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Let’s dance
Yvonne Rainer at the Carpenter Center, and Charles Atlas’s films about Rainer and others at the ICA
BY RANDI HOPKINS
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Social activism and art have never been mutually exclusive to pioneering experimental filmmaker and choreographer Yvonne Rainer. And even though reconciling avant-garde æsthetic activity with utopian strategies for political change has proved more difficult in recent decades than it was when the artist first stepped onto the cultural stage in the early 1960s, Rainer has maintained her quirky sense of humor right along with her status quo–challenging stance. Born in San Francisco in 1934 to immigrant anarchist parents, she studied dance in New York in the early 1960s with cutting-edge choreographers including Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham, and in 1962, as a member of a workshop based on composer John Cage’s principle of chance methods, she became a founding member of the famed Judson Dance Theater, a company that was revolutionary in its practice of bringing non-dancers, including musicians, poets, visual artists, and filmmakers, as well as everyday movements into performance. A retrospective of her work comes to town as Harvard’s Carpenter Center opens "Yvonne Rainer: Radical Juxtapositions 1961–2002" next Thursday, with Rainer herself in attendance to give a lecture about her work at 6 p.m. that evening and an opening reception to follow. Curated by Sid Sachs and recently on view at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, "Radical Juxtapositions" features photographs, posters, manuscripts, films, notebooks, and video by and about this influential artist whose production fits no single category — unless "relentlessly avant-garde" and "indefatigably subversive" are categories. Very busy between 1962 and 1975 presenting her choreography throughout the US and Europe, Rainer began to integrate short films into her live performances in 1968, and in 1972, she completed her first feature-length film, Lives of Performers. Since that time, she has made six more films, addressing themes including power and repression, sexuality, menopause, and marriage, but she’s also continued to choreograph dance performances and create video installations. "Radical Juxtapositions" provides what looks to be a comprehensive overview of this artist’s 40-year joust against convention — an idea whose time, one hopes, has not entirely come and gone. Rainer’s name and work will also come up at the Institute of Contemporary Art when the ICA continues its new "Friday Video Rush: Artists’ Visions of Artists" film series with "An Evening with Charles Atlas" next Friday at 8 p.m. Atlas, a filmmaker known for collaborating with remarkable artists including the outrageous (may he rest in peace) Leigh Bowery, will be on hand to introduce a selection of work including "Rainer Variations" (2002), in which he uses four performers, including Rainer herself and Martha Graham impersonator Richard Move, to create a video-montaged, faux documentary portrait of the artist. The ICA will also present an excerpt from Atlas’s groundbreaking early "Blue Studio: Five Segments" (1975-’76), which evolved from his collaboration with Merce Cunningham, for whose dance company Atlas was filmmaker-in-residence from 1978 to 1983; the short film "Teach" (1992), a portrait of the flamboyant Bower; and "SSS" (1989), which is about the work of performance artist Marina Abramovic. "Yvonne Rainer: Radical Juxtapositions 1961–2002" is at Harvard’s Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, 24 Quincy Street in Harvard Square, March 17 through April 22, with a lecture by Yvonne Rainer on March 17 at 6 p.m., followed by an opening reception; call (617) 495-3251. "An Evening with Charles Atlas" takes place at the Institute of Contemporary Art, 955 Boylston Street in Boston, on March 18 at 8 p.m. as part of the ICA’s "Friday Video Rush: Artists’ Visions of Artists" Film Series. Tickets are $6 for ICA members, students, and seniors and $7 for non-members; call (617) 266-5152.
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