Photo: Wah-Ming Chang
SOLD OUT! WONDER is a new solo created and performed by dancer Michelle Boulé with sound by Carmine Covelli and lighting design by Natalie Robin, premiering as part of ISSUE's Emerging Artists Commission program. In WONDER, Michelle Boulé mines the depth of information and perceptual patterns she has acquired through a lifetime of dance. Her choreographic drive, pushing her body into new dimensions of exposure, questions the culture of facades embedded in everyday life. In a continuous cycle of costumes and personas, Boulé explores archetypes and definitions of gender, identity, and virtuosity. The dance, which happens in the round, is meant to engage the audience in a purposeful relationship with the performer to mutually explore seeing and being seen. WONDER is an invitation to witness a body in the performance encounter where a shared space of curiosity and possibility is laid bare. Without wonder our eyes are closed.
Sound Design: Carmine Covelli,
Lighting Design: Natalie Robin
Michelle Boulé is a performer, choreographer, and teacher based in New York. Her work has been shown in New York at Dance and Process at The Kitchen, Center for Performance Research, Movement Research Festival at Judson Church, Food for Thought at Danspace Project, Catch Series, and Issue Project Room. She has been a choreographic assistant and performance coach for Deborah Hay solo adaptations, including an adaptation presented by El Auditorio in Tenerife, Spain. In 2010, she was an artist-in-residence at DanceHouse in Dublin, Ireland and a participant at the SKITE residency in Caen, France. She received a 2012 space grant from Brooklyn Arts Exchange and is a 2012-14 NY Movement Research Artist- in-Residence.
She has collaborated and performed in every group piece by Miguel Gutierrez and the Powerful People since 2001, and received a 'Bessie' for her performance as James Dean and collaboration in the creation of Last Meadow. Other dance artists she has worked with include John Scott, Deborah Hay, (William Forsythe commission If I Sing to You), David Wampach, John Jasperse, Donna Uchizono, Neal Medlyn, Christine Elmo, Neal Beasley, Beth Gill, Judith Sanchez-Ruiz, Doug Varone (Metropolitan Opera Ballet, Opera Colorado), and Gabriel Masson. She collaborates with cellist/composer Okkyung Lee and has also worked with playwright/director Rosie Goldensohn. She is part of the teaching faculty at The New School and Movement Research in New York. She has also been faculty at Hollins University and the University of Illinois as well as a guest teacher at other dance institutions in North America, Europe, Australia and Asia. She was a 2002 DanceWeb scholarship recipient at Impulstanz in Vienna. She received her B.F.A. from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.
Press:
5/26/13 Peeling Back The Layers, Siobhan Burke on Michelle Boulé's WONDER in the New York Times
5/24/13 Michelle Boulé in conversation with Matthew Walker in Movement Research's Critical Correspondence
11/23/12 Michelle Boulé, Dancer-Artist at Work, Claudia LaRocco interviews Boulé in the New York Times
