Dance
Book Review: Merce My Way, Photographs by Mikhail Baryshnikov
Mikhail Baryshnikov has become such a familiar presence in New York’s cultural world that it’s easy to take him for granted. He is one of the great ballet dancers of all time, has shown his acting chops, conquered modern dance (and continues to), and has become an impresario with the opening of the Baryshnikov Arts Center. And now he has published a book of photographs of Merce Cunningham Dance Company.

Conventional dance photography is somewhat perverse in that it aims to freeze movement completely rather than capture it. Blurry shots are usually rejected in favor of crisp stills. But Baryshnikov was inspired by old photography books to capture motion as an integral part of dance. Shooting with a digital camera, he himself moved, sometimes running while shooting. So the performers’ motion combines with Baryshnikov’s own, in a way implicating him in the performance shot.
Baryshnikov mentions that Cunningham’s work, with his particular use of space, is well-suited to photograph. Cunningham uses stasis frequently, alternating with rapid sequences of big movement. Many of the photographs reflect these two states, conveying the texture of the choreography. The photos, accompanied only by a brief introductory note from Baryshnikov, are more poetry than reportage, but that makes sense given this artist’s Russian soul
RECOMMENDED ARTICLES

PLEASE SEND TO REAL LIFE: Ray Johnson Photographs
By Jean DykstraJUL-AUG 2022 | ArtSeen
The photographs he made in his last three years, which have the muted color particular to disposable-camera snapshots, convey a kind of restless energy and a bottomless curiosity about framing the world through a camera lens, evenor especiallythrough the small fixed lens on a throwaway plastic camera.

Thomas Melle’s The World at My Back
By Michael ShorrisJULY/AUG 2023 | Books
For the German writer Thomas Melle, suffering and creation are inexorably intertwined. Melle, a celebrated novelist and playwright, suffers from a severe case of bipolar disorder. In The World at My Back, his English language debut (Biblioasis, May 2023), Melle grapples with his condition directly, striving to write [him]self free.
To Bend the Ear of the Outer World: Conversations on contemporary abstract painting
By Raphy SarkissianSEPT 2023 | ArtSeen
To Bend the Ear of the Outer World, an engaging exhibition astutely curated by Gary Garrels, brings together abstract works by forty-one artists in Gagosians two Mayfair galleries.
Chryssa: Chryssa & New York
By David Charles ShufordJUNE 2023 | ArtSeen
Some 60 years after her breakout solo shows in 1961 at the Betty Parsons Gallery and the Guggenheim Museum, the pioneering artist Chryssa is finally back in the public eye. Showcasing an impressive range of work centered upon light and form, Chryssa & New York at Dia Chelsea is the first museum show in North America in over four decades to focus on the Greek-born artist Chryssa Vardea-Mavromichali (19332013). Once considered a pivotal figure in the burgeoning dialogue amongst Pop, Minimalist, and Conceptual factions, Chryssas stature has suffered in recent decades, her profile fading as others in her milieu have had their reputations burnished to the level of cottage industries.