mnartists.org: Cathy Wright

"Thrower of Light"

Cathy Wright — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 01:43:18 GMT

[b]Artist statement: [/b]I have over 100 works of repertoire. “Thrower of Light” contains some of my favorites from the past decade and a few new ones too. I look at the show as a collection of short stories that are an expression of the human experience, and, in typical Cancerian style, are emotionally dynamic and all over the map skittering from one tale to the next. It’s like entering a cave and shining light on the hidden corners of the psyche. Enjoy the ride![b][/b] Thrower of Light reveals tales from the hidden corners of the human psyche. Dare to enter the cave of total theater and ride thrill and deception in a chasm of emotion. The production revisits two dance pieces Wombman and Phallousy from her Momentum show "Return" which had critics cry, "More please." (Camille LeFevre, Star Tribune Year in Review 2007). She continues to illuminate the gender experience with the regional premiere of The Demon Familiar, a journey into the Jungian philosophy of Anima/Animus featuring her own vocals and text in scores composed by 2007 Bush Fellow Matthew S. Smith. "Wright, who is always unpredictable" (minnpost.com), also travels beyond the deep psychological caverns to a dynamic, brighter side with works Old Man, Feline Fever, and the comical Irish Pirate Madness. Thrower of Light has an all-star cast including Rachel Barnes, Bryan Gerber, Alex Loch, Debra McGee, Jennifer Mack, Christine Maginnis, Kristin Ostebee, Sharon Picasso, Tim Rehborg, Teresa Tjepkes, Taja Will, and herself executing halting drama and riotous caricature. This may be Wright's first Fringe performance, but she is no stranger to production. Please visit mnartists.org/Cathy_Wright and cwrightdance.webs.com for a complete list of work at venues including the Walker Art Center's McGuire Theater, the Southern Theater, Bryant Lake Bowl, the Ritz Theater, Patrick's Cabaret, and many more. Her ritual gothic-grunge aesthetics brings something new to the MN arts scene. "Thrower of Light" is a collection of short stories: Territorial Dilemma (premiere) The Demon Familiar (premiere) Phallousy and Wombman from 2007 Momentum Series Return (2007) I Dream in Red- a short Dance for Camera (2000) Feline Fever (2004) Cannibal Mother (2006) Old Man (2006) Irish Pirate Madness (2005)

"Old Man" and "Full Moon Fever" to perform at Cabaret

Cathy Wright — Thu, 21 May 2009 23:21:07 GMT

"Old Man" ( 2006) and "Full Moon Fever" (2005) revisited Choreographed by Cathy Wright Performed by Rachel Barnes, Bryan Gerber, Debra McGee, Jennifer Mack, Sharon Picasso, Tim Rehborg, Teresa Tjepkes, Taja Will, and Cathy Wright "Cabaret" at Patrick's Cabaret June 5th and 6th at 8pm Tickets $10 at door 3010 Minnehaha Av S Mpls, MN 55406 www.patrickscabaret.org

"Falling Through Changes" by Cathy Wright

Cathy Wright — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:50:49 GMT

"Falling Through Changes" Choreographed by Cathy Wright Music by Louis Guzman and Cathy Wright Starring Eric Fetrow, Nell McCarty, Teresa Tjepkes, Alan Tse, Amanda Leaveck, Kristin Ostebee, Tim Rehborg, Katie Jane Hagen, Sarah Steichen, and Germaine Lindsey Zenon Block E Scholarship Concert December 12, 13, 14 7:30pm 528 Hennepin Ave South Minneapolis Tickets $10 at the door Scholarship Coordinator Megan Flood

