By Bobby Tyler and Dave Marr
btyler@uga.edu, davemarr@uga.edu
Choreographer Alonzo King and his LINES Ballet company will visit UGA and Athens for a series of events Jan. 15-18, including a performance by the company presented by the UGA Performing Arts Center and a lecture by King for the Global Georgia Initiative of the Willson Center for Humanities and Arts.
King’s Global Georgia talk, “A Life in Art,” will be held Jan. 17 at 11 a.m. in the New Dance Theatre in the dance building. LINES Ballet will perform Jan. 17 at 8 p.m. in the Fine Arts Theatre. A pre-concert lecture will be given at 7:15 p.m. prior to the performance in the Fine Arts Building Balcony Theatre.
King founded the San Francisco-based Alonzo King LINES Ballet company in 1982 with a mission to create bold, new dance innovations that break the mold of what ballet can be. LINES Ballet thrives on collaboration, pairing music from all over the globe with King’s unique choreography that digs into the mysteries of movement, bringing honesty and spirituality to the stage.
In addition to its biannual home seasons, the company’s international tours have included the Venice Biennale, Montpellier Danse, Maison de la Danse, the Wolfsburg Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, the Spoleto Festival and Monaco Dance Forum.
After a recent performance in France, a critic for Le Monde wrote, “Alonzo King possesses a sort of magical science of gesture and spatiality. The technique is classically based—the women are en pointe—but the capacity for choreographic innovation is boundless.”
The residency by King and the company also will include master classes for students in the dance department and a talk in the APERO Lecture Series hosted by the Institute for African American Studies and the African Studies Institute. The master class workshop with King and members of the LINES company will take place Jan. 17 at 2 p.m. in Room 272 of the dance building. King’s APERO lecture and conversation will be held Jan. 18 at 12:20 p.m. in Room 480 of the Tate Center.
Also on Jan. 18, the Performing Arts Center will present LINES Ballet in a performance for area school-children in grades five through 12. The performance takes place in the Fine Arts Theatre at 10 a.m., and reservations are required.
Additionally, King and members of the company will take part in a “Day of Dance” in celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Jan. 16 at the East Athens Educational Dance Center.
The event is open free to the public. Details are at dance.uga.edu.
“This is an extraordinary opportunity for UGA and the Athens community to have such a world-class artist and company on our campus and in our midst,” said Lisa Fusillo, professor and head of the dance department. “Alonzo King is an internationally renowned choreographer, and his company is in demand around the world. A Georgia native, King will be bring LINES Ballet ‘home’ for the very first time during the company’s 30th anniversary season.”
Tickets for the Fine Arts Theatre performance are $41-$52 and can be purchased at the Performing Arts Center, online at pac.uga.edu or by calling the box office at 706-542-4400. UGA students can purchase tickets for $6 with a valid UGA ID, limit one ticket per student. All other events are open free to the public.
Sponsors of the performance and residency include South Arts in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Georgia Council for the Arts, the President’s Venture Fund, the Office of the Provost, the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, the UGA Parents and Families Association and Southern Co.