Chicago Danztheatre Ensemble’s German-tinged name is hardly happenstance.
When Ellyzabeth Adler founded the company in 2001 at age 26, she was inspired by Tanztheater, which grew out of German expressionist dance of the 1910s and ‘20s and its revival in the 1970s by such famed choreographers as Pina Bausch.
“We are really unique,” Adler said, “because are we not a theater company. We are not a dance company. We’re a hybrid. We’re a multidisciplinary group, and our performances are very much like that as well.”
That cross-disciplinary spirit will be on full view March 1-2 and 8-9, when Danztheatre Ensemble presents the premiere of “Meditations on Being,” which will bring together art, music, dance and poetry.
Like all of the company’s offerings, this multifaceted program will deliver a sociopolitical message. Danztheatre Ensemble’s website calls it “performance with purpose.”
“One of the things we like to say,” Adler said, “’is we build community through the arts, one voice, one story, one person at a time.’ So, that’s the purpose of it all. We just try to do meaningful work all around art.”
“Meditations on Being” will offer reflections on the past four years — the impact of the COVID-19 shutdown and its aftermath — and building connections with others and nature.
“I’ve really been thinking about how art heals people and how art can bring people together,” Adler said.
In addition, it will weave in the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement following the murder of George Floyd in 2020 and touch on climate change.
“It’s a lot of topics,” she said, “I always feel that our work hits on a lot of heavy topics, but I also always try to focus on where is the hope, where is the conversation and where is the connectivity between humanity.”
Adler’s desire to effect social change dates back to an abusive relationship she endured as a college student, an experience that transformed her and her view on life. After encountering Tanztheater and German expressionist dance during her graduate studies, she realized she wanted to be an “activist-artist.”
The philosophy of pioneer choreographer Rudolf von Laban (1879-1958) particularly resonated with her. He sought to use expressionist dance to unite art forms and achieve what he called “an all-embracing, radical change in humankind.”
“Meditations on Being” will take place in Danztheatre Ensemble’s performance home since 2014 — the vaulted auditorium of the Ebenezer Lutheran Church in Andersonville, a flexible, 4,400-square-foot space.
Attendees are invited to first browse an art exhibition by artists including Nadia Ksenia Porycky and Bekah Norwood and then settle in for a program of seven performance works, including five created and presented by guest artists.
The evening’s bookends will be Danztheatre Ensemble’s “Meditations on Nature” and “Meditations on ‘Walden,’” which will incorporate music, film, theater, dance and even clowning. The latter piece draws on Henry David Thoreau’s classic 1854 book in which the naturalist reflected on more than two years spent in a cabin on Walden Pond in Massachusetts.
“During shelter-in-place, pollution lessened, and we saw the mountains in India, and animals returned to the forest,” company promotional materials state. “Is there a way for this to continue, and can we build a new community conscious of nature?”
Among the guest artist selections is “RIA” by Anniela Huidobro, who recently moved to Chicago from Mexico. It is set to a “soundscape” of stories and songs. “She is doing this absolutely gorgeous piece that is a water ritual,” Adler said, “and it is based on all the different women in her life.”
Other works include Duncan Dance Chicago’s “Street Salvation,” a restaging of modern dance pioneer Isadora Duncan’s “Nocturne” (1915) in a 21st-century context, and Siwei Xu and Daria Jin’s “Confluence2023,” which explores meditation and interconnection.
At the end of the program, the audience is encouraged to remain and discuss what they have experienced.
“And to me,” Adler said, “those conversations are where the change happens.”