"I Dream in Red" A Dance for Camera by Cathy Wright

Cathy Wright — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:45:41 GMT

"I Dream in Red" (2000) A Dance for Camera by Cathy Wright Starring Ian Jorgensen, Kathleen Kerr, Margaret Wright The Rabbit Show: Dances of Love, Loss, Sex, Romance and Tenderness Presented by Third Rabbit Dance Ensemble The therapists all advise variety in your sex life. Well how about your dance life? The Third Rabbit presents a Valentine's Week garland of extraordinary dances exploring love but also loss, and of course raw sex, plus romance, and, as a gesture to frail humanity, tenderness itself. See title of show. (Cough.) The lineup of choreographers is fabulous. Including Maggie Bergeron, Joe Chvala (with Karla Grotting), Gerry Girouard (with Rebecca Abas), Laura Holway, Kari Jensen, Kalila Indivar, Jim Lieberthal, Debra McGee, Kenna Sarge, Sara Scrimshaw, and Cathy Wright. There will be ballet, percussive, contemporary Middle Eastern, dance-theater, modern, tango, dance-for-film/video and who knows what else. There will be passion, humor, titillation and artistry. We have not yet devised a plan for what to do if the audience spontaneously starts undressing, but that's in the works. So far the choices under consideration include a) electronically block cell phones from calling the cops, b) provide massage oil, and c) invite the bowlers into the theater. We're not yet aware that any of the performers plan to undress because this is, after all, a high-class artistic endeavor. But you never know. Wednesday February 11 at 7:00 pm (6:00 doors) $6-$10 pay what you can

'Wombman' in "Renovate" at the Ritz

Cathy Wright — Thu, 21 May 2009 22:36:35 GMT

"Wombman" (2007) 'Wombman' from Cathy Wright's Return as a part of the 2007 Momentum Series revisited. Starring Nina Ebighausen, Jennifer Mack, Christine Maginnis, Kristin Ostebee and Sharon Picasso Choreographed by Cathy Wright Music by Matthew S. Smith Vocals, text, and costumes by Cathy Wright Date(s): March 13, 2009 at 8:00 PM, March 14, 2009 at 8:00 PM, March 15, 2009 at 7:00 PM, March 20, 2009 at 8:00 PM, March 21, 2009 at 8:00 PM, March 22, 2009 at 7:00 PM Price: $12-$18 Location: Ritz Theater Address: 345 13th Ave NE Minneapolis, 55413 United States Telephone: 612.623.7660

The Demon Familiar

Cathy Wright — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 17:25:27 GMT

New solo-in-progress by Cathy Wright "The Demon Familiar" with music by Matthew S. Smith choreographed and performed by Cathy Wright all sounds generated by Cathy's voice and text Hanging murals created by Cathy Wright January 9 x 22 Dance Lab curated by Laurie Van Wieren Wednesday, January 28th 7pm doors 8 pm show http://blb.ciceron.com/calendar.asp?date=1/28/2009 "The Demon Familiar" is under going expansion for a full-evening production. More details to come. Looking for sponsorship, please contact Cathy Wright at wrightcatherine3@gmail.com for inquiries

Cathy Wright Walker Art Blogger

Cathy Wright — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 21:29:06 GMT

Cathy Wright reviews Momentum 2007 and 2008 more to come! Please visit link below to read: http://blogs.walkerart.org/performingarts/author/cathy/

