningham's dancers and training. 
Training is a big part. Sharir dancer Kate Fisher spent considerable time in New York learning Cunningham tech­nique, and Cunningham's rehearsal di­rector, Chris Komar, came here to help mount the work. The results paid off, and Sharir' s dancers met the work's demands with a precision and concentration that you don't always see in their perform­ances. There are a lot of very quick, straight-limbed, "there-and-back" ges­tures and little curtseys that were by and large impeccably timed, even without the benefit of eye-contact or the son of score that can be used for rhythmic reference-­especially since the dancers do not work with the music until the dress rehearsal. 
In many ways, Inlets 2 marks a coming of age for the company, and especially as the company acquires more works it will benosmallfeatherinmanycapstobeable to say that Austin has a company that can dance Cunningham, or Jones/Zane, or David Jones, and dance it well. 
One hopes too that the experience will bear fruit in other effons. There were places where that precision was noticea­bly needed in Sharir's Percussion Con­certo #3, which opened the program. Even though the rhythmically deliberate score gave plenty of cues, in the many ensemble sections the folks at the front almost always lagged behind, and there are quick and easy ways to fix that sort of problem. These are perhaps symptoms of under-rehearsal due to the other demands of the program and the company's other­wise busy schedule. 



It was refreshing though to see a work by Sharie where he was working. in a sense, without a net. As much as we can admire and respect Sharir for working with deaf dancers, or choreographing a work in homage to Amie 7.ane who is dying of AIDS, such effons somehow insulate Sharir from whatever criticism, good or bad, that may come his way. This piece worked. The percussion score, which had a sixties, pre-minimalist mod­em flair to it, made it open for a mixture of faces-front, folk-style ensemble dancing mixed with some nice dialog and angular imitative counterpoint. Motives were nicely developed. especially a little leap and catch that would signal starts of phrases.Toward the end, phrases became shorn back until they became sudden little gestures. I liked watching it. 
If Sharir was working without a net, Ricardo Garcia was not His hyper­emotional Sursum is based on the life of Elisabet Ney-a topic close to the hearts of many Austinites-and there was much excitementin the dance community when word started circulating that Diana Prech­ter was going to play the role of Ney. Sursum strained hard to move the audi­ence, and perhaps much ofit was moved, but the strain was too apparent and the results were more affected than affecting. 
The curtain opens and we find Prechter as Ney with a rocking chair on an other­wise bare stage. Dancers portraying the heroes she sculpted enter the stage and dance a dance that, cry as she might, Ney could not join. There is great sadness and this unrelieved world-weariness never let up as we see Ney's family and friends recollected in a series of moments-be-­fore-death flashbacks until Ney met. as was described in the notes, "her ultimate destiny." 
The premise seemed flawed, but there 
were some nice touches. 
Ahhough barefoot ballet is notan idiom in which you expect to find these dancers, Garcia tailored the work nicely for their sttengths and personalities. Prechter was touching in her role. Her intense facial and physical expressiveness made her the perfect choice for the part, but even though she worked well with the Sharie dancers, she just did not quite fit 
.. .\ 
. · Sharir Dance Company presents: · , . ''Texas..New Dance Festival" _ :. 
;--: .. .· ~ •, ,, .. ~ 
.., \ .. -• • &. • .. "'"' ' 
~""'f. · , "' , . . . 1eatunng ·.: t~: 
. ; ·.:.. '";. ,_ .• .... .;. .....
. ,.. , 
Farrell Dyde Dance Thdltre ofHouston • Dancers l.lnlimited Repertory Company of Dallas .. · ~ ~·· Sharir Dance Company ofAustin ·. 
~' .. ., . . . 

1 :niursday-Saturday, April 14-16,·1988 Capitol City Playhouse 214 West 4th Street ,. 8:00pm
. . 
..,, $8 publJc/$6 students with I.D. and senior citizens .:.•-:'-$4 srudent rush one hour' before performance \;;r; .;.~...,. · For reservationc; and information, 
··~ · call CCP box office at 472-2966. 
t •' I 




The Rustin Chronicle 
April 8, 1988 




Southwestern . . 

u1U~y~~~ity1a1 

The Bulletin of 
Southwestern University 

August 1988 Volume XIV, No. 1 


Dance Company Comes to Campus 
Internationallv known dancer Yacov Sharir, found~r and artistic director of the Sharir Dance Company of Austin, will reach a master class on campus Sept. 9. 
The Sharir Dance Om1pany will ap­pear on campus as part of the Guest Artist Series on Saturday, Sept. 10, at 8 p.m. For ticket information call 
(512) 863-1378 or (512) 863-1380. 
A narive Israeli, Sharir graduated from the Bezak! Academy of Art in Jerusalem with a degree in ceramic:. and sculpture. He then joined "10+ , " an avant garde group of visual artists in Tel Aviv, and began studying at the Ruhin Academy of Dance in Jerusalem. For 12 years, Sharir danced with the Batsheva Dance Company of Israel and subse(1ucntly studied under the dircc:tion of Manha Graham, Jose Limon, Jerome .Rob­bins, John Cranko, Glenn Tetley, John Butler, Pearl Lang, Anna Sokolov and others. He left lsr.tcl for the U.S. in 1977 to form the American Deaf Dance Company and served five years as its director. The Sbarir Dance Company is now in its sixth season in residence at the U11jvcrs1ry ofTexas College of Fine Arts. 

Impish spirit, dedicated 
dance found at Carver 

By ED CONROY 
Speool to the Exp<llll·~ 
There ls an imptsh spirit at work in the Sharir Dan~Company, with a quirky, quixotic feeling. 
1t c2.>ne tumbling across the stage from the very ttisl moment of this Austin-based group's Saturday nightperformance at the Carver Com­munity Cultural Center. 
With tile world premiere or "The Blah-Blah-Blah B1tllet," (a loose ren­dering or the unru11nounceable title, all done in symbols), the Sharir Dance Company " gave the Carver center its very first dedicated dance. 
Aside from the fact that no doubt most people in the respectably-sized audience thought Carver executive director Jo Long and staff deserve the honor, this spnghtly, even humor­ous work was very warmly received. 
And with good reason. The ballet is imaginatively conceived to display an exaggerated mOdem sensibility at lhe limits where good aesthetics and absurdity frolic riskily with one an· other. 
Choreographers Yacov Sharir (company direct~r) and colleague ,Jose Luis Bustamante can pat one another on the ba~ 
Sharir states that he is interested 
in "cartooning" movement in this 
work. which takes the gestural vo­cabulary of modern ballet as it start­ing point and explodes it into a series 

Review 

of apparent "sto1>frame" cells. 
lt is also. despite discl!Umcrs to the contrary, something of a carica· ture of traditional ballet. as was evt· dent in the adagio movement to Jo­hann Nepomuk Hummell's trumpet volunlarv score. 
Marta Matthews was lifted over and below a group of four mal<' dan­cers in an almost Pilobiluslike se1ies of hilarious counter-balancmgs. 
Their play with righting for a be· rel that constantly changed heads was nothmg less than a touch of the New Vaudeville, too, something one might see in a Flying Karamazov Brothers act. 
Costumes, being a play on black· and-while, added a whimsical touch here, too. with checkered pants and sailor caps on some dancers con· trasting well with the more austere simplicil'.' on others. 
The group revealed an easy-going but ob\iOusly highly d.isc1ptined S('nse of ensemble in this piece, too. which to my mmd expressed something of the on-agaw. off-again nature of try. mg to prornotP. dance in a puhlic place. At limes plodding, at others soaring, "The Blah-Blah-Blah Ballet" is an apt tribute to the Carver. 
" Wise Heart." created by Busta­mante, struek a very different, ele­
giac chord in mid-program "ith a se­ries of tughly structured segments St!l to a haunting vocal score by Paul Dresher. 
With the entire company attired in azure shirts and tights, this work played with a series or upper-body movements that, at times. appeared to approach sign language for the deaf -seemlngly communicating m some unknown syntax. 
My comparison arises in partfrom having once seen the company when deaf performers were fea­tured, but this element nevertheless seemed to have an ob1ect1ve pres­ence. 
A more mirunmalist piece with so· los of wild abandon contrasting with the company in a series of choral poses and small ensemble ~upings, "Wise Heart" was entrancmg for its dramatie side-lighting and rapid pac­ing. The silences wluch punctuated the score. in which movement contin­ued to strongly develop, were effec­tively placed. 
"PercUSSlon Concerto No. 3;· the short cont•luding work, was techni­cally fascinating but emotionallynull. rauJ Salwdo's score ts power­ful, and the compan) rendered a competent pt•rcussive <'Oncomillant to I he music, but left me wanting more drama. 
Hopefully, we won't have to wait too long to see more, once more at 
the Carver. 
San Artonio Ugtt .A.ugust1988 
Sharlr dancers toast the Carver 

By JOSIE NEAL Dance critic 
Tile Sharir Dance Company came to the Carver Community Cultural Center Saturday night bearing a gift with a funny 
I REVIEW name: "The!@%%* Ballet," a tribute to the Carver for its support of modern dance. 
The ballet was an appropriate girt for a center that has presented some of the best in non-mainstream -·and sometimes off­the-watl -dance. because this work, a collaboration between Artistic Director Ya<:ov Sharir and Resident Cttoreographer Jose Luis Bustamante, tits snugly into tile non-mainstream (If that's not a contradiction in terms) -and it is definitely, deligbtfuJly off-the-wall. 
The ballet's title invites explanation -or perhaps speculation is the appropriate word. since the choreographers have enlgmatically left its meaning up to the beholder. For me, it is a sendup of some or the conceits or cl~ical ballet -and of tile maddening challenge ballet presents to modern dancers whose bodles are trained to move quite differently. (This company takes regular ballet classes as a part of its discipline.) 
In any case, it is full of deliciously silly stuff, set to a cheerily virtuosic horn voluntary by Johann Hummell that Is ripe tor satirizatlon. Dancers attired in a motley assortment of black and white garb careen mto one another; a running herd of them suddenly stops perched on half-toe and erupts ln a frenzy of determined batterie; one man slowlywalks across the stage carrying two women ln an Improbable lift; men hoist and toss one another into the air; bodies entwine in Chinese tangles and zip busily on and off stage. 
The ballet is at Its most wittilyirreverent in the adagio sequence, in wb.icb the dancers solemnly deadpan tllelr way through an inventive series of 
SHARIR DANCE COMPANY 
WHEN: Saturday. 
WHERE: carver Community Cultural Center. 

