↓ synopsis
june 8-9, 2024 ⁞ mcguire theater, walker art center ⁞ mpls, mn
BRKFST Dance Company presents two wildly different works of art in celebration of their 10-year anniversary. BRKFST continues to “show us the future of dance” (Star Tribune) with STORMCLUTTER, a world premiere co-commissioned by The Cowles Center and Northrop, with composition by company member Renée Copeland. Their unique style of breaking and storytelling shines through in a restaging of Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents by composer Daniel Bernard Roumain.
STORMCLUTTER is an exploration of relationships and ongoing efforts to resolve opposing states of interpersonal tension. Misunderstanding, compassion, resentment, egoism, love, loss, betrayal—moving through or attempting to compartmentalize complex dynamics between family and friends and the emotional baggage collected over time becomes an overwhelming task, while maturation requires people to accept that which they cannot change. BRKFST members illustrate the efforts individuals may take when working to resolve the inner chaos that triggers feelings of dissociation, paralysis, and isolation.
BRKFST interprets Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents as a commentary on American life that is filled with a mix of ambition, passion, blame, justice, hope, and love. And while this country is deemed the “land of the free,” it is riddled with systemic problems that seem impossible to overcome. For many, the “American Dream” remains just that—a dream.
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↓ credits
STORMCLUTTER is originally commissioned by The Cowles Center, Northrop, Princeton University’s Lewis Center for the Arts’ Caroline Hearst Choreographer-In-Residence Program and is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation and Development Fund Project co-commissioned by John Michael Kohler Arts Center, National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron, Bates Dance Festival and NPN. The Creation and Development Fund is supported by The Doris Duke Foundation, the Mellon Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency). BRKFST Dance Company is the recipient of a creative residency at The National Center for Choreography-Akron. The development of STORMCLUTTER was made possible in part by The National Center for Choreography-Akron.
BRKFST acknowledges this activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board and a grant from the Metropolitan Regional Arts Council thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.
The creation and premiere of the work by BRKFST Dance Company set to “Dancers, Dreamers and Presidents” by Daniel Bernard Roumain was made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Mellon Foundation.