Admittance at the Ritz Theater 12/4-12/6, 2008

Cathy Wright — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 21:21:12 GMT

Contact: Scott Artley sartley@gmail.com C: (952)-221-1724 For immediate release. ADMITTANCE An Evening in Seven Parts A collaborative dance theater work Conceived, produced, and directed by Matthew S. Smith Music composed by Matthew S. Smith Choreographed by Deborah Jinza Thayer and Cathy Wright Film by Matthew S. Smith and Matt Zawislak December 4-6, 2008 At the Ritz Theater MINNEAPOLIS, MN - 2007 Bush Fellowship Composer Matthew S. Smith presents an evening-length production, engaging choreographers Deborah Jinza Thayer and Cathy Wright in a work combining dance, film, and music. Set in the fear-laden atmosphere of the Cold War 1950s, at a time when the government was denying the effects of nuclear testing on its own soldiers, ADMITTANCE imagines the layers of trauma and denial in a family stunned by a mother's schizophrenia and institutionalization. Paired with Thayer's unique movement vocabulary and Wright's arresting choreographic urgency, ADMITTANCE features Smith's layered electro-acoustic score, weaving sound and bodies into a space where detonations obscure or expose what we're able to admit. Performances: Thurs. Dec. 4th and Fri. Dec. 5th at 8pm Sat. Dec. 6th at 5pm and 8pm Tickets: Adults $18, Students and Seniors $13 Pay-What-You-Can Sat. Dec. 6th at 5pm The Ritz Theater www.ritztheaterfoundation.org 345 13th Avenue NE Minneapolis, MN 55413 Box Office: 612-436-1129 Artist Bios: Matthew S. Smith "[A] painter who composes layered landscapes with rich textures, absorbing color depths, and dramatic swaths...a composer who pieces together fragments of 1/16-size Suzuki violin gestures into some of the most gorgeous soundscapes you are likely to hear." - avantmusicnews.com Matthew Sawyer Smith was born in 1953 in Cleveland, Ohio. He attended Oberlin College were he studied music and painting. As a painter, Smith has shown his work in galleries across the nation - Ohio, Washington, D.C., New York, and Minnesota (Groveland Gallery). In 1999, he came to a rather sudden realization that his creative expression was no longer served by painting, and switched to his lifelong second passion: music. Co-creator of the American Composers Forum's SALON, a monthly program of new works by contemporary classical composers, Smith has been honored as a Bush Fellow (2007), McKnight Composing Fellow (2004), and Grammy Awards semi-finalist (2006). Building textures of recorded instrumentation like brush-strokes on a canvas, Smith's contemporary classical compositions are collected in the 2005 audio release Archaic from INNOVA RECORDINGS. Again reaching across artistic disciplines, Smith's music has been featured in dance/sound collaborations with Peter Witrak, Cathy Wright, Colleen Callahan, and Deborah Jinza Thayer. Cathy Wright "And we'd all better pay attention, because [she's] good. Intriguing. Weird. Fantastical. Creepy, even. But good." - mnartists.org Cathy Wright (choreographer, teacher, performer) was a devoted fan of film directors David Lynch and Ridley Scott in her preteens, and as such, she started creating short films in high school. She then went on to the University of Utah for her BFA and MFA in Modern Dance, where she shocked peers with her "sacrilegious" compositions. She returned to the Twin Cities in 2002, teaching, directing, and choreographing while completing an MA in Education at Minnesota State University Mankato. She produced her own concert Dweller on the Threshold in August 2006 at the Bloomington Center for the Arts. It marked her first performance since 2001 in her solo Cannibal Mother. Also active as a performer, her recent choreography has been staged at various Twin Cities venues, including the Walker Art Center's McGuire Theater, the Southern Theater as part of the Momentum Series, Macalester College, Patrick's Cabaret, and the MN Zoo. Her choreography has also been performed nationally at the University of the Arts and Merriam Theater (Philadelphia, PA), New World School of the Arts and the Gusman Center for Performing Arts (Miami, FL), and at the Rose Wagner Center for Performing Arts, Marriot Center for Dance, art galleries and streets in Salt Lake City, UT. She has directed 24 productions at Apple Valley High School and has taught Pre-K through higher education at various schools across the country. More information can be found at www.mnartists.org/Cathy_Wright. Deborah Jinza Thayer "[A] typical Thayer experience--a strange encounter that's also utterly normal to the extent that it speaks the language of living." - City Pages After spending the first six years in Japan and Southeast Asia, Deborah Jinza Thayer grew up in Brooklyn, New York. She graduated from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland in 1984; trained in dance in New York City from 1984-93; and received an MFA in Dance from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia in 1997. Her most influential training includes Laban Bartienieff fundamentals and choreography under the direction of Karen Studd at GMU; Butoh with Maureen Fleming in New York; vocal dance with Amsterdam-based Patricia Bardi; various movement theater techniques; Global Somatics (Body Mind Centering) with Suzanne Rivers in Minneapolis; and the research of Eugenio Barba of the International School of Theater Anthropology (ISTA) in Copenhagen. She has presented her choreography, Movement Architecture - a blend of dance and theater in structured environments - and has created approximately 50 original works in New York City, Washington DC metro region and Minneapolis. She has twice been a semi-finalist for France's Rencontres choregraphiques internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis (Bagnolet), and received McKnight Choreographers Fellowship in 2004. She has been teaching ballet and modern dance technique since 1993 and currently teaches dance composition and technique at Zenon Dance Company and School in Minneapolis. For more information about Thayer's distinctive approach to movement, visit www.movementarchitecture.com. # # #

