Spring Studio Series: Heather Kravas @ Harper Joy Theatre, Whitman College

This April, for the first time ever, Whitman College Department of Theatre and Dance will bring the dance program’s Spring Studio Series to Harper Joy Theatre’s black box for three different experimental performances by Kristopher K.Q. Pourzal (New York), Anna Martine Whitehead (Chicago), and Heather Kravas (Seattle) on April 5th, 6th, and 7th at 8 p.m.  Whitman students will kick off each performance with material developed in workshops conducted during the week, and Nina Lerman, Lisa Uddin, and Tia Kramer will each lead one of three distinct post-performance discussions.  I encourage you to attend one (or all three!) of these performances as they culminate an exciting week of collaborative creation, experimental performance, and critical dialogue.

Heather Kravas
one solid object
Performance on Saturday April 7 at 8:00 p.m.  
Freimann Studio Theatre (black box)
Discussion lead by Tia Kramer

Punk, feminist, precise and extreme, one solid object is a choreographic 
abstraction grappling with the messy and incontrollable inevitability of 
human emotion.  Utilizing borrowed movements, the dance is reduced to 
rhythm and essence then rebuilt through strict and sloppy repetitions. 
Making room for a presence of failure, physical vulnerability tangles with 
formal obsessions to embrace accidents, boredom, exhaustion and exuberance.

Heather Kravas is a choreographer and performing artist. Since 1995, she has
investigated choreographic, improvisation and collaborative practices in
contemporary dance to explore the limits of choreography as a form and her
abilities as an artist. Combining recognizable traditions, tasks and somatic
practices her dances grapple with structural idealism and uncontainable
emotions. In a renunciation of the spectacular, she strives to illuminate
actions such as labor, listening, concentration, failure and presence.
Kravas grew up in Pullman, Washington, where, under the tutelage of Deirdre
Wilson, she studied classical ballet and the experimental theater theories of
Jerzy Grotowski. Significant to her understanding of dance as a relevant and
complex form are the many artists/teachers/colleagues she has been privileged
to work with/for: Antonija Livingstone, DD Dorvillier, Dayna Hanson, Stephanie
Skura, Marina Abramavic, Okkyung Lee, Yvonne Meier among many.
Ms. Kravas has received support from Creative Capital, the Doris Duke Impact
Award, Foundation for Contemporary Art, MAP Fund, National Performance
Network, Seattle Arts Commission, 4 Culture, f.u.s.e.d, Bossack-Heilbron
Foundation, the Yard and Pact-Zollverein. Her choreography has been
presented at venues including American Realness, Base, Chez Bushwick, The
Chocolate Factory, Dance Theater Workshop, Danspace Project @ St.Mark’s
Church, Fusebox Festival, The Kitchen, Movement Research @ Judson Church,
On the Boards, Performance Space 122, Tonic and Velocity Dance Center as well
as internationally.

Heather currently lives in Seattle, Washington with her family.