As part of its ongoing Restart Stages initiative – activating and reimagining outdoor public spaces for our new era through artistic and community involvement – Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts presents the world premiere of its latest commission You Are Here. Supported by the Arnhold Dance Innovation Fund (ADIF), the free sculpture, sound, and live performance installation, conceived by award-winning choreographer Andrea Miller (Artistic Director of the Brooklyn-based movement company GALLIM), is open for visitors to experience on the campus’s iconic Hearst Plaza from July 14-30. The project is designed with inclusion integrated throughout, so that all guests can experience the work.
Miller’s co-creation with the Lincoln Center site and the local New York community is focused on processing this past year and the human pursuit of understanding through the alchemy of performance. “I was inspired to create You Are Here in the plazas,” she explained. “Creating a performance is an essential expression of hope, and this piece is a practice of sharing and witnessing each other, of place-making in the heart of an art center, and art-making in the eye of a global storm. It’s a way for me to honor artists and the huge unseen community that makes the arts possible, that makes this labor of rebuilding possible. The title describes it best, I think, I hope.”
Sculptures by Tony Award-winning scenic designer Mimi Lien stand in the place of human beings, each housing a speaker through which audio portraits of New Yorkers are projected in an aural garden by sound artist and composer Justin Hicks. Artists, ushers, security guards, educators, and other staff members of the Lincoln Center family, along with New Yorkers from across the city, tell a story, dance, sing, breathe, or reflect, offering a window into their experiences.
The audio portraits feature Bruce Adolphe (The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center), Kiri Avelar (Ballet Hispánico), Dietrice Bolden (Harlem Week), Jessica Chen (Asian American Arts Alliance), Anthony Roth Costanzo (The Metropolitan Opera), Ryan Dobrin (Movement Theatre Company), Egyptt LaBeija (BAAD! Bronx Academy of Arts and Dance), Jermaine Greaves (Lincoln Center Accessibility), Milosz Grzywacz (Lincoln Center Accessibility), Alphonso Horne (Jazz at Lincoln Center), Lila Lomax (Lincoln Center Security), Cassie Mey (The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts), Muriel Miguel (Spiderwoman Theater), Ryan Opalanietet (The Eagle Project), Elijah Schreiner (Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School), Alexandra Siladi (Film at Lincoln Center), Paul Smithyman (Lincoln Center Theater), Hahn Dae Soo (Korean Cultural Center New York), Taylor Stanley (New York City Ballet), Jen Suragiat (Lincoln Center Theater), KJ Takahashi (The School of American Ballet), Fatou Thiam (Maxine Greene School), Susan Thomasson (Lincoln Center Education), Gabriela Torres (The Juilliard School), and Valarie Wong (NewYork Presbyterian)
During the second half of the shifting installation, the sound portraits will gradually be brought to life, transforming into live performances in Hearst Plaza by GALLIM dancers Lauryn Hayes, Christopher Kinsey, Nouhoum Koita, Misa Lucyshyn, Gary Reagan, Connor Speetjens, Taylor Stanley, Haley Sung, Georgia Usborne, and Amadi Washington, co-directed by Miller and Lynsey Peisinger, with costumes by Oana Botez and choreography by Miller. The final evening of the installation will feature all of the performers live and on-site, to symbolize the hope for our full re-emergence from the isolation necessitated by COVID-19.
“As we begin to see hope through this pandemic, there is much to grapple with throughout our city and communities,” said Henry Timms, President and CEO of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts. “We’re proud to offer You Are Here as part of our collective reflection, processing of shared experience, and renewal during a time of trauma.”
You Are Here runs July 14-30, at Hearst Plaza, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, 40 Lincoln Center Plaza, NYC. The free sculpture and sound installation is open July 14-16, 18-19, and 21-23, from 11:30 am–6:30 pm, and July 17, from 2:30–8:30 pm. The live performances play July 24–30 at 7 pm, and the sound installation will open at 6:00 pm each of those days, prior to show-time, for ticketed guests. Free tickets are available through TodayTix Lottery, which will close three days prior to each performance at 12:59 pm. Attendees who secure tickets will be required to follow safety protocols.
