An exhibition by the photographer Peggy Jarrell Kaplan shows famous figures ([Pina] Bausch, Merce Cunningham, William Forsythe) as well as younger dance makers like Boris Charmatz or Ann Liv Young. … A perfect opportunity to speculate upon the relationship between physiognomy and choreographic style.
–Roslyn Sulcas, The New York Times, 2006
Peggy Jarrell Kaplan will exhibit new portraits of 50 dance artists at the cutting edge of dance. Kaplan has been photographing performing artists for more than three decades; and her historic collection is a time-line of contemporary dance, beginning with the iconoclastic Judson Church group in New York and currently including emerging artists from Africa, the Balkans and China. With Glorious Notorious Kaplan continues to create a collective portrait of artists who embrace both the flagrant and sublime to push the canon of dance in new directions.
Working within the tradition of classical studio photography, Kaplan approaches dance obliquely, conveying qualities related to performance. Intense close-ups incorporate drama and implied corporeal energy, and the photographic studio becomes a small stage that interweaves performance with the personal.
I became interested in the qualities of these artists that inspired and informed their work, the sources of their creativity and a portrait seemed the best way to get closer to what cannot be seen [as observed by Susan Sontag]. I also liked that the relationship of the dance artist to his/her creation is the most immediate and direct. In the words of the choreographer, Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui – “The dancer is both draughtsman and the pencil.”
–Peggy Jarrell Kaplan. Interview www/.labkultur.tv.
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Kaplan’s last exhibition at the Feldman Gallery was in 2006. Her work has been exhibited in conjunction with numerous dance festivals including: iDANS (Turkey), Dance Umbrella, (Johannesburg), Balkan Dance Festival (Ljubljana), Tanz im August (Berlin), the Montpellier Festival of Dance, and The Holland Festival. Solo exhibitions at public institutions include The National Arts Centre (Ottawa), Sadler’s Wells (London), Fundaçāo Calouste Gulbenkian (Lisbon), the Centre Pompidou (Paris), and the Lincoln Center Museum and Library of the Performing Arts.
In New York the Nippon Gallery with support from The Japan Foundation exhibited her Japanese collection of choreographers; The French Institute/Alliance Française exhibited her work in conjunction with the 2001 French Moves festival; and her series of Dissident Soviet Artists was shown at the Harriman Institute at Columbia University. Her portraits of The Judson Church group traveled with Mikhail Baryshnikov’s White Oak Dance Project tour of FASTforward. Her work is in permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art and The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
CPR – Center for Performance Research, a performance space in Brooklyn has been displaying Kaplan’s photographs on a rotating basis since 2008. Her newest installment, Dance Around Town, will open on December 2.
There will be a reception November 23, 6 - 8. Gallery hours are Tuesday - Saturday, 10 - 6. Monday by appointment. For information, contact Varvara Mikushkina at (212) 226-3232 or Varvara@feldmangallery.com.