River Valley Arts Collective: Vanessa Anspaugh

For the fifth staging of dance in Al Held’s painting studio, the acclaimed choreographer and dance artist Vanessa Anspaugh will preview a new work, Diamond Cutter. Created in collaboration with performers Tara Aisha Willis, C Green, Leah Cox, Laura Osterhaus, Tristan Koepke and Jo Warren, the choreography investigates edge-spaces and the unique, resilient life that takes hold in hostile environments. Growing up in Los Angeles’s historical coastal wetlands that have been almost entirely lost to urbanization, Anspaugh credits this formidable space to inquire: What do we relegate to the edges? Who lives on the margins and what do these bodies need to heal? Thinking through being and matter, ecosystems and the sphere, the work considers how outside elements can enter in, as a means of rewilding our spaces and ourselves.

Vanessa Anspaugh is a choreographer and performance based artist born and raised in the unceded land of the Tongva & Chumash (also known as Los Angeles, CA). Anspaugh has worked with Taylor Mac, Sara Shelton Mann, Aretha Aoki, Faye Driscoll, Juliette Mapp, Robbinschilds, devynn emory and has collaborated with visual artists SWOON, Every Ocean Hughes and Amber Bemak. She is a two-time Bessie Award Nominee for both Most Outstanding Choreographer (morning after mournings) of 2023 and Most Outstanding Production (The End of Men). Her work has been commissioned and presented by The Joyce Theater, New York Live Arts, Danspace Project, Dance Theater Workshop, The Kitchen, The Rubin Museum, The Bates Dance Festival, The River to River Festival, SculptureCenter, CCS Hessel Museum of Art, Opera House Arts, Space Gallery, along with other national and international venues.

Diamond Cutter will premiere at the Al Held Foundation on Saturday, June 27 at 1pm during Upstate Art Weekend. Click here to RSVP. The sign-up link also includes an option to join us the day before on June 26 for an open rehearsal at 2pm.