coupllngs, tripllngs, quadruplings and 
quintuplings -stepping, rolling and 
crawling over, under and on top of one 
another -all the while keeping a black 
beret in play, passing and snatching it 
from one head to the next hand to the 
next foot. 
The two works that followed -Sharir's ''Percussion Concerto" and Bustamante's "Wise Heart" -were less satisfying,perhaps because neither appeared as fully-realized or well-crafted as the preceding one. Both are somewhat free­form and open-ended, sort of meandering to a close rather than coming to a conclusion. Both have their strengths, however, not least of them a penchant shared by both choreographers for doodling: playing with the movement and what the body can do, altering,Interrupting and manipulating its momentum, accenting poses with eccentric, calligraphic gestures. 
The splky, angular movement of "Percussion Concert<>'' is a visual restatement its Paul Salzedo score, at its best in the middle allegro section In which the dancers match punishingly fast drumbeats almost step tor note. 
''Wise Heart,'' set to music of Paul Dresher, offered a strong contrast in mood: meditative, almost melancholy, with slow, controlled movement, long-held poses and lines of dancers surging forward and back like waves upon the beach. 
The dancers are an engaging lot, no technical virtuosos, but wonderfully 'ndividual, each with a highly idiosyncratic style that Sharlr and Bustamante employ to good advantage. 
San Artonio Ugtt 

August 21, 1989 


Big names 

fill Austin's 
dance card 

By Sondra Lomu 
Special to the Am«IClln..Sta..,,,.,, 
With September around the comer, Austin dance companies are pulling on tights and flexing their toe8 for another aeason of back-to-back performances. 
Two well-eetabliabed groups, BalletAus­tin and the Sbarir Dance Company, both enter their sixth season as professional troupes. Each company has six performing dates locally and increased touring for 1988-89; both anticipate larger audiences this year. 
The Sharir Dance Company leapa into the year with three kudos: the announce­ment of a collaborative aaaociation with the New York-hued Merce Cunningham Dance Foundation, admittance into the National Endowment for the Arts Ad­vancement Program and selection to the Mid-America Arts Alliance touring program. 
"Our association with the Cunningham Dance Foundation began last aeaaon when we received our firstCunningham choreog­raphy, Inlets II.'' said artistic director Ya-
matching funds from the NEA. The Advancement Program also pvea ua the impetus to apply to larger private foundations for funding." 
The Sbarir Dance Company has alao been eelected for the 1988-89 Mid-American Arts Alliance Re­gional Touring Program for Teus, Oklahoma, Arkanau, Miaaouri, Kanau and Nebraaka. Admittance into the organization will offer more opportunities for out-of-state tourinc, one ofthe company's five­
~~. 

cov Sharir. "We are currently negotiating the acquisition ofour second Cunningham piece. Over the next five years we hope to make Austin the second home for the Cun­ningham Dance Company." 
The Sbarir Dance Company will inaugu­rate a three-week Texas residency by the Cunningham troupe in January 1989. The residency, to be at the University ofTexas College of Fine Arts, will result in a new work by Cunningham, the first of three dances he will create and premiere in Aus­
"Thia is our largeet touring aea­aon ever, including eight perfor­mances statewide, and one tentatively 1eheduled for Atlanta in February," Sharir said. 
Thia aeaaon, the company will premiere two collaborative worka 

Friday, August 26, 1988 Austin American-Statesman 
by Sbarir and company member Joee Luis Buatamante (Dec. 9-10 and Feb. 3-4) and a commiuioned work by poet-modem choreogra­pher David Gordon (April 27-29). 
Additional Sharir performances an echedu1ed Oct. 13-16, March U-25 and May 27. 
tin over the next six years. 
The Cunningham Dance Company will premiere the work at the Basa Concert HalJ Jan. 27-28. 
''Thia ia a very exciting venture with one of the most highly acclaimed modem cho· reographers of thia century," Sharir said. 
Fundedbythe NEA andtheTexasCom­mission onthe Artsduring its first five eea­aons, the Sbarir Dance Company recently was selected to participate in the NEA Ad­vancement Program for "emerging organi­zations of artistic excellence." The companyia one of37 organizationsnation­wide selected for the program from 110ap­plicants in aeven artistic disciplines. 
"Competition ia stiff for selection into the AdvancementProgram," said company managing director\Carol Smith A~ms.J "The NEA sponsors an mtensive dev~p­ment program tailored to our company's specific needs, and after 15 months we be­come eligible to receive $75.000 in match· 
IMO.nee, Fl 
Sunday, August 28, 1988 
The Sunday Sun, Georgetown, Texas 





Roundabout 


Speclal/Rebecca Mcentee 
Kate Fisher and Jose Bustamante in Percussion Concerto No. 3 at Southwestern September 1o. 
Sharir Dance Company comes to SU 

The nationally-acclaimed Sharir Dance Company of Austin will present The/@$$%& ?II Ballet, Wise Heartand Percussion Concerto No. 3 at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, September 1 O, in Alma Thomas Theater in a Southwestern University Artist Series Presentation. 
Founded in 1982 by Yacov Sharir, the reper­tory company of 12professional dancers in residence at the University ofTexas frequently tours Texas and the United States performing contemporary and post modern works. 
Although the choreography is accompanied by post modern, New Music and classical composi­tions, Sharir explains, the music and dance do not necessarily coincide. "They coexist in impor­tance and enhance each other; Sharir said. 
A native of Israel, Sharir studied at the Rubin Academy of Dance in Jerulselem after obtaining a degree in ceramics and sculpture from the Bezalel Academy of Arts. He danced 12 years with the Batsheva Dance Company of Israel and also studied under such luminaries as Martha Graham, Jose Limon, Jerome Robbings and Anna Sokolov. 
Sharir left Israel for the United States in 1977 to form the American Deaf Dance Company, serving as its director for five years. In 1982, he founded the SharirDance Company which regularly performs with nationallyrenowned groups such as the Hartford Ballet and the Margaret Jenkins Dance Company. The September 1 O perform­ance will be the company's first at SU. 
The /@$$%&?JI Balletwill feature choreog­raphy by Sharir and resident choreographer Jose Luis Bustamante with music by Johann Nepomuk Hummel. The company premiered Wise Heart in January at the University of Texas-Austin, with choreography by Busta­mante and music by Paul Dresher. Sharir choreographed the intricate footwork of Percussion Concerto No.3by Paul Salzedo. The general admission tickets are $5 per person.For ticket information call 863-1378. 
Sunday Sun, Georgetown, Texas 
Sunday, September 4, 1988 
Southwestern University Artist Series 

presents 


SHARIR DANCE COMPANY 

Saturday, September 1 O, 8:30 p.m. 
Alma Thomas Theater 
Tickets $5 at the door -Open Seating 
For information, call 863-1378 

Section 1, page 14 The Sunday Sun, Georgetown. Texas 
Sunday, September 18, 1988 
Sharir shines at SU 

Southwestern's Fine Arts Depart­ment gave everyone a treat las1 Sat­
urday by including Ya~vSharlr ~nd his company of splendid dancers in the university's 1988-89 Artist Series. 
Sharir and company dancer Jo8' Luis Bustamante share choreogra­phical duties and together created a wonderfully light, often hilarious ballet, "The 1@#%•g?11 Ballet: which set the evening's mood and won the audience's approval. 
Next. Bustamante'& dreamlike 
"Wise Heart• and Sharir's rivetting 
"Percussion Concerto 13• showcased 
each dancer's talents while molding 
them as a whole. 
The Austin company's dancers in­
clude: Bustamante, Andrea Beck· 
ham, Toni Bravo, Maurice Dancer, 
Jennifer Denham, Gaye Greever, 
Mart• Matthews, Stephen Marcello, 
Kate Warren and Charles Santos. 
The Southwestern Drama 
Department's technical director, 
Stephen WoH, and his production 
staff of students: Lance Ball, Mellua 
Miller, Kristy Woods, Dwayne 
Mcfarland and Brenda Burton per­
formed their lighting and sound tasks 
with professional ease. 
Audience notables included: Lau­
rel Rose and Bride Roberts of 
Round Rock. San Antonio's Bonni• 
Doyle, Georgetown's Debra Marlow, 
and Kathy and David Lander who'd 
arrived from Los Angeles with their 
daughter to begin rehearsals for SU's 
The House ofBlue Leaves, in which 
Lander is guest artist. 

