MDC Live Arts’ Resident Artists Tackle Concepts of Memory and Coming of Age
Miami, Jan. 24, 2018 – Miami Dade College’s (MDC) MDC Live Arts presents a double bill, Dov by Pioneer Winter and Blasting Pixels by Claudio Marcotulli, at 8 p.m., Thursday, Feb. 7 and Friday, Feb. 8, at the MDC Live Arts Lab. The original works, created as part of MDC Live Arts’ Live Arts Lab Alliance residency, explore coming of age and concept of memory in innovative and experimental ways.
Dancer/ choreographer Pioneer Winter, recently selected as one of Dance Magazine’s “25 to Watch,” is known for pushing boundaries—physical and ideological. Director of the risk-taking Pioneer Winter Collective, he is invested in physical theatre, contemporary dance, and transmedia. In Dov, Winter directs a solo physical theater work for a young boy named Izzy, exploring his transition from a 12-to 13-year-old by using dance, monologue and the boy’s prodigious basketball skills as soundscore.
Filmmaker and aerial cinematographer Claudio Marcotulli, initially trained as aeronautical engineer, is known for performance-driven film and video artworks that explore surreal and existential ideas, absurdity and ludicrous characters, while engaging in distorted narratives and dream-like imagery. Blasting Pixels is an immersive experience in which Marcotulli blends multi-channel projections of real-time feed and video loops with dance performance and live music in attempts to explore the concept of memory tied to a personal timeline.
Intent on celebrating, expanding and deepening the practice of Miami’s community of working performing artists, MDC Live Arts created the Live Arts Lab Alliance (LALA) residency to support local artists in the creation of new works. The season opened with Juraj Kojs’ The Black Queen and will close with a triple bill of dance-focused LALA premieres: Ana Mendez’s Laborers, Adele Meyers’ The Stage Show, and Rosie Herrera’s Cosquillas—about childbirth, artist-audience interaction, and Caribbean glamour, respectively—on May 9 and 10 at the MDC Live Arts Lab.
About Pioneer Winter
Deeply passionate about the democratization of performance with unexpected bodies in unexpected places, and its potential to manifest in unexpected leadership and social change, Winter created L.E.A.P. (Leaders of Equality through Arts and Performance), a creative communication program for LGBTQIA+ teens and their allies that focuses on using the arts for activism; and the Grass Stains fellowship, a site-specific performance initiative that mentors and commissions artists interested in site-based and public art work through a close collaboration with acclaimed site choreographer Stephan Koplowitz. He also continues to create and perform with the Pioneer Winter Collective.
Winter completed a Master of Fine Arts in Choreography from Jacksonville University/White Oak, as the first artist to be named a Dennis R. Washington Achievement Scholar. He also holds a Master of Epidemiology degree from Florida International University (FIU).
He was a Dance Miami Choreographic Program recipient (2014-2015) and Miami Goes Elsewhere Fellowship recipient (2016). Winter is also a fellow and faculty member in the FIU Honors College Department. He was recently appointed director of Tigertail Production’s ScreenDance Miami Festival 2017 and is guest artist at both MDC and Broward College.
About Claudio Marcotulli
Since receiving his B.F.A. from Emerson College and M.F.A. from the Miami International University of Art and Design, Marcotulli’s films have been exhibited internationally and have received support from South Florida PBS Filmmaker Project, Department of Cultural Affairs’ Creative Capital Professional Development Program. FUNDarte and The Awesome Foundation. He’s co-produced award-winning collaborative works with Miami-based choreographers and been featured in publications including The Open Space Magazine and El Nuevo Herald. His projects have been commissioned by Miami Performance International Festival and MDC Live Arts.
Marcotulli’s cinematographic work includes Biscayne Blues, a short film selected for the Miami short Film Festival (2016); Umbilical Limbo, a dance film selected for Tigertail’s ScreenDance Miami (2015); Labyrinth, a dance film created in collaboration with choreographer Sandra Portal-Andreu; Heterodox, a dance film funded by the Miami Beach Cultural Arts Council in collaboration with choreographer Pioneer Winter; and Zenu, a new surreal short film capturing the grandiosity and mysticism of Miami’s Little River, where he acts and directs. His work has been presented at the Bakehouse Art Complex, Adrienne Arsht Center, Miami Beach Cinemateque, Miami Performance Festival, Inkub8 and Miami Dade County Public Libraries. Claudio has taught TV and film production at MDC and currently teaches high school students at Florida Film Institute.
WHAT: MDC Live Arts presents Dov/ Blasting Pixels
WHEN: Thursday, Feb. 7 at 8 p.m., and Friday, Feb. 8, at 8 p.m.
WHERE: MDC Live Arts Lab at MDC’s Wolfson Campus (Bldg. 1, First floor), 300 N.E Second Ave.
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To purchase tickets, please visit: mdclivearts.org. Tickets are $10.
About MDC Live Arts
MDC Live Arts is Miami’s most eclectic performing arts series. Created in 1990 as Cultura del Lobo, MDC Live Arts has a celebrated history of bringing extraordinary national and international performing artists to Miami. The annual series presents today’s most exciting artists and designs meaningful engagement between these artists, the students of MDC, and the greater community. MDC Live Arts seeks artists from across the globe who push boundaries and honor traditions relevant to Miami’s diverse community, and aims to offer audiences opportunities to discover new ideas, perspectives and forms of expression. For more information, please visit www.mdclivearts.org.
MDC Live Arts Contacts: Alexa Burneikis, Marketing Manager, 305-237-7733, aburneik@mdc.edu
Lisa Palley, Palley Promotes, 305-642-3132, lpalley@bellsouth.net