Trisha Brown's Planes at the Walker Art Center

Cathy Wright — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 21:10:23 GMT

Cathy Wright performs "Planes" by Trisha Brown at the Walker Art Center with Sally Rousse, Galen Trauer, Sarah LaRose, and Melanie Kling. Wright performed at the Opening Reception on Thursday, April 17th Saturday, April 19th and Monday, April 21st for the WAC Board of Directors. Performances at the Metronic Gallery Please visit link below for more information: http://calendar.walkerart.org/event.wac?id=4471

image: Trisha Brown's Planes

"The Danger Zone" at Bryant Lake Bowl

Cathy Wright — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 20:57:27 GMT

"The Danger Zone" choreographed by Cathy Wright Bryant Lake Bowl January 9, 2007 7pm Minneapolis, MN The Rabbit Show- Hot and Cold: The MN Siberian Express presented by John Munger's Third Rabbit Dance Ensemble Wright takes a dramatic shift from her ritualistic gothic work to experiment with a humorous spoof inspired by the notorious film on the life of a dancer in "Flashdance." Set on 9 of her high school students, "The Danger Zone" is a dance maniac's dream of 80's aerobic and jazz moves. Spray bottles, inhalers, leg warmers, headbands, and neon spandex give Bryant Lake Bowl viewers a hot break in the brutal throws of MN winter!

"Cannibal Mother" at Bryant Lake Bowl

Cathy Wright — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 20:23:43 GMT

"Cannibal Mother" choreographed and performed by Cathy Wright. Music by PJ Harvey John Munger's Third Rabbit Dance Ensemble Bryant Lake Bowl Minneapolis, MN November 14th 7pm

Zenon Block E 2007

Cathy Wright — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 20:08:35 GMT

"Drinking in Dilation" choreographed by Cathy Wright. Originial music composed by Matthew S. Smith Zenon Block E Scholarship Concert August 17-19, 2007 7:30 pm Hennepin Center for the Arts Minneapolis, MN performers: Crystal Pelletier, Michelle Collins, Brianna Johnson, Nora Bichler, Shannon Edwards, Kalie French, Erin Lundberg, Penny, Prem Govindawamy

"Return" review by Camille LeFevre

Cathy Wright — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 18:57:40 GMT

July 23, 2007 Camille LeFevre Camille LeFevre gives us her take on the second weekend of Momentum: Cathy Wright and Off-Leash Area are wild and wonderful.

Momentum 2007

Cathy Wright — Thu, 17 May 2007 02:25:15 GMT

Momentum 2007 Choreographer July 19-21, 2007 Southern Theater Minneapolis, MN Independent artist Cathy Wight choreographs modern dance with a raw and highly emotional movement vocabulary that explores the hidden realms of the psyche. Return, created for eight dancers, depicts a journey from entrapment to liberation as Wright examines gender roles both primitive and modern, within environments natural and urban. Text and voice by Cathy Wright Set by Cathy Wright Costumes by Cathy Wright Sound design and music composition by Matthew S. Smith, 2007 Bush Foundation Fellowship Recipent Music also composed by Ben Siems Performers include Cathy Wright, Margot Bassett, Jill Foster, Jennifer Glaws, Carrie Lande, Kim Richardson, Christopher LaPlante, Alex Loch, Dustin Maxwell for more information please visit walkerart.org http://calendar.walkerart.org/event.wac?id=3813 http://www.southerntheater.org/onstage/momentum_07-2007.php

Zenon Block E 2005

Cathy Wright — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 18:16:37 GMT

Zenon Block E Scholarship Concert Hennepin Center for the Arts Minneapolis, MN August, 2005 curated by Megan Flood "Full Moon Fever" choreographed by Cathy Wright