Liss Fain Dance Announces New Performance Installation At Z Space

Liss Fain Dance is pleased to announce its newest performance installation CLOSE THE DOOR SLOWLY. Set to a commissioned score by Oakland-based percussionist Jordan Glenn, and featuring an ensemble of six dancers, Close the Door Slowly runs May 3 5, 2019, Friday to Saturday at 8 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m., at Z Space. Tickets are $18 - $35, and may be purchased online at zspace.org.

Close the Door Slowly explores elements of the uncanny present in the everyday. Thresholds mark the end of one space and the beginning of another, and my early investigations in this piece have focused on how the alteration of a simple object can mark a transition into the surreal, said company founder and Artistic Director Liss Fain. I'm interested in exploring those moments when real life echoes our dreams.

Glenn is an Oakland-based drummer, percussionist, composer and bandleader. Since moving to the Bay Area in 2006, he has worked closely with Fred Frith, William Winant, Zeena Parkins, Roscoe Mitchell, Ben Goldberg, Todd Sickafoose, John Schott, Dominique Leone and the bands Jack O' The Clock, Arts & Sciences, tUnE-yArDs, and the Oakland Active Orchestra. He conducts and composes music for the large, percussion heavy band Beak, and leads the trio Wiener Kids with saxophonists Aram Shelton and Cory Wright. Close the Door Slowly marks Glenn's third collaboration with Liss Fain Dance.

Additional collaborators on the project include Matthew Antaky, installation design, and Mary Domenico, costume design. Fain's dancers this season include Keryn Breiterman-Loader, Sonja Dale, Sydney Franz, Anna Greenberg, Megan Kurashige and Shannon Kurashige.

For more information visit lissfaindance.org.

ABOUT LISS FAIN DANCE
Liss Fain Dance (LFD) is a San Francisco-based dance company whose work expresses the unpredictable course of events that comprise one's life. Liss Fain's highly physical, emotionally resonant choreography fuses modern dance's forceful energy with the kinetic precision of ballet. Since 2010, LFD has focused on the creation of evening-length installation works that bring together dance, music and literature inside unique Visual Environments.

LFD's performance installations integrate dance with spoken text and immersive set and sound environments in theaters, non-proscenium venues, unusual architectural structures, public spaces and libraries. The architecture of the installation and the variety of perspectives this creates for the audience is pivotal to the experience of these works, which are created in an intensely collaborative process with designers, composers, actors and dancers.

LFD tours nationally and internationally and presents annual home seasons in San Francisco. The artistic vision of the company is shaped by ongoing partnerships with designer Matthew Antaky, costume designer Mary Domenico and projection designer Fr d ric O. Boulay.

Founded in Boston in 1988, LFD has premiered more than 50 evening-length works by Fain. The company's innovative performances and collaborations began with projects at MIT's Center for Advanced Visual Studies and, after moving to San Francisco in 1990, continued with collaborations with set and lighting designers, composers, filmmakers, videographers and technologists.

LFD performs annual home seasons at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, Z Space, and ODC Theater in San Francisco. The company's presence beyond the Bay Area extends to the East Coast through performances at 3LD Art & Technology Center, Powerhouse Arena, and Downtown Dance Festival in New York; the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, Dance Umbrella, Harvard University, Clark University, and MIT in Massachusetts; and Colby College in Maine. LFD has performed at the Cerritos Center for the Performing Arts in Los Angeles and has toured to Poland, Germany, Belarus, Russia and the United Kingdom. FACT SHEET WHAT: Liss Fain Dance presents Close the Door Slowly, an immersive performance installation for six dancers, with original music by Jordan Glenn.

Director and Choreographer: Liss Fain Dancers: Keryn Breiterman-Loader, Sonja Dale, Sydney Franz, Anna Greenberg, Megan Kurashige, Shannon Kurashige Composer: Jordan Glenn Installation Designer: Matthew Antaky Costume Designer: Mary Domenico