Richard Move by Philip Habib

Richard Move by Josef Astor
for The New York Times

Biography 

Richard Move is Artistic Director of MoveOpolis! a TEDGlobal Oxford Fellow and Ph.D. Candidate (ABD) at New York University. MoveOpolis! has been presented by Dance Theater Workshop, New York Live Arts, Jacobs Pillow Dance Festival, Sitelines/River to River Festival and international venues. MoveOpolis! collaborators include designer Patricia Field (Sex and the City, The Devil Wears Prada), maverick visual artist Charles Atlas and writer Hilton Als (The New Yorker). Move’s The Show (Achilles Heels), originally commissioned and performed by Mikhail Baryshnikov and the White Oak Dance Project, has been hailed as “A brilliant work and the most revolutionary work Baryshnikov has commissioned... A powerful, iconoclastic theater piece that’s made to measure for the 21st Century." -Dance Magazine. The Show (Achilles Heels) had its New York premiere at The Kitchen, featuring Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Deborah Harry of Blondie and Rasta Thomas.

His other choreographic commissions include Lamentation Variations for the Martha Graham Dance Company, described as “Move understands the beauty in strength ...he produces a work of blistering authenticity.” -The New York Times. And, acclaimed works for PARADIGM (Carmen DeLavallade, Gus Solomons, Jr., and Dudley Williams), the American Festival of Paris, the Opera Ballet of Florence, Italy and for New York City Ballet Principal Helene Alexopoulos, lauded as “Stunning, first rate work.” - The New York Times.  Move has created large-scale, multi-media events for the European Cultural Capitol of France, the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the VH1/Vogue Fashion Awards and in 2014 at the Parrish Art Museum. 

He choreographed Dame Shirley Bassey's Diamonds are Forever at the Cannes Film Festival AMFAR Gala and directed Isaac Mizrahi in LES MIZrahi. "Director Richard Move and Mizrahi have created a triumph." -Time Out.

Move’s works as filmmaker include: Bardo, which received the Jury Prize nomination at Lincoln Center’s Dance on Camera Festival and BloodWork-The Ana Mendieta Story, recipient of the National Board of Review Award / CityVision’s Film Festival at the Director’s Guild of America. The feature Ghostlight, which had its World Premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival, is available on DVD at NETFLIX and Amazon and numerous other retailers. These films have screened internationally at festivals, museums and galleries. He also choreographed the cult film Strangers With Candy, starring Amy Sedaris, Mathew Broderick and Stephen Colbert. Move is Director and Producer of GIMP-The Documentary, which has its World Premiere at the 2014 Dance on Camera Festival, co-presented by the Film Society of Lincoln Center and Dance Films Association. For more information, please visit GIMP-The Documentary.

Move has performed with Karole Armitage, DANCENOISE, Koosil Ja and Pooh Kaye, among  many dance-theater companies and was guest artist with the Le Centre Choreographique National de Tours in France. He is also co-founder of the legendary and long-running late-night cabaret, Jackie60.  

Martha@ ..., Move’s celebrated performances as 20th Century Icon Martha Graham began in 1996, received two New York Dance and Performance Awards (Bessies), tours globally and has been featured on the BBC, La Sept TV/France, PBS’ City Arts (Emmy Award) and is subject of the forthcoming documentary Channeling Martha. “Move’s channelling of the modern dance diva is too brilliant for words.” -Time Out. Martha@...The 1963 Interview, named “Best of 2011” by ARTFORUM International, Time Out and many more publications, had it’s World Premiere at New York’s Dance Theater Workshop in March, 2011 and returned for encore performances in November, 2011 at New York Live Arts. “Martha Graham lives, and is interviewed...Move brilliantly incarnates her...” - The New York Times. For full details, press, images, to view a preview video and PBS Sunday Arts television segments, please visit Martha@...The 1963 Interview. 

At MoMA - The Museum of Modern Art in October of 2013, Move appeared as Graham in 20 Dancers for the XX Century, conceived by Boris Charmatz’ Musée de la Danse and described by The New York Times as, "…Move also was the art. The Graham choreography he performed was an exhibit, yet so was he: a dancer as a living archive of dance…Move and 19 other distinguished dancers inhabited spaces all through the building…” The Financial Times stated, “Best of all was Richard Move’s setting…He caught her tragic Clytemnestra between the two massive screens for Douglas Gordon’s life-sized videos of elephants tromping then rolling helplessly on a Gagosian Gallery floor.”

Move is Choreographer of Off- Broadway’s The Fartiste, winner of the Outstanding Musical Award at the NYC Fringe Festival, an “Entertaining, highly amusing and strangely touching musical...also notable is the choreography of Richard Move, who sexes up such traditional dance forms as the cancan to highly lascivious effect." -The New York Post. The musical tells the true story of Joseph Pujol (“Le Petomane”), the highest paid and most famed headliner of the 1890’s Moulin Rouge. Previews began October, 2011 with a November, 2011 Opening. For full details, please visit: thefartiste.com.

Move is recipient of awards from the Creative Capital Foundation, Bossak/Heilbron Foundation, Altria Corporation and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts, among many others. He curated and produced Where is Ana Mendieta? - An Exhibition and Symposium at New York University, August 1 - October 8, 2010.