Ear Susan Ney 
Speaking of local notables: Former Georgetowner Archie Mayor has hit the literary big time. The publishing firm of G. P. Putnam's Sons has seen the light and published Mayor's mystery Open Season. 
John Coyne, author of The Searing and The Shroud. calls Open Season a iaut,tense police thriller" and Thom••T. Noguchi, author of Coronerand Unnatural Causes, found it •a powerfully gripping, fast-paced page-turner.• . 
This avid mystery buff has enpyed 
it thoroughly as have others around 
town. But then those who read 
Mayor's earlier manuscripts years 
ago knew there must be an editor out 
there who'd recognize a good thing. 
Fiesta San Jose crowned some 
hard working ladies over Labor Day 
weekend. Seven-year-old Joyce 
Zavala-Davi!• earned the title Queen 
of San Joseby raising the mos1 
money for the Los Unidos Scholar­
ship Fund. 
Princess Annette Montez, 6, came 
in next followed by duchess Aprll 
Acosta, 8, and lady-in-waiting 
Marth• Resendez, 5. 





ouston 
G 1988, The HOUiton Poet 


By Cart Cunningham 
POST MUSIC EDITOR 
Modem dance in various forms made its annual visit to Miller The­atre this weekend. as Houston's Farrell Dyde Dance Theatre, the Houston-Atlanta company, Several Dancers Core. and Austin's Yacov Sharir Dance Company collaborat­ed in an evening of five works on Hermann Park's big outdoor stage. 
Overall, the most striking im­pression was made by the Sharir Dance Company, whose ranks in­clude several tall. limber men this season. The company's dancing also was defined by strongly disci­------plined move-
MusiC ment.. o~ten em­
phas1z1ng at­
tractive
review geometric cho­
reographic pat­
terns. 
This strong sense of pattern was 
true not only of Sharir's Percussion 
Concerto, which was in progress 
when I arrived Saturday, but of 
Bustamente's Beyond the Pale, 
which opened the third segment of 
the program. 
The use of pattern was naturally 
adapted to Sharir's piece, which 
was set to a rhythmic percussion 
piece by Paul Salzedo. Fortunately, 
Bustamente also depended upon 
definite patterns in his piece, to 
bring some sense of architecture to 
one of those ill-defined, stop-start 
space music scores by Michael Ka­
poulis. 
But Sue Schroeder of Several 
Dancers Core took the opJ?Qsite ap-
MODERN DANCE EVENING 
The Yat(YY Shalir Dance Compe.ny ol Austin. the Farrell Oyde Dance Theatre and Several Dancers Core el Miiier Outdoor Theatre Saturday evening 
Yacov Sharir /Salzedo. Percussiott Con<:flrto: Oyde/New MU$1C Sampler 1{1; New York Mu, (The L A VetSion) ; Sue Shroeder/Michael Keck: The &w· entl! Pia~ Jose l.lllt. Bustamente/Michael Kat>OU­
lis: BeyonO Iha Palu, Oyde/tape co«age: Their Flnes1 Hour (Th& Austin 5'111/J) . 
proach, letting the dancing whirl, patter and roll about aimlessly in her stream-of-consciousness piece, The Seventh Plane. It was aJso set to one of those wandering, hold­the-~ord-down electronic space­mus1c scores you hear on the late­night FM music shows. 
It was pretty, it was sometimes lyrical and it was inoffensive, bul it took a long time to say very little. 
The Farrell Dyde Dance Theater was represented by New Age and old-time versions of his favorite medium: a collage of pop music and radio talk. New York Mix (The 
L.A. Version) was a set of soft­shoe ddnces done to 1930s pop, blues and jazz tunes. interspersed with snippets of famous radio voices of the era. It was highlighted by a slinky dance duet done to tune of Gershwin's "Summertime." 
Their Finest Hour was a kinky dance, set to a jerky electromc score with some intervening verbal gobbledygook. Where the raincoat­ed, derby-hatted dancers looked like they had just stepped out of_ a Magritte painting in New York Mix, sleek athletic attir~ suggested some sort of game in Their Finest Hour. 
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 26, 1988 

SHARIR DANCE COMPANY PRESENTS 


JIMMY TURNER 
DIANA PRECHTER 
WOODY McGRIFF 
AND 
TINA MARSH 

AT CAPITOL CITY PLAYHOUSE 
THURS.-SAT. OCT. 13-15, 8 PM 

$8/$6 SR. & STUDENTS 
$5/STUDENT RUSH 

Th< A"'rln Chrunicl< Odob<r 7, 1988 JJ 

Yacov Sharir wants to do it all. Usually a choreographer forms a modern dance company so he can eee his own works, and this week at the Capitol City Playhouse, the Sharir Dance Company will pre· miere the two movements that complete Sharir'a Percwsion Con· certo No. 3. But Sharir says that audiences would have loat interest 
if hit company performed only his choreography. 
After six years, audiences have proved they like Sharir's mix of original works and guest choreog­raphers. His successes could be measured in many ways, but the one that baa kept his dancer& on stage is the number ofseats he can fill. For thia three-night stand at the Capitol City Playhouse, if you get there late you will probably have to sit on the floor. But having the audience up close and on three aides iPves Sharir a chance to try some more intimate ideaa -the modern dance equivalent of cham· ber music. 
Sharir will present Trio #3, com· pleting a trilogy involving Jimmy 'l\lmer, a deaf dancer and long­time collaborator. (Sharir wants to put all three sections together next year.) With musical accompani· ment provided by singer Tina Mareh, theae are intense and intro­spective works that Sharir thinks are best when seen up close. 
"Personally, I think we are at our best when we are working with Jimmy Turner and Tina Marsh," Sharir said. "These pieces may or may not be appropriate when we perform at the Paramount; we al­ways have to consider the audience wherever we perform." 
The intimate setting also gives ,the viewer a cl<>&er look at the piece• for the full company. Last spring when it performed Inlets 2, the troupe's major acquisition from modem legend Merce Cunning­ham, it waa on the stage ofthe Par· amount Theater. It was a major step; it stretched his dancers' tech­nique and dance aenaibility, and gave them national exposure. 
Like a good painting, Sharir thinks that Inlets 2 works well whether the viewer is at.anding back or is up next to it. 
"People tend to think of Cun­ningham's choreography ae being a bit cold and detached," he said. Cunningham's baaic definition of dance aa "movement in apace and time" ia in ~contrast to the 
Sharir uses variety to 


keep alldience interest 

etorytelling ofclassical ballet orthe often angst-driven modem dance of Martha Graham, with whom Cunningham worked for several years. But Sharir feels that as his dancers have worked with Inlets 2, they have found an "emotional context." "Cunningham knows it exists," Sharir a88erts, "becauee it is executed by persons." 
Cunningham is becoming some· thing of a godfather to Sharir'a company. In January, Cunning­ham will be in Austin for three weeks ofmaster classes and perfor· mances. Out of the residency will come the first of a set of three pieces commissioned by Sharir. The Cunningham Dane" Compnny will premiere the new work at the end of the residency. 
Sharir also likes involving other local dancers, and this perfor· mance will feature a solo b~ guest artist Diana Prechter. She will per·form A Little Something, which she premieredonthe Dance Umbrella's "Ten Minutes Max" in September. Thia will be the last chance to see 
the work, at least for a while; Prechter ia due to give birth later this month. She stands on a plat· form exposing herbounteous stom­ach accompanied by a recording of aound.s from inside the womb and texts about the birth experience. Obviously in no shape for jetes, Prechter moves slowly and mini· mally. She describes the perfor­
mance as sculptural. Heywood "Woody" McGriff was scheduled to perform his Looking Glass, but was forced to cancel be­cause of a case of the flu. 
The Sharir Dance Company will perform at 8 p.m., Thursday through gat~. at Capitol Cit-· Playhouse 214 W.FourthSt. Tick· ets are $8 for general admigaion, $6 for aenior citizens and $6 for the studentrush which begins at 7p.m. For information call 472-2966. 
Wednesday, October 12, 1988 
Austin American-Statesman 


THE SHARIR DANCE COMPANY b1:111n> 11> se.N1" on Tlllu'. Oct. I J .it ~.1p11ol (tty Pl,1yhnoN• w11h j\Ul'>I J>t~r· former• \Voody \,\CLntl, 1tmn1y Turner TinJ \\Jt'h and Di.1na Ptt>ch!••r Turner and MJr~h \\Ill be p<•rformtng a ne\\ w11rk b1· Y..u:m <.hJror 11111.'d Tno woth St.'Vt'rJI mcml>eh oJ ~IX Prl'<hl"I" 'I Pfl!Sl'nl A lllll<" )l)tm:llum: wt-1ch 1> desert~ J~,1 ,culplural perfor mance art p1t'Cc," and r-kGrofi "ti perform Loo~mgud,, Also on the program .11e lhe lrd dnd 41h mov;:omen: of Pt•rrussion (onct'r!O rThe rust l\\'O mo.ement• o11h1~piece Wt'tc 1ncwn11-d la.i w.1>0n1 ~OC'"II penor'Tl Thu... Sat night' at Cdpnol C'11y. t;hm,11me 1s 8pm .ind 1ockm' at<' S8, '"'h .a Sl d1scoum 1or •<•noo" dnd d S) d"c:ount Im stud•"* C,111 47:! :!%.& 
1ormc,rt'1n10 

ISIS. ,, "'~" mU•ll >'rN•mhlo• will n1.1~1· tlwu olt'liu1 .11 
7pm l>c1 ~ ,11 C.1p1tol (111 Pl.1yholN' Th1•y p1om1s1• •.in t'XI 11111g ewn1n11 OI '·''" l<ltli ( t'OIUry ,, orh hv Mlkh~il Gllnko, M1rh,1<•I ~<·h•·ll~ .1nrl D,11l,1 ~''"'<'!!!•n fm mart• 
onlo c~fl 4 7 l l%1>. PERCUSSION RECITAL Do M>lll'h·YunR Sh1•n, A~'"1.1n1 Protc·,~•lr ·"lu,ic ,11 Southwl',f<·rn UnM'l\llV '"" fl<•tiurm a J>t'f<U''ion rcc11,1l .1t 8pm on \1on On. IO 111 Alm.1 Thoma~ ThNler on Gcorg1•1own. Thi• progr•m wrll indude work' by luhn C.oJ!P. Sh•·n .ind 01hrr' C.tll 1·863-&51 I lor 
more 1nform.1t1on 
DRUSILLA HUFFMASTER , lormrr Art"l·tn-Re,1d1•nn• ,1nd plan,.t, woll 11·1urn ro ~ulh'""lPrn Unl\nSllV on Grorge· town 10 P<"rtorm ,., gu'"' ~"''t woth Dr. ·\nthunv 1\rtt',..,, ,.\w'1.lnt Ptolf'~50r ol Mu'" and v1olonl>1 •n ri..:11.11 at 2pm on <oun O<I <) Theor progr;im \\Ill include• mu'oc b, xhubf.11, Dl'f.111,1 Jnd Strau" Call 1.8t, \.11511 lor more 
m1orrn.1t1on. 
F11 Austin American-Statesman Saturday, October 15, 1988 
ET CETERA 

