Fabrications (1987)


Music: Emanuel Dimas de Melo Pimenta, Short Waves & SBbr
Décor and Costumes: Dove Bradshaw
Lighting: Josh Johnson

A work for the full company of fifteen dancers, led by Merce Cunningham. The first performance was in Minneapolis, MN in February 1987. The dance remained in the repertory until March 1991. In 2002 it was reconstructed—recreated, even—by Patricia Lent, of the original cast, with Cédric Andrieux in Cunningham’s role. The revival was first performed at the New York State Theater in July 2002, during Merce Cunningham Dance Company’s appearances in the Lincoln Center Festival 2002.

As usual, Merce Cunningham used a chance process, this time based on 64 phrases (64 being the number of hexagrams in the I Ching, the ancient Chinese book of oracles), whose continuity and distribution among the dancers were determined by chance. Such is its structure, yet the dance undeniably has a dramatic, elegiac quality, though without narrative content.

The music by Emanuel Dimas de Melo Pimenta, Short Waves (1985), actually comprises two separate electronic compositions on tape, combined with short-wave radio sounds, divided by a period of silence. The mixing of the different sounds is done in performance by one of the musicians. The décor and costumes are by Dove Bradshaw. Unusually, the women wear dresses; the men shirts and trousers.

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