Spring / Summer 2012 Events include the Martha Graham Dance Company’s New York season featuring Lamentation Variations with choreography by Richard Move, March 15 - 18. Martha@...Camp/AntiCamp - A presentation and discussion with Douglas Crimp at Berlin’s Hebbel/HAU Theater, April 19 -22. And, the World Premiere of siXperiments, Inc. July 26 - 29 at University of Florida’s Summer Dance Intensive, Swamp Dance Fest!

2013 winter events included the premiere of Move’s The Show (Achilles Heels) by the Martha Graham Dance Company at New York’s Joyce Theater, February 20-March 3. Please *click here for more press on “Move’s hour-long tour de force, now set on the Graham company, where it deserves a long life.”– The Financial Times.

2014 highlights include: A film screening of BloodWork-The Ana Mendieta Story and Martha@The Johnny Carson Theater at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln - February 26 -28, 2014. Martha@The Asian Civilizations Museum and a screening of Ghostlight in Singapore - June 26 through June 29, 2014 and Martha@...The 1963 Interview at the Singapore Arts Festival in August of 2014. On October 3, 2014, Colgate University presented Performing On Screen: The Films of Richard Move, including GIMP- The Documentary, BloodWork-The Ana Mendieta Story and Ghostlight. On October 25, Move joined an esteemed group of scholars at New York University for Fred Herko:A Crash Course, a symposium on the late artist.

2015 Highlights include: Dance/NYC Symposium 2015 – “Technology” on February 22. Douglas Rushkoff's Media Studies Colloquia at Queens College, CUNY on Wed. March 25. A screening of GIMP- THE DOCUMENTARY at Butler University’s ArtsFest 2015 on April 11. The book launch event DANSE: A Glossary, for DANSE: A Catalogue at the French Embassy on June 4. Performances and Symposium with DANCENOISE at the Whitney Museum of American Art July 23 -26. The TED Fellows Conference in Monterey, CA. August 26-30.

Soon to be announced: The World Premiere of XXYY (Working Title), a collaboration with artists Paolo Canevari and Alba Clemente.

Please visit MoveOpolis! and Move- It! Productions on Facebook and follow on Twitter @RichardMove1 and LinkedIn.

Move is Lecturer in Design at Yale University’s School of Drama. He is Assistant Professor of Dance in the Department of Drama, Theatre and Dance at Queens College, CUNY.

Education

Ph.D. Candidate (ABD). Performance Studies. New York University.
M.F.A.  Media Arts Production. The City College of New York. 
M.A. Performance Studies. New York University. 
B.F.A. Dance. Virginia Commonwealth University.

Select Published Works by Richard Move

• “The Sovereign Soloist – States of Exceptional Labor and State of Darkness" in Rhythm Field – The Dances of Molissa Fenley (Seagull Books, 2015)
• “Two Portraits, One Persona” in The Women We Love (Magnus Books, 2015)
• • “The Opulent Towers’ First Responders” in FRED HERKO:CRASH COURSE (New York University, 2015)
• “Molissa Fenley in Conversation with Richard Move” in Critical Correspondence (January, 2015)
• Introduction – “Where is Ana Mendieta?” in Where is Ana Mendieta? 25 Years Later – An Exhibition and Symposium Dossier (Women & Performance - Routledge Press, 2011)
• Introduction – "On Part Real, Part Dream" in Part Real, Part Dream, Dancing with Martha Graham by Stuart Hodes (Concord Press, 2011)
• Exhibition Catalogue – Where is Ana Mendieta? 25 Years Later – An Exhibition and Symposium (Fales Library and Special Collections, New York University, 2010)

Richard Move named TEDGlobal Oxford Fellow

“The TED Fellows program seeks individuals who demonstrate remarkable achievement in their field of endeavor. TEDGlobal Fellows reflect both geographic and discipline diversity. From Venezuela to Ghana to Brazil to Costa Rica,  these pioneers are breaking new ground in technology, engineering, programming, biology, genetics, environmental science and invention. Fellows also are innovating in filmmaking, photojournalism, architecture, music, poetry, entrepreneurship and activism, among other disciplines.”

 Press Release
(click to read)

Richard Move - TEDGlobal Oxford - TED Talk

"What Makes the Still Photograph Dance?” 

Move’s TEDGlobal Oxford talk explored the metakinetic animism of the still photograph in Dance and Performance, where the use of photography is often the primary tool for both the reconstruction of old masterpieces and the creative genesis for new works. Move addressed this with his own art practice, in which iconic still images of two deceased artists, Martha Graham and Ana Mendieta, evoked within him the haunting agency to create new works of kinetic cinema. The TED talk includes video clips from Move‘s films Ghostlight and BloodWork - The Ana Mendieta Story.

Photo and Video Gallery

More coming soon!

Richard Move at the TED Fellows Retreat. Whistler, B.C.
Photo by Ryan Lash.

Mikhail Baryshnikov and Richard Move
by Stephanie Berger

PBS Sunday Arts - Martha@...The 1963 Interview - November, 2011
 

Dame Shirley Bassey - Diamonds Are Forever at Cannes Film Festival
AMFAR Gala. Staging and choreography by Richard Move.

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