DANCE 
Sh•rlr Duce Comptiny 
The Sharlr Dance Company performs Its season premiere. featuring guest artists Heywood "Woody" McGrlff, Jimmy Tur­ner, Tina Marsh and Diana Prechter. at 8 tonight In Capitol City Playhouse. 214 W. Fourth St. Tickets are $5 for students; $6 tor senior citizens: and $8 tor others. Call 472-2966. 
TH Aastin Chronicle 
J.rnuary li, 1989 

The Merce Cunningham Dance Company "ill 
perform " Poinh in Space" Jan. 17-28 at Bass 
Concert Hall. 
THE MERCE CUNNINGHAM DANCE COMPANY" 
1w1torm1ng lwo r11lleren1 pro~ram' di •he BJ" Lrmcert HJll lh1' w1•••kt-nd 1ncludin11 l\\1' pertormann•' of.i world premiere spec1<1llv comm1\Sloned hy lhe Cun· n1n11hdm founda11on . 1he ~h.mr 0Jnce Comp.in\', and "L"c>ral otlwrs The nPW \\Ork Pnlllled Cargo X will he prem1Pre<f on t n. J.,n ll. ()1her p1eu·s on the""' nr11ht'' progr~m mdutfe Points in Space .ind Fabrka· lion< -which will indudr a' amt>o 1ppNranc1• hr Che &9 y .. ar oft! Cunnmgham ('argo X will b<> d.mced ;i~am on Sdc n111h1.1long"1tb Rainforest .1nd Pictures Cun mngham "111 perform 1n Pidures Tich·I <l() 1h•· sho" are 1> 15 .1nd $13 w11h d1'tOIH11' ior \t>nior' group• .in1f 
FA'l cluh mPmfwr,. C.11147 l <2060 tor mo11• 1niormo111on A -1·mp1h1um on IM>' wort. uf Mwce Cunningham 1< .,1,0 'clwnull'd ior f11d,1y .ind Saturd.iv Fnr 111nrr• 1morm,1hon call tht> UT d.1nn• dl'f>.Jfllm•nr ,,1 47 1 ·7544 

c 
i as 
CD
-as 
0•
c 
as 
c.>
a: 
CD 
E 
c( 
..E
-., 

::s 
c( 
Cll 
-CD Cll 





Cunningham's spirit 
imbues performance 

By Jerry Young 
Specilll to ~Amertolln-StatM!Mn 
Review 
The Merce Cunningham Dance Company ended its Aua­performed one of the oldeattin a~wtweekendatthe Bus works in its repertory, the re­Concert Hall with programs cently reconstructed Ra.inforut

that included the first two per­(1968), on a stage cluttered withformances of Cargo X Andy Warhol's ailvery, floatingThe atage for Cargo X is bare pillows. At fint the dance is res­except for a large and simple trictedto thoee few places where ladder that, like a pyramid, is there are no pillows, but oncefrom all aides much wider at the the pillows are proven barmleaa,bottom than at the top. This 
they get ahoved and kicked
ladder had much the aame pree­about. The costumes are dustyence as the inanimate heroes of brown, like the lighter parts ofworks by Mu Ermt or the om­
houae tparrowa . . 
nipreaent chocolate grinder of Cunningham leaves you freeMarcel Duchamp. That aenae of to sort things as you wish, andallegory wu enhan~ .as 
to invent your own scenarios ifdancerain tum adornedthis dis­
need be. And you can be sure
tinguished found object with that thoee next to you areyellow flowers. 
watching different thinga, andJuat as Cunningham, at 69, finding connections as irreaiat­has preciaely con.aide.red his fun. 
ibletothem 88 they are differentitationa for the parts he dances, from your own.
he gave the ladder its own rea­But there was one momenttricted role. It wu lifted. cloaed when everyone was looking at
and made to lie on it& aide. A 
the aame thing amid the whirl­woman dancer, frozen in an out,.. 
Winds and private ceremonies at.etched poae, was carried to it, on the stage, and that'& whenand it held her in a lift. It wu Cunningham appeared. In Sat­tilted to the point ofimbalance, urday's Picture.s, his entrancewhere it provided a pivot for a wuconcealedatthe back ofthemale dancer's slow-motion spin, crowded staie, but you couldwhich was about the only danc­hear the collective whisper,ing done near it. 
"There's Cunningham."
This powerful stationary ob­
Pictures, which the company
ject made all else stand still in also performed here in 1986. is 
it.a quarter of the ~~ge, ~d one of Cunningham'• leut whennearit, dancers Jomed 1t m 
thorny worb. The gentle ayn­a portrait-like poae to oversee thesizer and violin acore never 
the activity on the rest of the 
jara, and the dancers' alow phraae8 end with them fastened~younger cast on Friday togetherin tw06 and threes. sur· 
night carried the ladder offstage gesting letters in aome newly at the end like a gaggle of Pal!· forming language. The dancen bearers in crayon-colored um­holdtheir positions, andfor sev­
tarc:la, gradually uptuming it ao eral seconds· only the ac:rim re­that it was for the first time mains lighted, leaving them in completely upside-down only silhouette, 88 ifto impreas each 
for its Wt half second on stage. new letter upon our memory.Saturday's performance had a 
AB the lights went down for happy ending as the rest of the good at center stage, Cun­cutleftthe revered guest stand­ningham was &lightly crouched,ing ablaze with its floral awards lifting a woman dancer crou­10itcould joiI\ them for the cm­wise in front ofhim. That acene
tain calla. 
became one last lone monogram On Saturday the company that will long atay in memory. 






MASTER 

OF THE 

DANCE 

Cunningham builds legacy of style 

very nice not to be doing this.' Dancing has
By Jerry Young 
been what I've done all my life.'' 
Special to the American-Statesman 
While Cunningham the dancer is becoming 
M 
more careful these days, Cunningham the erce Cunningham will turn 70 choreographer is very busy and still taking this spring. For 40 years the chances. In Austin, he's putting the finishing soft-spoken dancer and dance-touches on Cargo X, a work co-commissioned maker has shaped modern cho-for the company by the Sharir Dance Com­reography, and while it is difficult to look at pany. The title doesn't reveal much about his dances and be reminded of what came be-the work, but the source of the title says a fore, it is nearly impossible to look at anyone lot about the man who, in spite of the scram­else's choreography nowadays and not find ble of so many choreographers to be al 
something of Cunningham. ,____.________-.. dance's cutting edge, may Cunningham has writteu 'O f th th' have started the most con 
himself QUI Of nlUCh Qf his ne 0 I e mgs we Vincing revolution in dance early choreography, and have tried to do is to in the last 50 years. when he includes himself in be In the era that we "It's made up," Cun­recent works, his part is are in at the moment.' ningham said. 
smaller and less athletic; he ''It can mean anything. often appears in the role of Merce Cunningham Cargo means something go-a director of the events on mg around and moving stage. around, although it doesn't have anything to 
When the Merce Cunningham Dance Com-do with the dance. And I thought that 1f I pany performs in Austin next Wfekend, he added an X that would confuse it all even will appear in Fabrications Friday night and further." Pictures Jan. 28. Cunningham was born in Centralia, Wash., 
This week, when asked about retiring, he and, after deciding against a law career, stu­gave a meusured response. "I think ahout it died acting and then dance. He was a mem­often, when I get very tired. I think that all ber of Martha Grnham's dance company dancers think that way anyway. They get f:rom 1939 to 1945, during which time he he-very tired and they think: 'Oh, it would be See Cunningham. D18 

C4 Austin American-Statesman Thursday, February 2, 1989 

Innovative Sharir changes dancers, 

By Jerry Young 
Spec;lal 10 the Amerlcan•SIAIM/Tllln 
Yacov Sharir has been busy. 
For the past six months, he has been doing a lot of foot work off the stage making arrangements for the two-week residency at the University of Texas by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, which ended last weekend with the world premiere of Cunning­ham's Corio X. 
This weekend, Sharir and his own dancers take to the stage with a program that includes two works of Sharlr's: Four Love Studies, which is being performed for the first time on a proscenium stage, and the Per­cussion Concerto #3, which will get its first complete performance. 
Sharir said he likes putting his dancers in different performance spaces because it brings them new audi­ences and lets them experiment with different ~ tings. But moving a piece from the Capitol City Playhouse, where Sharir said the audience "embraces the stage.'' to a traditional stage can mean major alter­ations. 
"Itchanges the contextofthe piece, andthe interre­lationships of the dancers," Sharir said. ''It's as if the audiences see another piece." Because Love Studies is such an intimate work, Sharir feels that it. may be more effective at Capitol City. "It remains to be seen," he said. "Every time we go to a new place we bring new artiste with us -so there is always something new.'' 
Thia weekend's program includes Jose Luis Busta­mante's Beyond the Pale, which Sharir said he is look­ing forward to sioce he's "dancing for a change." 
The Sharir Dance Company basprovided a meeting ground for many Austin performers, like Bustamante, 

performance and space 


Jimmy Turner, Lynn Grossman and Diana Prechter. made his Austin aolo debut with the Sharir Company The most recent, and one ofthe busiest ofthe compa-last fall and will appear in another ,solo piece on this n)'s regular guests, is Woody McGriff. program, The A Train Takes Me. 
McGriff, who is in his first year teaching at UT, The dance was choreographed in 1983 when 

