<em>Approaching ecstasy</em> Pours Cavafy’s Poetry into Liquid Bones in Suits

Approaching ecstasy Pours Cavafy’s Poetry into Liquid Bones in Suits

There’s no question that Cavafy is a major poet, but his reputation had to wait until society caught up to him. Though he worked as a nondescript ministry clerk for years, Cavafy made of his poetry a treasure house of the erotic, sensual, visceral–every fleeting thing that shot through the body, he trapped not in amber but in ink, refusing (as Auden later wrote of him) “to pretend that his memories of moments of sensual pleasure are unhappy or spoiled by feelings of guilt.” Continue reading Approaching ecstasy Pours Cavafy’s Poetry into Liquid Bones in Suits

For Whim W’Him’s Olivier Wevers, A New Dance is Life or Death

For Whim W’Him’s Olivier Wevers, A New Dance is Life or Death

No one needs to tell choreographer Olivier Wevers that a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. On the same bill with his death penalty dance, thrOwn, this weekend at the Intiman, are two lighter works: la langue de l’amour, a “very naughty” solo for Chalnessa Eames; and Flower Festival, with August Bournonville’s flirtatious, teasing pas de deux, Flower Festival in Genzano, re-imagined for two men who begin the dance in suits, but then there arises a “jousting” feeling, says Wevers, promising very “kinetic” movement. Continue reading For Whim W’Him’s Olivier Wevers, A New Dance is Life or Death

PNB’s Season Encore a Momentous Farewell to Eight Dancers

PNB’s Season Encore a Momentous Farewell to Eight Dancers

Five dances into Pacific Northwest Ballet’s Season Encore last Sunday night, I got sick to my stomach. It suddenly became viscerally apparent to me just how much we are losing with the departure of eight PNB dancers: Chalnessa Eames, Barry Kerollis, Ariana Lallone, Stacy Lowenberg, Stanko Milov, Josh Spell, Jeffrey Stanton, and Olivier Wevers.

“The end of an era,” said the couple next to me. Continue reading PNB’s Season Encore a Momentous Farewell to Eight Dancers