UT Dallas to present international choreographer Renana Raz

by PegNews wire

The School of Arts and Humanities at The University of Texas at Dallas presents award-winning Israeli choreographer Renana Raz. Raz and the UT Dallas Dance Ensemble will cap the end of her 11-week residency at the University with a performance of her works Dec. 4 at 8 p.m. and Dec. 5 at 2 and 8 p.m. in the University Theatre.

Admission is $10. For tickets, call 972-883-2552, Monday through Friday 2 to 5 p.m. For more information, visit ah.utdallas.edu/events. The University Theatre is located near Drive C in the center of the UT Dallas campus in Richardson.

An Israeli choreographer who has performed her works around the world, Raz began creating independently in 1999. She received the Israeli Ministry of Culture award for young choreographers in 2002 and 2003. Artistic director of the Renana Raz Dance Group in Tel Aviv, her choreographies have been staged in Israel, Brazil, Germany, Poland, Holland, Japan, Denmark, and the U.S. Raz’ works are theatrical explorations of physical expression, investigating the ways that people come together through dance.

Part One of Bach, Britney, BIGGER, Banjo was created in collaboration with UT Dallas dance students. Raz came to Texas with the idea of interpreting Johann Sebastian Bach’s keyboard composition, The Well-Tempered Clavier, into a dance work. Once here, however, she says her experiences compelled her to change her formal vision. Her new work is an associative journey beginning with the music of Bach, and synthesizing these experiences with her creative vocabulary and world view. A collision of American icons with European sensibilities, this dance has seemingly random episodes, mixed images, and energies, which ultimately reveal their own unique logic. Raz references the act of surfing the web -- searches lead to new thoughts, which lead to new searches -- to describe the flow of logic in her new work. Stage design for the new piece is influenced by these images and sensations. Guest dancers from the Dallas community and Southern Methodist University will perform along with the UT Dallas dancers. Raz says of her new work, “It’s like wandering around someone’s mind.”

Part two of Bach, Britney, BIGGER, Banjo is a glimpse into the “backstage” of the creative process, where ideas, images, and sensations blend and mix into a new compound.

“This specific piece was inspired by the music of Jean-Philippe Rameau, my actual time in Dallas, my fantasy about Texas, longing for my homeland, my dreams about horses, cowboys and the legendary Ms. Britney Spears,” said Raz, who will perform the solo work.

In 2004, Raz won the choreography prize at the Annual Theatre Awards from the Jerusalem Khan Theater for the choreography and movement for the play Osher, directed by Miki Gurevitz. During 2006, Raz was presented the Young Artist Rosenblum Award. She has received grants from the Yehoshua Rabinovitz Foundation, the National Lottery Company, BI-ARTS (the British Council’s British Israeli Arts Training Scheme) and the Buchman-Heiman Foundation.

While in Texas, Raz was an artist-in-residence at the UT Dallas Centraltrak near downtown Dallas, with the support of the Schusterman Family Foundation and the UT Dallas School of Arts and Humanities.

Source: UT Dallas