The Sharif Dance Company ptesents SHAIURDANCI COMPANY 
and HEYWOOD 
"WOODY" McORIFF 1neoncen 
An annual spnng event 
.,, performances· 
---~.·~3tllMl4

UT Opera Lab Theatre at 8 P m. 
CHAllGl· A·11CKITs 477·6060 AtlvMKe 

Tickets $9 ($7 Senior Citizens and All Students) $5 Student Rush one hour before per1ormance. lnforma11on: 471-1444 

SHARIR DANCE COMPANY 

Guest ertiat: Woody McGritf 
When: ap.m. Friday and Saturday 
Where: UT Opera Lab Theatre 
AdmlHion: $9, student and senior citizen 
discounts avellable 
Information: 471-1444 
McGriff wai; with the Frank Holder Dance Company, he performed it frequently with the Bill Evans Dance 
Company. 
"1 had retired it while I was in New York," McGriff 
said. "When 1was dancing in a company, there wasn't 
time to continue solo dancing." When he was asked to dance the work last year in Houston, McGriffpulled out his old video tapes to pre­
pare himself. 
''I brought it up to date," he said. "Because I know 
the music very well I am able to play with other 
rhythms and express things in different ways. When I 
made the solo it was an exercise in balances, on one 
foot and on two feet. When I reconstructed it, it was 
wonderful to mesh the original choreography \\.ith 
what I had learned since then -letting it mature rath­
er than let it stay what it was." For fans who have come to expect a muture of mod­em and post-modern styles from Sharir performances, expect something different this weekend: McGriff's jazz dancing places the emphasis on sheer enter­
tainment. 
"I really enjoy performing it,'' McGriff said. "I'm not asking the audience to think about anything in 
particular. just to watch and enjoy it." 
Thursday, February 2, 1989 
Austin American-Statesman 
Monday, February 6, 1989 Austin American-Statesman 


Sharir troupe bears .stamp of Cwmingham 

By Jerry foung 
Special to the Amerlcan-Stateeman 
Seeing t.00 Sharir Dance Com­pany at the University of Texas Opera Lab Theatre on Saturday night, eo cloee on the heels of Merce Ctmningham's residency, undencored the influence Cun­ningham ha.a had on Yacov Sharir andhia dancel'8.Butfar from being merely clones, the Sharirhas devel· oped much of that Cunningham sense of intimate ensemble danc· ing, which celebra~ both indivi­duality and precise coordination. 
Jose Luis Bustamante'& Beyond the Pale, with its uniform gray COS· ~and confrontational light· mg, has a grim, futuristic undercurrent. It shows Buataman­te'a impreaaively imaginative movement vocabulary, well-'t.ai· lored for and exuberantly executed by these dancers. But occasionally Buatamante strings too many of hisgoodideas together, diluting his argument with busy, run-on phrases. 
TDe theme of being beyond the pale, as in outside society's nonne.. recurs in the text to Buatamante'a dance skit in the Four Love Duets. The affectionate humor depends as much on the text about a lesbian romance ae it does on the move­ment. That is not the case with 
Review 

Buatamante's stunning duet with Stephen Marcello to end the piece. In the first two duets, Sharir ex­plores relationships, one that works and one that doesn't. 
Guest artist Woody McGriff per­formed his The ·~" Train Takes Me to a piano solo by Richard Tee. 
Just as Tee's stylish locomotive makes a few brief stops to make a heartf'.elt tribute to Duke Ellington, McGriff wove in momentary touches of street and showdancing without abandoning his strong seamless lines. ' 
Although he seldom gets down to the 64th-n.>te chugging of Tee's music, McGrifrsis an express train that took him all over the stage. This piece gives McGriff a chance to dazil~ with bis impressive strength and charismatic style, but there is an element of meditation present just as when a John Col­trane or an Art Tatum gets the heart, head and feet moving to the same beat. 
In Sharir's PercU6aion Concerto #3, one finds many voices, but not .all of them are resoundingly Shar· ir's. The '60s-modern acore lends an air ofdrama, asv~eas it is in­tense, reminiAcent of those ten­sion-building soundtracks in detective shows. The dance shares a sense of ambient urgency, accen­tuatedbypantomimedshovingand unabashed dancing to the beat. At one point, the castsquares off with the audience to dancein unison, re· calling Laura Dean's b~·the· rhythm-possessed group dancing. 
The costuming and motivic de­velopment show the firm stamp of Cunningham. 
But it is fragments that stick in the mind, and again it may be a surplus ofideas andinfluences that kept this work from leaving a firm coherant impression overall. 
Vol. 4 Spring 
No. 1 1989

• T H E • 


The Sharir Dance Company has received three accolades during its 1988-1989 season. They include admittance into the National Endowment for the Arts Advancement Program, an affiliation with the Merce Cunningham Dance Foundation in New York and selection to the Mid-American Arts Alliance Touring Program for Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska. 
The group's success can be attributed in large part to founder and artistic director Yacov Sharir' s guidance. Sharir searches for works by the country's best choreographers for his company to perform to enhance the presentation of his works and those ofco-resident choreographer Jose Louis Bustamante. Sharir's twelve-member company also presents other local and national com~niesduring its season. 
The company originated as a group of deaf dancers which toured the South, East Coastand Texas from 1978to1981. The group, known as the American Deaf Dance Company, pioneered the inclusion of deaf people in professional dance. The company began incorporating hearing dancers and became the Sharir Dance Company in 1982. 
For performance schedules and touring dates, pkase Cllll 320-8704 or 476-5185. 




Dance Umbrella 
Newsletter March 1989 
March Calendar 
·.
25 Sharlr Dance Company's Annual Gata Performance features Japanese perfonners and choreographers Elko and Koma. 
8:00 P.M., Paramount Theatre, 713 Congress. For tickets call 472-5420; for infonnation call 476-5185 or320­
8704. * 
Out of Town 
~~1.1 .sharlr Dance Company 
1n a JOint performance w~hDancers Unllmlted Repertory Company. 
8:00 P.M., Pavillion Trammell Crow Center, 2001 Ross Ave, Dallas. Ticket information: [214) 522-8988· general information [512) 476-518S. 

~~·>­
•-· 

Raised in Japan but imbued with Western aesthetic concepts, Eiko & Koma build on a unique, cosmopolitan foundation, which incorporates an Oriental awareness of physical nuance and time with the Western recognition of the individualistic creative act. 
Critics have called their work "avant-garde," but Eiko and Koma eschew labels. Their aim, they say, is to present themselves as if naked and, existentially, to give birth to the inexpressible. They often use images taken from nature, such as that of a fragile moth or aging seal. Then, by the power of their concentration, they transcend the limits of that image, sometimes moving very slowly until, transfixed, everyday categories of time and space are shattered. 
Each of Eiko &Koma's performances represent captured moments of an ongoing event, not the framed exhibition of a finished work. Sometimes the work Is challenging, and sometimes their sense of play explodes the tension. The responses they evok&-emotional, primitive, often unexpected-differ among individuals, but almost all seem susceptible to the universal reach of their talent. 
"Our work, explains El'ko & Koma, "is not choreography borrowed from others, or that we can lend to others to perform. It is, instead, simply the event which we execute, 

and on stage we, as well as the audience, are witnesses to whattakes place. The fonn, is just a recipe, as if we were cooks. It's there to be adjusted, for what we want is to create a dish that neither we nor the people have ever tasted. 
"We try to avoid fancy recipes orover-cooking, because we feel the taste of the food suffers if one has to be impressed by hard kitchen work. 
"We seldom do symmetrial movements. There won't be much pleasure if both legs weigh the same. We are often off balance. When we move forward, it is as if somebody was grabbing us from the back, as ifourright sides were landsliding. The heart must be quiet to listento that sound. Our bodies are.most unreasonable toys which often betray us, which laugh at the pretension that we stand at the edge of the cliff." 
Eiko andKoma perform in Austin.one night only at The Sharir Dance Company's Annual Gala Performance, March 25, 1989, 8:00 P.M., Paramount Theatre, 713 Congress. For ticket infonnation call 472-5420; for general information ca/1476-5185 or320-8704. 

3/March 1989 
THE AUS-TIN CHRONICLE 
March 17. 1989 
THE SHARIR DANCE COMPANY &EllCO ANO KOMA 
will share the stage at the Paramoul\t Theatre, 713 
Congress, on March 25 at 8pm This performance ls 
Sham's annual gala and continues a long hne of 
guest companies that Sham has has brought to 
Austin Eiko and Koma will perform a piece called 
Gram, a dance that MeKplores the myth of the bir1h of 
rice." Like other Japanese choreographers and 
dancers that have come to America, Elko and Koma 
Inject their dances wltl'I surreal and disparate Im· 
ages tl'lat are somehow unique to the Japanese It's 
hard to explain, but the Japanese 1ust see the stage 
and theatricality in a different way from Americans I 
guess that's what makes them so Interesting. The 
Sharir company will be presenting de la nult .• , /e 
1our, choreographed by Jose Luis Bustamante and 
Yacov Sharir. Tickets are $10 with a $2 discount tor 
81udents and seniors. Student rush tickets will be 
avalfable one hour before curtain tor $5 Call 
472·5420 for ticket info or call the Sharir Dance Com· 
pany at 476-5185. 

