Elaine Summers: Windows in the Kitchen (1981) & Invitation to Secret Dancers (1973)

Windows In the Kitchen (1981)

Choreography: Elaine Summers

Music: Jon Gibson

Performers: Douglas Dunn, Matt Turney

Invitation to Secret Dancers (1973)

Participating dancers: Kiori Kawai, Harriet Bograd, Dale Andree, Elissa White, Tina Erfer, Marion Ramirez, Richard Jochum, and more

Music: Carman Moore

Windows in the Kitchen (1981) was shot at the Kitchen's old performance space on Broome Street. Matt Turney dances with the light from large loft windows. For this special occasion, Douglas Dunn will dance with Matt Turney in the projection. Preservation of this film was made possible by a grant from the Women's Film Preservation Fund of New York Women in Film & Television.

Note: It is with great sadness that we have to announce Jon Gibson’s passing October 11th, 2020. He and Elaine had been longtime collaborators since likely the days of Judson. Our thoughts go out to Jon’s family and friends, his amazing and equally illustrious colleagues, who formed an entire era in US-American cultural development. Please see the New York Times for a beautiful obituary, showing him with Douglas Dunn and Matt Turney.

Invitation to Secret Dancers (1973)’s participatory dance score by Elaine Summers is for everybody. Because everybody is a dancer.

"Ordinary movements as a basis for free and open improvisation. There will be music which may or may not be followed. There will be projections. We hope you love the image of people dancing in many places. One may dance all alone or join friends or make friends."

It has been performed in numerous concerts, usually at the end of the program. There are safety rules that make the dance score fun and safe. If there are children, yours or somebody else's, keep them close and gentle. If you need space, find a place. Stay within the boundaries of the stage. It is great fun dancing with people and around them. You know the dance - it is your dance. We long to see it.

Music by Carman Moore, who in 2020 has been chosen Visionary Artist of the Year by Composers Now. Congratulations Carman!

The film was made of photos from another Invitation to Secret Dancers at Solar 1, a New York Downtown Green Energy Education Center, in 2005.

Elaine Summers, MA, (1925-2014) Fulbright Fellow, MIT fellow (CAVS) received her BA in Visual Arts in Boston, MA, and came to New York City in 1953 to study dance at Juilliard. She has worked and lived here ever since and became one of the founders of the legendary workshop that would form the Judson Dance Theatre. She realized the first intermedia performance piece Ouverture in 1962 and developed a dizzying array of intermedia Film/Dance performances throughout her career, such as Crow's Nest at the Guggenheim Museum in 1980 and Energy Changes at MOMA in 1973. She founded the Experimental Intermedia Foundation and originated the movement approach Kinetic Awareness®.

She has worked with people as diverse as Trisha Brown, Davidson Gigliotti, Otto Piene, Nam June Paik, Malcolm Goldstein, the Wooster Group, Meredith Monk, Pauline Oliveros, amongst others. Her latest project, Skytime was a web-based Concept Artwork that invites all the world to celebrate the sky together in any relatable medium.

Since her passing in 2014, Elaine’s artist-interests are taken care of by the Artistic Estate of Elaine Summers, facilitated by the Kinetic Awareness® Center and with special thanks to the Jerome Robbins Dance Division, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. www.elainesummersdance.com

"Many many thanks to all of our Rainbow Makers!" Women's Film preservation Fund of New York Women in Film & Television, Emily Harvey Foundation, New York Public Library - Jerome Robbins Dance Division, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Fales Library, The Kitchen, Davidson Gigliotti, Jay Clayton, Douglas Dunn, Jon Gibson, Juliette Mapp, Dan Streible, Tanisha Jones, Linda Murray, Drake Stutesman, Terry Lawler, Judy Hussie-Taylor, Meg Chang, Gloria McLean, Levi Gonzarez, Movement Research, Joanna Steinberg, Sally Sommer, Bonnie Maranca, Gia Kourlas, Roselee Goldberg, Karen Helmerson, Pauline Oliveros + lone, Russell Connor, Bonnie Maranca, Geoff Hendricks, Pearl Bowser, Ingrid Wiegand, Jenneth Webster This performance is endorsed by the Artistic Estate of Elaine Summers, with special thanks to Kinetic Awareness® Center, Inc. and the Jerome Robbins Dance Division, the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

Dianne Mclntyre: Love Poems to God (Excerpt, 1992)

Concept: Hannibal Lokumbe & Dianne McIntyre

Music & Poetry: Hannibal Lokumbe

Choreography: Dianne McIntyre

Performer: Dianne McIntyre

Vocals: Tulivu

Costume: Brenda Brunson-Bey

Videography: Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

Dianne McIntyre is a choreographer, dancer, director, and dance-driven dramatist whose work appears in concert dance, theatre, film and opera.  Her company Sounds in Motion toured internationally from 1972 to 1988.  The Sounds in Motion studio, based in Harlem, offered classes, nurtured many dance artists, produced concerts, and was a major hub for artists to exchange ideas.  McIntyre creates new works on her own companies and the following:  Dance Theatre of Harlem, Dayton Contemporary Dance Company, Dallas Black Dance Theatre, Dancing Wheels, Philadanco!, GroundWorks Dance Theater, and Cleo Parker Robinson Dance.  In 1991 she reconstructed Helen Tamiris’ “How Long, Brethren? Her work has been at the Joyce Theater, Jacob’s Pillow, American Dance Festival, New York City Center, Kennedy Center, BAM, New York Live Arts, European and US concert halls.  Some signature dance works: “Life’s Force”, “Take-Off from a Forced Landing”, “Deep South Suite”, “Love Poems to God.”

McIntyre has choreographed for Broadway, London’s West End and for over 40 regional theatre productions.  Her own works for theatre: “I Could Stop on a Dime and Get Ten Cents Change” and “Open the Door, Virginia!” Screen works include “Beloved” and “Miss Evers’ Boys” (Emmy nomination). Close collaborators have been with Olu Dara, Ahmed Abdullah, Hannibal Lokumbe, Ntozake Shange, Lester Bowie, Regina Taylor, Don Pullen and Cecil Taylor. She is the co-director with Risa Steinberg of the Hicks Choreography Fellows Program at Jacob’s Pillow.

Awards include: 2020 United States Artist Fellowship, 2019 Dance/USA Honor Award, 2016 Doris Duke Artist Award, 2010 Workforce Fellowship, Guggenheim Fellowship, 3 Bessie Awards, 2 AUDELCO Awards, ADF Distinguished Teaching Chair, Honorary Fine Arts Degrees from SUNY Purchase and Cleveland State University.  Dianne McIntyre graduated in Dance from The Ohio State University and her mentors are Elaine Gibbs Redmond, Vera Blaine, Gus Solomons jr, Louise Roberts and Dr. Richard Davis. Interviews about her work appear in “the Grand Union” by Wendy Perron and “Dance We Do” by Ntozake Shange.