Lincoln Center Festival's Hot Summer Dance

NEW YORK CITY--From lounge chairs to plush velvet seats, Lincoln Center Festival 99 offers a variety of ways to see dance. French trapezists Les Arts Sauts will put spectators in reclining positions to comfortably watch their aerial show. An inflatable tent in Damrosch Park will be their theater, says festival director Nigel Redden, who saw the troupe perform in France. "You approach these rather strange doors that you thrust yourself through," he says. "They are, in effect, lips. Once inside, a seamless ballet of people on trapezes unfolds."

For theatergoers who prefer to sit upright, choreographers Jiri Kylian and Paul Lightfoot present revivals and U.S. premieres July 13 to 18 in the New York State Theater. Merce Cunningham's work will be presented July 21 to 25 [See article, page 54]. The three companies of Netherlands Dance Theater perform works by artistic director Kylian and by Lightfoot. Dancers range from NDT 2's 18- to 21-year-old emerging artists and NDT 1's internationally acclaimed performers to NDT 3's experienced artists, all of whom are over 40. All three companies are onstage during Kylian's Arcimboldo, which appears on a bill with Lightfoot's Skew Whiff. One of a Kind, Kylian's newest full-length ballet, makes its U.S. premiere July 13. This August, after 24 years with NDT, Kylian will step down from his post as artistic director, though he will remain as artistic adviser and house choreographer. [See February 1999, page 36.]

During the festival's tribute to composer Steve Reich, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker will perform her Fase [now titled Steve Reich: Four] with Michele Anne De Mey. Ea Sola, a French-Vietnamese artist, blends her European and Vietnamese heritage into "works that are absolutely contemporary," says Redden. Vietnamese dancers and musicians perform her voila voila July 7 to 10.

As if choreography by Cunningham were not spellbinding enough, Festival 99 closes with an all-star lineup performing the master's works: Mikhail Baryshnikov and members of the New York City Ballet will join the Merce Cunningham Dance Company in repertory that spans four decades.

"One piece that also involves choreography is The Peony Pavilion," adds Redden. The world premiere of the marathon Chinese opera (there are six episodes at three hours and fifteen minutes each) includes stylized Chinese dance. Redden's budget--in excess of $9 million--covers expenses for all 113 performances, including music, dance, theater, opera, and video events. by Kate Mattingly