DEBORAH HAY will present tour performances of 
The Aviator, a new work choreographed by Hay to 
music by Ellen Fullman, on April Fool's Day at noon, 
3, 6 .\ 9pm The performances wlll be al tl'le Ballet 
Austin Academy, 3002 Guadalupe. The performers in 
the show are John Coan Ill, Lorena Monda, Beth 
Montgomery Mary Saunders, Linda Scott Sarah 
Stromeyer, Jenny Tomlinson & Jodi Ann Tucker Ad· 
mission Is by donation and all proceeds w111 go the 
Christopher House, a hospice for people with AIDS 
and to the Texas Alhance ot Prolesslonal AcuPUnc· 
lurlsts. Call 472-0763 !or more Info. 

SARAH BRUMGARTwlll perform March 31·April 1 at 
8pm at the Synergy Studio, 1501 W 5tl'I The title of 
the new wor1t Is Silent White Dances XIX, the latest 




SHARIR DANCE COMPANY PRESENTS 
E 
·~ 
K K 
0 0 

M 
A 

IN PERFORMANCE WITH 
SHARIR DANCE COMPANY SATURDAY MARCH 25, 1989 BPM PARAMOUNT THEATRE FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS 
713 CONGRESS AVENUE 
S10 Gl:NERAL. $8 SI UOENTS/SR 
$5 STUDENT RUSH 
1 HR PRIOR TO PERFORMANCE 


The Austin Chronicle March 17, 1989 
D12 Austin American-Statesman * Wednesday, March 22, 1989 

Spring awakening 
Burst of dance performances brings Austin companies into bloom 
It alwaya bappena this time of year. The city's dancers will be qui­et for months, and then in April and May everybody starts dancing. So while Austin dancers are put­ting on their dancing ehoea, audi­ences are putting on their running shoes to keep up with everybody. 
Thursday night, the Migration Performance Group will hold an in­formal showing of its own works and works by students in MPG ar­tistic director Darla Johnson's im­provisation and performance clasa. 
"We start with a little warm-up to show people what that's all about," said Johnaon. "I've taught them a phrase of material and they Yr:i}l each do something with that phrase. That lets people see how different people work." 
MPG company members will perform Tim Mateer's Headlock, arid excerpts from Johnson's As Birds Fly By. Johnson describes the piece as "about being in love with being in love. It is my way of look­ing at people in your life that are sometime& here for a short time to be a catalyst for change in your life." The company premieres the entire work in San Antonio on May 5 and 6. 
The Austin performance is at 8 
p.m. Thursday at the Invisible Inc. Studio, atthe corner ofSan Gabriel and 24th streets. Admi.saion is by donation. For information call 471­4811. 
Coming up Saturday is the Sharir Dance Company's Annual Gala Spring Performance. This 

ear the gueats are Japanese hue­
d-and-wife Butoh dancers Eiko 
and Koma. (Butoh is the avant­
garde Japanese style that waa 
created in the '60s in Northern Ja­
pan, but baa found a more welcome 
home in New York and Paris.) 
iko and Koma will perform Groin, 
work which meditates on the birth of rice. The joint perfor· mance with the Sharir Company begins at 8 p.m. For information call 443-1305. 
Sarah Brumgart, who baa been 
etting considerable national at­
ntion, will present her annual Austin program on March 31 and April 1 at Synergy Studio, 1601 W. Fifth St. 
Steve Paxton begins hia work­shop April 1. Paxton's Austin stay Will include performance& April 7-9 and panel diacuaaiona. For infor­mation call Dance Umbrella at 327­0227. 

Dance 
Jerry Young 
1 

Urban Bush Women, a lO·mem­ber troupe of Black women dancers, bring& a combination of movement and eong that bonows from African and African-Ameri­can folklore. The company was formed in 1984 by Jawole Willie Jo Zollar, and its spiritually energetic and outspoken style baa won a tre· mendous international following. Thursday the company will give free performances at 10:30 a.m. at Givens Recreation Center and at 
1:30 p.m. at Maplewood Elemen­tary School Regular performances will be at 8 p.m. Friday and Satur­day at the UT Opera Lab Theatre. For information call 477-1064. 
Saying that "only fools perform all day,'' the Deborah Hay Dance Company will premiere the Aviator in four performances on April 1. With music by Ellen Fullman, Hay's choreography for eight dancera was shown in informal per­formance& in her home in January and February. Performancea are at noon and 3, 6 and 9 p.m. atthe Bal­let Austin Academy, 3002 Guada­lupe St. All proceeds go to Christopher House, a residential 
hospice and care center for people with AIDS, and to the Texae Alli­ance of Acupuncturists, which is lobbying for acupuncture legisla­tion in Texaa. 
Saturday night with Ruth and Bob: As you entered the Green Studio on East Sixth last Saturday night, a computer-gener· ated voice coursed its way down a list of mantras while two video ecreene produced constantly changing mandalas. Bob Price en­tered in Indian garb, and Ruth Al­pert came in and lay motionless before a sort of personal ehrine of props, which included a package of rye cracken and a library book about Jewish feminism. 
Price and Alpert seem aa faacin ­ated with the exotic, bothtechnolo­gical and cultural, as they are obseeaed with the everyday, and this performance tetted the dis­tinctions between the two. Price amplifiedan Oriental bamboo flute as it rolled acroaa the wom and warped elats on the cake·icing­green floor. Alpert's movements are at times very meditative and breathing-conscious and at other times childlike. She played out a scene with two small plastic dolls while Price provided the sound­track and Ric Speed, who occasion­ally left the audience to join in the performance, supplied a wordlff8 
dialogue. 
Therewas a disquieting aspect to Alpert's play. She would toss down a ecarf in disgust, mutter com­plaints or admonish Bob for malc­ing a meae aa ehe tore off the masking tape from the studio floor, wadded it into balls and stuck it on a chair. Her frustration waa re­
lieved with a wildly t1ailing dance that aent her leaping and twirling across the floor, past the electronic kaleidoecopes that kept indiffer­ently flashing their patterns. In these moments Alpert reminds you that, although she focuaea mostly on simple, commonplace move­ments and Jong-held poses, she baa traditional dancing talents and skille that ahe can draw on when ehe needs them. 
This is improviaation and, like the weather, it'a hard to tell ifsome gentle breeze will die out in a few eeconda or tum into a hurricane, and neither you nor the performers knows exactly where the piece i8 going to end. Like a dying operatic character, when you think every­one baa had their say, someone goes off in a new direction and the game goes into overtime. At the end, the three performers eat let­ting the silence ripen, and like the momentofjudgmenton To Tell the Truth, made us wonder which one was going to give thesignal thatthe piece should be over. 



Choreography and allegory 
Sbarir Dance Company's Annual GaJa Performance builds slowly 
By Jerry Young 
Special to the Amerlean-Stateeman 
The Sharir Dance Company in­vited New York-based Japanese performers Eiko and Koma to share its Annual Gala Performance Saturday night at the Paramount Theatre for a performance of Grain. 
Grain ia most of all a ceremony about death and food, presented as a aeries ofvignettes performed on a white rectangular platform. In the opening scene, Eiko appeared as a corpse that had fallen on the stage. Lying face down with her head twisted awkwardly to one side, her weight was on her shoulders and knees, and her movement, confined to her lower body, was a hopeless struggle to move herself. The scene ends, the lights go down, and when the next scene begins we see a pile of grain where she had been. 
In another scene, Koma carried a tray overflowing with steamed rice topped with two burning candles, reminding ua of a grim metaphor we have come to overlook on our own birthday cakes. The scene ends when be smashes the candles into the rice. 
Like most ceremonies, all is not easily revealed and events unfold slowly. The viewer can leave (dark­ening the stage between aections provided cover for the numerous deserters) or stay and try to find the slow pulse of the piece. As ag­gravation turned to calmneaa, one could savor the work's charged am­biguities and austere nuances. 

Review 

Just as the stark surface they danced on drew the eye to subtle patterns made by the piles ofgrain, the slownesa added weight to oth­erwise simple events. Well into the piece, when Eiko and Koma made physical contact for the first time, one was riveted by Eiko's contorted toe& as they pressed into Koma's flesh, a moment that would have been lost at a faster tempo. 
The Sharir Dance Company opened the program with de la nuit ... le jour, choreographed by Yacov Sharir and Jose Luis Busta­mante. As with Grain, there is an allegory atwork here, something in the genre of Night of the LwinB Dead. The work is divided into five loosely connected tales. As the tell­erofthese tales Bustamante acts as a &Ort of master of ceremonies ­an oddly dandified stranger in this strange land, with the sensitivity of a mime in a community where folks sometimes travel in packs and on 
all fours. 
The rest of the dancers wear 
soiled-looking, flesh-tone body 
stockings to drive home the point 
thatthese are creatures with differ­
ent social expectations than our 
own. For the most part, their feet 
are set far apart, the legs are bowed 
and the body stays rigid, like toy 
"action figures," limbs are rigid 
and all movement ia from the 
joints, giving the men especially a 
kind ofmonstrous and often comic dumbness as they skip around and rotate their heads to see from side to side. 
Inthe end jt appears that Busta­mante willjoin the pack as he is rit­ually stripped of his fashionable duds. But the conversion is incom­plete, and the piece ends with him still as outsider wearing only his designer underwear amongst all these perplexed and elemental creatures. 
The full-length work is a major undertaking and was expertly danced by the SDC and guests Lynne Grossman and Woody Mc­Griff. The work drags a bit, and while there is some impressively ingenious and theatrical choreog­raphy here, the work is cluttered with filler and schtick borrowed from other SOC dances. It's a • strong work, hut in this case, its punch is diminished by a slow de· livery. 



