MCA Live: Neighborhood Dances

On select Saturdays during Merce Cunningham: Common Time, local dance companies engage with Merce’s conviction of “common time” to activate the driving themes and concepts behind the exhibition. These collaborative and cross-disciplinary performances demonstrate overlapping relationships between movement, music, fashion, architecture, social media, set, and lighting design.

Neighborhood Dances progenitor Victoria Bradford choreographs dances in public spaces in accordance with a specific set of prompts and parameters that she has developed. These performances are meticulously documented in still- and moving images, and then catalogued and archived on her website.

Now, Bradford invites the public to participate in the project; their contributions will form the basis for the April 15 event. Submissions from the public will be reviewed and three will be selected as source material for choreographed performances by Bradford and staged at the MCA on April 15 as part of Merce Cunningham: Common Time. Four new 20-minute performances begin on the hour (1, 2, 3, and 4 pm), with a 10-minute talkback after each, followed by 30-minute performative rests.