Braiding Time, Memory and Water

By Sue Schroeder with Jonathon Keats and Felipe Pérez Santiago

Presented by Flux Projects in collaboration with Core Dance

Braiding Time, Memory and Water is a site-specific interactive dance performance by Sue Schroeder of Core Dance in collaboration with conceptual artist Jonathon Keats and composer Felipe Pérez Santiago. The performance responds to the geography and history of the site and encourages us to reconnect with our natural environment.

Alongside the creek in Tanyard Creek Park, Braiding Time will unfold in three movements. With each movement a water clock will measure the rate of flow of the water, and its speed will determine the pace of the performance, thus enlisting the water as a natural timekeeper and a collaborator in the performance. Ambient sounds integrated into a larger sound composition will further nature’s collaboration in the work.

Local and international dancers with Core Dance will be joined by musicians from Bent Frequency and the Georgia State University Percussion Ensemble for four days of open rehearsals followed by two days of performances. To further engagement with the natural environment, community activities for all ages will take place prior to each performance. The hope is a deeper understanding of the natural cycles in nature will encourage us to seek and find solutions to safeguard and nurture our environment.

Photo by David Naugle

FLOW

Braiding Time, Memory and Water is part of FLOW, a multi-year series designed to explore Atlanta’s history with water, how it has shaped our city and the potential it holds for our future. FLOW engages issues of conservation, equity, and urban design through installations and performances around the city.

About the Artist

In over 40 years of work in the arts, Sue Schroeder has created more than 110 original dance
works for theaters, museums, green spaces, architectural works, and water environments.  Her 
work has appeared throughout the United States, as well as Mexico, Israel, France, Germany,
 Poland, Georgia, Slovenia, Czech Republic, Iceland, United Kingdom, Sweden, Canada,
 Guatemala, and Hungary.  Schroeder’s multidisciplinary vision has led to collaborations with
major voices in dance, music, spoken word, visual arts and design.

Additionally, Schroeder is recognized as a leading arts activist and mentor and the founding
 artistic director of Core Dance.  As a contemporary artist and dance maker, Schroeder focuses
 on the creative process, movement research, exploration, and dance-making as a catalyst for social change.

Under the umbrella of Core Dance, Schroeder facilitated the creation of DanceATL, a dance
 service organization that nurtures and promotes dance as a vibrant part of Atlanta’s arts
 ecosystem.  DanceATL connects artists to resources, grows and engages audiences in the city,
 and supports the full range of the industry by cultivating an awareness and appreciation of
 dance that is sustainable and expansive.

Schroeder holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Houston and earned her Master of
 Fine Arts in Theater Arts with a dance and anthropology concentration from the University of
 Arizona at Tucson.  Educated under dance greats Bill Evans, Hanya Holm, Oliver Kostock, Anna
 Halprin, Isa Bergsohn and John M. Wilson, she holds certifications throughout the U.S. as a
 Teaching Artist and is a founding member of the Teacher Training Institute (TTI), a training
 program established to develop best practices to teach dance and kinetic learning in
community-based settings.

About Schroeder’s Collaborators

Jonathon Keats is an environmental artist and experimental philosopher whose work focuses on the biosphere and our relationship with nonhuman beings and living systems. Over the past couple decades, his site-specific artwork has deepened people’s connections with critical ecosystems ranging from the Sonoran Desert to the Alaskan tundra, often through installations that explore the changing climate in relation to deep time. As an artist, Keats has exhibited and lectured at dozens of institutions worldwide, from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art to Stanford University to the Triennale di Milano, and from SXSW to CERN to UNESCO.

Felipe Pérez Santiago is a Mexican composer whose music has been commissioned and performed in more than 40 countries and included in more than 30 discographic productions worldwide including orchestral pieces, operas, chamber music, solo pieces, electronic works, and music for films, dance, video, and multimedia installations. In 2023, he was appointed as Cultural Ambassador of the “Global Network of Learning Cities” by UNESCO for his work with children and youth orchestras.

See Also

Performances October 2024