Something new 
'2nd Texas New Dance Festival shows off latest from around the state 
By Jerry Young 
Special to the Arnerlcan-St1teem1n 
New dance in Texas, like new dance any­where, ia difficult to categorize. There ia a near­ly unlimited source of influencea, and many more ways in which those influences are combined. 
For newcomer Woody McGriff, who ia com­pleting hie first year on the dance faculty at the University ofTexas, this state ot'fers a chance to take the time to develop ideas that the fast pace of New York doesn't. 
"In New York you always feel like you have to prove something," he said. "And you getwrapped up in the trends. Here I think it's easier for your ideas to come from inside instead of the outside." 
Aa part ofihe Second Texas New Dance Fes­tival, McGriff will perform hie solo Looking Gia#, which be created in New York when be wu a member of the Bill T. Jones/Amie Zane Dance Company. It started with an abatract framework that set very alow-moving eectioD8 against very rapid ones. The more he danced it, the more it took on a story. 
"I felt like I wu a being traveling through apace at hie own slow apeed that somehow plopped into New York City at rush hour. To survive in New York, you have to deal with that energy." 
Houston dancer/choreographer Farrell Dyde will perform hia solo Stilmata. Dyde said he of­ten takea on specific characters in the works he dances, and in this one he ia a "40· or 60-year­old priest who got trapped in profe88ionaliem. He ia thoroughly familiar with lhe Bible, but couldn't find the aimple meaaage that God is love." 
Austin dancer Diana Prechter is reviving The Beach Piece, which she created shortly after moving to Austin on New Year's Day, 1980. The 

Woody McGrlff: 'Here (In Austin) I think It's ~asler for your Ideas to come from Inside.' 
work describes a shy 17-year-old'a day at a New Jeraey beach. 
It was a piece that introduced Precht.er to 
many in the Austin dance community. "A lot of 
people remember it and people seem to mention 
it in unusual places," she said. One ofthose peo­
ple is Yacov Sharir, who asked Precht.er to bring 
s1c0Ab TEXAS NEW 
DANCE FESTIVAL 
Featurlnt: Farrell Oyde, The Sharlr Dance Company, Diana Prechter, Heywood "Woody" McGrtff When: 8 p.m. Thursday through Saturday Whw9: Capitol City Playhouse Admlulon: $8; $8 for students and seniors lnftirmatlon: 472-29&6 
it back out for the festival. 
This ia her rmt Austin performance since her 
second child was born in October. She admit$ 
motherhood bu affected the way ahe now ap­
proaches The Beach Piece. ''I am more playful 
with it now. I feel the weilht oh lot ofthe aeri­
ouane11 thathmqtwo clUldren brinp on you, 
but ba'rint t..-o ehildMn brilJ.I out a childhood 
MDM ofMil.ht -that these• a hiller ranp of 
~-:'--
Tbe SMrlr o.nce Compey will perferm Meuoluna., Mled on a poem by Ellen Sollod. The ftnt p.nwu choreo_J?APhed by Sbarir, and the eeeGDd byJoae Luis Bustamante. According to Buatamante, the two purpoeely did not collaborate. 
"We ~antto see what happens when you put two different dances baaed on the eame poem back to back." Buatamante saw Sharir'a contri­bution for the firat time last week, and he aaid Sharir worked with the rhythm of the poem while Buetamante developed the story. 
· Coincidentally, there are connections· between the two reaults. 
"The poem mak• a loose reference to a third 
person, and there uema to be a third peraon it 
both worke,'* Bustamante said. "Like an imagi I nary peraon." 
AustinAmerica~Statesman 
Aptil 1989 
RECOMMENDED: THE SHARIR DANCE CO. Tl'le Second Texas New Dance Festival at Capltol Ci· 
ty Playhouse, 214 W. 4th St., takes place from Tl1urs~ 
April 27·Sat., April 29, Spm. Tne Festival will include 
performances by the Farrell Oyde Dance Theatre ol 
Houston and Austlmtes Woody McGrlff and Tina 
Marsh. Oyde Is a talented dancer and choreographer 
and this Is an excellent opportunity to watch him 
and his company.Tickets tor the show are S8 with a 
$2discount for seniors and students. Formore Info 
call Carol Adams at 476-518S. 


THE SHARIR DANCE COMPANY 
In the World Premiere: "Ml'ZZAL<JNA" 
FARRELL DYDE DANCE THEATRE 
HEYWOOD ''WOODY" MCGRIFF 
DIANA PRECHTER 
TINA MARSH 


The Austin Chronicle April 28, l989 

AL 
THE SHARIR DANCE COMPANY In th., World Prl'mierr: MfZZAlU:';A 
FARREU DYDE DANCE THEATRE 
HEYWOOD "WOODY'' MCGRIFF 
DIANA PRECHTER 
TINA MARSH 






Local dancer studies in France 

Auatin-baeed choreographer Jose Luis Bustamante, 28, was one of 10 young choroeo­graphen selected for the Ameri­can Dance Festival Young Choreographer& Franco-Ameri­can Bilateral Exchange, orga­nized as part of the celebration of the bicentennial of the French revolution. 
On July 1, Bustamante left for a three-week visit to France where he will work with French choreographera and dance com­panies. 
Bustamante, who is complet· ing a master's degree in Theatri­cal Deaign from the University ofTexas, baa been a member of the Sharir Dance Company since 1984 and its resident chor­eographer since 1986. 
-Jerrr Young 
Austin American-Statesman Jun& 1989 




Hwnor carrries new Sharir program 

By Sondra Lomas: 
Special to the Arnetlcan-5tetfl911'1an 
Yacov Sharir will try almost anything once, choreographically speaking. Over the years, the Sharir Dance Company members have danced while carrying tree limbs in their mouths, pour­ingsand onto the floor, imitating apes and even singing a cappella. Sham's choreography can be traditional, surreal, confusing, .symbolic or ab­. stract, but his dances are usually thought-pro­voking, even ifthey don't always appeal to you. 
In his latest program, titled "Thirty-Two Feet in a Basket," Sharir ventured.into the realm ofcomedy. The Thursday night premiere of Conversations introduced a well-crafted duet which is technically clever and very, very funny. 
While chattering non-stop and constantly in­
terrupting each other, Lynne Grossman and 
Kate Warren ambled onstage at the Synergy 
Studio, engro111ed in a conversation on what it 
means to dance. Seldom completing a sentence, 
the two nodded heads in agreement, gesticulat­
ing and pushing against each other for empha-

Austin American-Statesman 
saturdey, June 3, 1989 
.. 
f 
. I 

sis. As themusic by George Rochberg began, the conversation became pantomime, lips silently mouthing, "Oh, I know what you mean," while the arm gestures melted into full body move­ments echoing the rhythms of both speech and music . 
Like kittens cavorting in slow motion, the dancers manipulated, tugged and rolled each other's bodies through choreography reminis· centofcontactimprovi~tion. Maintaining con­stant body contact, theyskewed into a variety of shapes while the facial expre88ions and mouths kept moving. When the music stopped, the dia­logue became audible again, including the cryp­tic phrase "Like it's from the pasaion place." 
Sharir has had dancers speak onstage before, but inConversations, he has perfected the gift of gab literally and physically. Grossman and War­ren prattled and mugged convincingly, display­ing the split-second timing crucial to any comedy routine. 
Timing also played an important role in Heywood "Woody" McGriff's Danse de Krishna, an athletic. complex work for six dancers set totraditional Indian music. Built on themes ofshowing, passing and catching move­ment phrases from one group to the next, the dense choreography carved illustrations in space through intricate arm movements. Krishna featured Andrea Beckham in a non­stop solo that used her considerable technical skills. 
Other works on the Thursday program at SynergyStudio included Andrea Ariel's The Tea Party, a barefoot ballet that premiered recently on the Dance Umbrella "WorkOute" program; Jose Luis Bustamante'& Soulless Green, a sym­bolic solo evoking animal imagery; and Sharir's Opus 102, an abstract group work showcas~ the company apprentices and guest dancen from the community. 
"Thirty-Two Feet in a Basket" continues at Synergy Stu.f#io toni&ht at 8 and Sunctay after­noon at 2. 
The Austin Chronicle 

SHARIR DANCE COMPANY choreographer Jose 
Luis Bustamante was recently chosen as one of ten 
young American choreographers lor the American 
Dance Festivals Franco-American Young Choreoo· 
raphers Biiaterai Exchange Program. The program, a 
celebration of France's btcentennlat, allows lor ten 
American and ten French choreographers to switch 
countries for three weeks The eKchange " Is de· 
signed to give these emerging artists an opportunly 
to explore the artistic similarities between the two 
countries. Fur1hering historic ties Jn dance between 
France and the United States, the proleaslonal ex· 
change will allow the U.S. choreographers an In· 
depth learning experience through visits to the Mont· 
pelier Festival, Alx Dance Festival, Avignon Feauval and other dance lnslttutlons, as well as the oppor· tunlty to par11cipate In dance classes and workshops with world-renowned teachers and choreographers " Bustamante has won several awards for his choreog­raphy and this trip Is certainly a feather In his cap. 
Atta boy, Jose. 
Dann· l mbrdla Ne\\slctkr 
Young Choreographer Broadens Horizons 

