The Ringling’s 2014-2015 Art of Performance season includes theater featuring Academy Award winning actors, engaging music in the spirit of fandango and innovative performance acts examining our relationship with the environment.
The Art of Performance season provides audiences with the opportunity to view and engage with world-class performance art in the Sarasota-Bradenton region. The season launches with the previously announced line-up of the Ringling International Arts Festival Oct. 15-18, 2014 and concludes in March 2015.
“We are cultivating a community for the performance arts at The Ringling,” said Steven High, executive director of The Ringling. “This schedule is a treasure for those seeking out art that is present, daring and often just fun. The 2014-15 Art of Performance schedule provides further evidence that performance is a vital part of The Ringling’s offerings.”
East Los Angeles group Cambalache will present “Una Historia de Fandango,” a performance inspired by fandango of Son Jarocho —themusic and dance of Veracruz that celebrates 500 years of bringing together the Spanish, African and indigenous cultures of Latin America.Cambalache encourages audience participation in their shows, and its performance is presented in conjunction with the exhibition, “Behind Closed Doors: Art in the Spanish American Home, 1492-1898.”
Performances will be at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 7-8 in the Historic Asolo Theater. Tickets cost $30, $25 or $20 with a discounted price of $25, $20 or $15 for museum members. Tickets may be purchased at Ringling.org.
National Theatre Live, HD broadcasts of productions from the United Kingdom’s National Theatre, is a new addition to the Art of Performance. The full schedule for National Theatre Live performances at The Ringling includes:
The 2011 production of “Frankenstein” will air Oct. 24. The classic tale of a mad doctor’s attempt to create life, and the resulting terror will be told through the vision of Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle (“Slumdog Millionaire”). Benedict Cumberbatch (“Star Trek: Into Darkness” BBC’s “Sherlock”) and Jonny Lee Miller (“Trainspotting”, CBS’s “Elementary”) alternate in roles as Victor Frankenstein and his creation.
“Medea” will play on Nov. 14. Helen McCrory plays the title role in Euripides’ tragedy, which has been updated by writer Ben Power. Carrie Cracknell directs the tale of a woman’s quest for revenge after abandonment by her husband.
Bill Nighy (“Love Actually”, “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel) and Carey Mulligan (“Inside Llewyn Davis”, “The Great Gatsby”) star in the production of David Hare’s “Skylight” on Dec. 12. Directed by Stephen Daldry (“The Audience”), “Skylight” tells the story of a schoolteacher receiving an unexpected visit from her former lover whose wife recently died. The attempt to rekindle their once passionate relationship becomes a dangerous battle of opposing ideologies and mutual desires.
All National Theatre Live performances will be at 7:30 p.m. on Friday nights in the Historic Asolo Theater. Tickets cost $20 for general admission with a discounted price of $18 for museum members. Tickets may be purchased at Ringling.org.
New Stages 2015: RE:Imaginedis afive-part exhibition of contemporary performances created in response to historic and anticipated influences. According to The Ringling’s Curator of Performance, Dwight Currie, the works were selected to engage not only with the creative powers of the artists on stage, but also with the aesthetic and cultural stimuli that inspired their performance. The schedule includes:
- Julian Sands in “A Celebration of Harold Pinter” will play on Feb. 6-7. Created in collaboration with the late Nobel Prize-winning playwright and directed by John Malkovich, “A Celebration of Harold Pinter” is a humorous and fascinating solo performance by the acclaimed British actor, Julian Sands – star of such films as “A Room with a View,” “Arachnophobia,” and “Warlock.”
- The quartet ETHEL returns to The Ringling with “Documerica” on Feb. 20-21. The source material for “Documerica”is an archive of powerful photographs commissioned in 1971 by the Environmental Protection Agency to document the state of our environment. Working in collaboration with projection designer Deborah Johnson, the musicians of ETHEL tap the archive’s evocative potential by juxtaposing the music of today’s composers with the imagery of the photographs. The result is a dramatic portrait of a tumultuous era that is urban, rural, pastoral and gritty.
- Choreographer Dušan Týnek will debut his original dance work “Camera Illuminata” on March 6-7. Týnek will draw his inspiration from The Ringling’s art collection to create a new work for a program that already includes intimate solos and duets inspired by such artists as Caravaggio, Degas and Schiele. Widely hailed for his sophisticated command of structure and space, Týnek evokes the imagery of the camera obscura in the visualization of tableaux that recall the atmosphere and emotion of the paintings.
- The Hot Club of San Francisco transports the audience to the French countryside of the 1930s in “Cinema Vivant” March 20-21. The flickering imagery of pioneering stop-action animation is accompanied by live gypsy swing in this imaginative and innovation screening of two films by pre-WWI European filmmaker, Ladislaw Starewicz: “The Cameraman’s Revenge,” a charming piece about the marital troubles of beetles; and “The Mascot,” an adventure story about lost toys.
- Lars Jan presents “Holoscenes” March 25-29. Presented in the open air on The Ringling’s Bolger Campiello waterfront, “Holoscenes” explores our capacity for empathy and long-term thinking by presenting movement art in a large aquarium where the performers are threatened and engulfed by the rising waters caused by global climate change.It is a visceral and deeply involving engagement with universal vulnerability. Admission to “Holoscenes” is free.
All New Stages performances (other than “Holoscenes”) are at 7:30 p.m. in the Historic Asolo Theater. Tickets cost $30, $25 and $20 with discounted prices of $25, $20 and $15 for Museum Members. Tickets may be purchased at Ringling.org.
In 2000, the Florida legislature placed the stewardship of The Ringling under Florida State University.FSU has a long tradition of excellence in the arts, and the College of Visual Arts, Theatre and Dance, contains some of the leading arts programs in the nation.The Ringling cultural campus is also home to the Sarasota Ballet, Asolo Repertory Theatre and FSU/Asolo Conservatory for Actor Training making it one of the largest college arts complexes in the country.