signs and symbols

those there in
Tony Orrico & Cecily Campbell

Thursday, March 23, 2023
7:00pm

Duration: 24 minutes

signs and symbols is pleased to present those there in, a movement investigation by Cecily Campbell in response to Tony Orrico's current exhibition THIS ONE HERE NOW, and featuring an original sound score by Orrico.

O foolish writer. Now moves. Even in storytime, dreamtime, once-upon-a-time, now isn't then.  
–Ursula K. LeGuin

those there in was conceived as an exchange of ideas between Tony Orrico's THIS ONE HERE NOW and Cecily Campbell's moving body of memory. Campbell's dance follows a score, grounded by seven fixed locations in the space, each of which serves as the beginning point for a three minute improvisation. Orrico's original sound score engages the same form and parameters through the act of drawing. His series of recordings become the textural backdrop of Campbell's live investigation, coexisting together in time and place, all the while derivatives of elsewhere.

Landing at a location, Campbell arrives in stillness and searches (without preciousness) for a memory — following sensations that move through her body, and allowing thoughts and imagery to meander through time until she lands on an "island." This island then becomes the physical shape (though in truth, an entirely fluid structure) of the memory itself. Sometimes the island arrives because a memory solidifies, and sometimes the island arrives because a movement arrives that doesn't have anywhere else to go, in which case she stays and looks for a memory there. Once on the island, so to speak, she rests with it for a moment to give the memory room, and then continues on into the improvisation. While she moves, she references the remarkable radial reflection so active in Orrico's drawings, which surround her in the gallery space. Allowing the memory/movement to travel through her body and through her body's sense of time, she invites and re-invites the ideas of intersections, weavings and reflective cross-references within the movement. The memory/movement translates out in new directions/orientations/body parts over the course of three minutes, and then stops (without protest) at the sound of one bell. This process repeats at each location, and the score is complete when she makes one brief and final pass through each one — exposing what is deemed memorable and all that is forgotten.

tony orrico is known for his ingenuity within the intersections of performance and drawing. His works investigate mental and physical endurance, somatic drawing, choreography, bio-geometrics and improvisational practices. Orrico has performed/exhibited his work across the US and internationally in Australia, Belgium, China, Denmark, France, Germany, Mexico, Norway, the Netherlands, Poland and Spain. His visual work is in the permanent collections of The National Academy of Sciences (Washington DC) and Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporáneo (MUAC, Mexico City) as well as prominent private collections such as Grazyna Kulczyk, Kablanc/Fundación Otazu and Bergmeier/Kunstsaele among others. He has presented at the CCCB, Centre Pompidou-Metz, The New Museum and Poptech 2011: The World Rebalancing. Orrico was one of a select group of artists to re-perform the work of Marina Abramovic during her retrospective at MoMA (2010). As a former member of Trisha Brown Dance Company and Shen Wei Dance Arts, Orrico has graced such stages as the Sydney Opera House, Teatro La Fenice, New York State Theater and Theatre du Palais-Royal. In 2020, Orrico was included in the book PERFORMANCE DRAWING: New Practices since 1945, a collection of interviews and essays exploring the relationship between drawing and performance, published by Bloomsbury. Orrico is currently an Assistant Professor of Sculpture & Intermedia, and Dance at the University of Iowa, in Iowa City.

cecily campbell was born and raised in Santa Fe, New Mexico and holds a BFA in dance from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. She was a company member of Shen Wei Dance Arts from 2008 to 2013 and joined the Trisha Brown Dance Company in 2012. She has performed repertory spanning Trisha Brown's 40-year career and has taught master classes and workshops around the world in technique, repertory, improvisation and composition. She has re-staged Trisha Brown’s work on multiple companies including Set and Reset/Reset at the Venice Biennale College Danza, Italy; Newark and Foray Forêt on the Lyon Opera Ballet, France; Solo Olos on A.I.M.; Solo Olos at CNDC in Angers, France; and Set and Reset/Reset at The Juilliard School, New York. She also performed in the Bessie award-winning Night of 100 Solos as part of the Merce Cunningham Centennial at Brooklyn Academy of Music and made her Metropolitan Opera debut last fall in The Hours, choreographed by Annie-B Parson.