by Phyllis A. Slattery 
I set up an inteNiew with Jose Luis Bustamante a couple ofweeks ago. Afterseeing him perform with the Sharir Company for the pastfew years and enjoying his choreography, I was looking forward to talking to one ofAustin's up and coming choreog­raphers atx:Jut his work, his trip to France this summer. and dance in general. 
Jose Luis Bustamante, dancer and resident choreographer with the Sharir Dance Company, will be traveling to France this month as part of the Franco-American Bilateral Choreographer's Exchange Program. Jose was selected as one of ten choreographers nationwide to participate in the program. 
This exchange, part of the International Professiona1 Services Program of the American Dance Festival, will send ten dancers from the U.S. to France and ten from France to the U.S. for three weeks this summer. 
The purpose of the exchange is to give dancers the opportunity to explore the artistic similarities and differences between the two countries. As well as participating in dance classes and workshops with renowned teachers, Jose will visit the Montpellier Dance Festival, Ajx Dance Festival, Avignon Festival, and a variety of dance institutions. 
Jose received a B.F.A. in Communications from the lnstituto Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey. While at the school, he began dancing. He also found time to come to Austin each summer to take classes at Dance Associates, where he met Yacov Sharir. When Jose finally moved here in 1984to pursue a M.F.A. in Theatrical Design at UT, he was asked to join the Sharir Dance Company. 
In 1985, Jose's choreographic career took off. He entered his first big piece, "Aoks," in Dance Umbrella's WorkOuts and in competition at the American College Dance Festival. Not only was Jose selected as a finalist in both programs, his choreography caught the attention of artistic director Sharir, who asked Jose to set "Aoks" on his company. A year later, Jose became Sharir's resident choreographer. 
He will soon graduate from The University of Texas with a degree in Theatrical Design, rather than Dance. "I'm interested in seeing what happens with all this training," Jose explains. "How I can incorporate it into dance-or simply see what it does to me as a choreographer. I've always taken into consideration the theatrical part of dance. When you put dance in a theater, there are many options to explore. The problem has always beenhowto experiment; it's very expensive. 
I'm very interested in treating the scenery and sound as systems of information and in how to give information from different perspectives." 
Jose admits he doesn't use a particular dance vocabulary. "I like to explore whatever the subject is for my dances. I like to come up with movement that I've never done before, so it's not based on a specific technique. Different pieces require different structures. I'm still searching. I usually work from piece to piece. I try not to do what I've done before since it usually doesn't work the second time around. 
"I use to think that you should plan and write continusously. When I did that I always ended up with too much, too many ideas. Now Iwork through a piece in my head. I like things that are not blocked, shaped, locked. 
continued on page 5 

3/July 1989 
''Waterworks" continued 
This will be the fourth i~mation of "Waterworks." The other performances were in 1979, 1982, and 1985. According to Dee, the first version was a very grueling affair for the performers and audience. It used both deep and shallow ends of the pool, and moving a very large audience around resulted in "long pauses for the dancers, who subsequently froze while waiting," Dee remembers. 
My first performance was the 1982 "Waterworks," which hooked me. I am now a co-choreographer for the event and can vouch for the changes. 
Eachyearwehavecondensed and refined the piece, using less and 
Dance l 'mbrella Newsletter 
less of the deep end and continually tightening and improving the movement and images that are used. 
Over the years, numbers of participants have varied. The '89 version will have about 25-30 aquadancers and 10-15 musicians, who will be coordinated by Gene Menger. This year,we offered 'Waterworks" as a six-week workshop­class through Austin Community College. These students are joined by some veteran guest artists, like Doug Dyer and Bobbi OeAngelis, who were in the original1979 version. 
And what exactly will the public experience? 
"It's very magical," says Dee. "Plant, animal,fish,and human images unfold and seem to flow into 
each other, moving in and out of, primarily. the shallower end of the Springs. 
''The piece is about 50 minutes long and by starting at 8:00 PM,we'll finish right about sunset. This leaves the piece with a very special, somewhat magical feeling." 
The performance is free and we encourage folks to arrive early, as we aways till the park to capacity. Hope to see you at the pool. 
Lynn Raridon 
"Waterworl<s, #Barton Springs, 8:00 PM, July 8. Admission: Free. Ca/1479-6724 for information. The program is sponsoredbyAustin Community College, Barton Springs Pool, and City ofAustin Parl<s and Recreation Department. 

4/July 1989 
Dann.· l mhrdla '\t'''"ktlt·r 
Summer Classes continued 
and art, performances, readings and critiques by some of the south's most exciting and original performing artists, late-night music and dancing, swimming, and more. Total costtor five and a half days (food, lodging, registration) is less than $200. Call 
[404] 577-1079 tor information. 
TAI CHI RETREATwith Heloise Gold in the magnificent mountains of northern New Mexico. Package includes delicious vegetarian meals. sweat lodge ceremony, singing around the campfire. August 6-12; $285. Space is limited. so call soon: 444-6139. 

Choreographer from page 3 
I don't like hermetic things to start with,so I'm always looking for what will happen in rehearsal. I'd rather have a loose idea or pattern and then see what happens. It's hard for me to produce a process when I'm not sure of what it is. It needs to be part idea, part discovery." 
Jose says that humor in choreography is something he finds himself unable to resist, but only when it happens naturally. 
"I never look for it because when I do, it ends up being stupid or silly. I like to keep the freshness. Some­times those things are a result of being in a rehearsal and doing something out of the blue-and it works-and you want to keep it. It's part of the atmosphere of relating, when you start relating in the space with other dancers. Often, as I you make a value judgment on what you are seeing, that is all you will get in the end. If there is a block, then nothing is there, and you cannot go back to the piece-you cannot enjoy it. Oftentimes, you cannot discover the joy and pleasure in going to see art. I think this is another option for the future of dance. Can we discover other ways of looking at dance? 
Is it our responsibility as artists to adjust our work to current trends? I think it has to do with the pace of how things are happening and how those processes are affecting our perceptions. Basically, I think we need to explore what needs to be explored and call it whatever it needs to be called. There are so many interconnections now. For me, anything that can contribute to your ideas is what you should focus on." 

Bustamantein S.D.C.'.s "!@#$%/\&?Ballet." Photos by Jon Leatherwood. 
work on a piece, I will see the possi­bilities for humor in contradictions or weird gestures. They happen and I keep them." 
We asked Jose about the role of future audiences in creative process and he replied, "Is it the person who creates it orthe person who looks at it? Sometimes it could be both, but the question also means that whenever we look at something we are the ones who can bring something different to it;we can see it in a new way. Whether we can educate an audience to see differently is something for the future. 
I think it's very scientific. I've been reading a lot about quantum mechanics and it all comes from there. The role of the person who observes has a lot to do with the outcome. As an audience member, every time 
Jose is thrilled with the chance to visit France and spend his time exclusively on dance. His selection caught him by surprise. 
"For such a long time I have tried to involve myself with choreographing or dancing and I've always had to do it on the side. I was doing it in the last hours of the day, which is very frus­
trating and very con­suming. Now, I am in a situation where lean work with it fulltime­andbe consumed by it legitimately." 

5/July 1989 
Dann· l 'mhrdla :\t.•\\~ll'lt<.·r 

Announcements 
DU and ACOT will present "1 O Minutes Max," two evenings of new performance works, August 25-26, at Synergy Studio, 1501 W. 5th. If you are interested in performing, contact DU at 322-0227 to receive an entry form. 
Dance Umbrella is now offering its members a reduced subscription rate to Dance Magazine. With this special arrangement, a year's subscription will now cost only $15.00 ($10.00 off regular subscription and $21.50 off news-stand price!). 
This offer extends only to current members ot DU. Your $15 payment should be made to DU (with notation on check earmarking it for subscription), and should include your correct address. DU will send the group subscription to Dance Magazineon September 1, so 
Newsletter Deadline is 
the 15th 
of every month 

we need your subscription before then. Processing takes six to eight weeks, and subscriptions will begin with the October issue. 
DU has noticed some members, particularly out-of-town members, have been receiving their newsletters late. There is not much we can do about this, as the post office has a new routing and bulk mail system that seems to have technically regressed rather than progressed. We are sorry about this inconvenience but it is out of our hands. 

BALLET AUSTIN ACADEMY offers an Intensive Summer Workshop starting June 5. Faculty includes Ballet Austin dancers Stephen Miiis and Pamela Kawai, Academy faculty members Linda Divin and Rick Miiland, and special guest artist, Lynne Grossman. Dancers should be 10-20 years old with at least three years of training. Placement will be at an audition Saturday, June 3, 2:00 PM, 3002 Guadalupe. Call the Academy at 476­9051 for further information. 
SHARIA DANCE COMPANY SCHOOL Summer Session includes Beginning, Intermediate, and Advanced Modem; Intermediate Ballet I & II: Super-Aerobic Workout; and Aerobic Tone-Up. Faculty members are Yacov Sharir, Kate Fisher Warren, Lynne Grossman, Andrea Ariel, Carol Smith Adams, and Toni Bravo. Call 452-9132 or320-8704 for registration. 
THE BENNINGTON CHOREOGRAPHY PROJECT, July 30-August 20, is an intensive, studio­oriented study program limited to 16 students seriously 
involved in making dance.Students will work on their ideas under the guidance of a faculty composed of professional choreographers, dancers, and teachers. 
The first week will be largely devoted to workshops given by faculty, and the second and third weeks to studio time with one-day guest workshops on weekends. The fee for the three-week program is $850, which includes room and board and tuition. 
To apply contact Tony Carruthers, Acting Director; The Bennington Choreography Project; Bennington College; Bennington, VT 05201; (802} 442-5401 Ext. 202. 
JO ANN SCHATZwillteachsummertapdance classes for adults beginning May 30. Beginning Tap will meet Tuesdays and Thursdays 6:00-7:00 PM. Intermediate level meets Tuesdays and Thursdays 7:00­
8:00 PM. The studio is located at8018 Mesa. Call Jo Ann at476-1413 for more information. 
DARLA JOHNSON, artistic director of Migration Performance Group, announces a new session of "Improvisation and Performance." Classes will begin Monday, June 26, at Invisible Inc., 2.:th and San Gabriel, Mondays and Thursdays, 7:00·8:30 PM. Cost is $5 per class. Based on elements of improvisation and contemporary technique, the class is designed to develop the students' body awareness while they express their creativity through movement. No dance experience is necessary. A daytime class will also be offered, with time and location to be announced. For more information on these classes, contact Darla Johnson at 441-0638. 
ALTERNATE ROOTS' 13TH ANNUAL MEETING will be held in Black Mountain, North Carolina, August 27-Sept. 1. This summer arts camp for adults includes master classes, passionate discussions of politics 
continued on page 5 
2/July 1989