PUTNEY — Nimbus Dance Works will present a staging of historic, original, and new works on Saturday, March 28, at 8 p.m., in The Putney School's Michael S. Currier Center's Calder Hall. Admission is free and the public is invited.
Nimbus Dance Works of Jersey City, N.J., celebrating its 10th anniversary season, has been in residency at The Putney School every spring since 2012, working with the school's dance program and developing new work for its upcoming performance season.
Last year's work in progress, Surface Tension, is now complete and will be part of its Saturday evening performance. New for this season are Patch of Turf, a story of man/womankind in a diminishing natural environment told on a 12-foot square patch of artificial grass, and Strange Fruit, a solo piece set to the poem of the same title by Abel Meeropol, as sung by Nina Simone.
Strange Fruit was choreographed in 1942 by Pearl Primus and resonates with Charles Weidman's Lynchtown, an historical (1936) ensemble piece that will also be part of this year's program. Lynchtown served as inspiration for Samuel Pott's We Acquiesce.
Patch of Turf, also by Samuel Pott, is this year's work in progress. Backspace, by Francesca Harper, will round out the evening's offerings.
Nimbus Dance Works focuses on the intersection between high-level dance and innovative ways of involving communities and audiences. Performers with Nimbus Dance Works are top-tier dance artists drawn from widely-recognized companies including Ballet Hispanico, Ailey II, and the Martha Graham Dance Company.
In addition to work by Artistic Director Samuel Pott, the company commissions dances by leading international dancemakers including Pedro Ruiz (Cuba/USA), Huang Yi (Taiwan), Korhan Basaran (Turkey), and Xiao-Xiong Zhang (Australia/Taiwan).
Through critically acclaimed performances throughout New Jersey and the Northeast, programs for Jersey City youth and seniors, partnerships with institutions such as the Jersey City Board of Education, Rutgers University, and the Newark Museum, and collaborations with notable composers and visual artists, Nimbus weaves together artistic excellence and community impact.