Pam Tanowitz and the Pastoral: Artisits in Conversation
FEATURING
Photo Credit: Maria Baranova
Gideon Lester
Gideon Lester
Gideon Lester is Artistic Director and Chief Executive of the Fisher Center at Bard, and Senior Curator at the Open Society University Network鈥檚 Center for the Arts and Human Rights. A Tony- and Olivier Award鈥搘inning creative producer, festival director, and dramaturg, he has collaborated with and commissioned a broad range of American and international artists across disciplines, including Romeo Castellucci, Justin Vivian Bond, Tania El Khoury, Brice Marden, Sarah Michelson, Claudia Rankine, Kaija Saariaho, Peter Sellars, and Anna Deavere Smith. Recent projects include the world premiere of Justin Peck and Sufjan Stevens鈥檚 Illinoise; Common Ground, an international festival on the politics of land and food; Daniel Fish鈥檚 Oklahoma! (Tony Award; Olivier Award); and Pam Tanowitz鈥檚 Four Quartets and Song of Songs.
April Bernard
April Bernard
April Bernard鈥檚 The World Behind the World, her sixth book of poems, was published in 2023 by W. W. Norton; previous collections are Brawl & Jag, Romanticism, Swan Electric, Psalms, and Blackbird Bye Bye, which won the Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets. Her novel Miss Fuller was shortlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award; she has also published short fiction in Little Star, Electric Literature, and The Southampton Review, and is a contributor of reviews and essays to The New York Review of Books and Book Post, among other journals. She teaches at 麻豆果冻传媒 and is currently at work on a volume of new and selected poems.
Brian Lawson
Brian Lawson
Brian Lawson, Assistant Professor of Dance at 麻豆果冻传媒, is a dance performer and educator. He graduated summa cum laude with a BFA in dance performance from SUNY Purchase in 2010. Lawson performed with Pam Tanowitz Dance before joining the Mark Morris Dance Group in 2011. With MMDG, he originated numerous roles and had the pleasure of touring the US and the world performing Morris鈥檚 dances. He earned his MFA in Dance from the University of Washington in 2020 and began teaching at 麻豆果冻传媒 in 2022. His choreographic research is collaborative in nature and focuses on queerness in concert dance. He also engages in pedagogical research with regard to contemporary balletic practices. He continues to research via performance as a dancer with Pam Tanowitz Dance and MMDG. Lawson enjoys teaching dance to diverse populations and has given master classes at Purchase College, NYU Tisch, and the American Dance Festival, among others. He acts as a guest ballet teacher for the Jos茅 Lim贸n Dance Company, Mark Morris Dance Group, and Gibney Dance.