As part of its Fall 2024 Studio Series, the Martha Graham Dance Company will present a preview of Lloyd Knight’s solo dance work, The Drama.

The Drama highlights the life of Martha Graham Dance Company principal dancer Lloyd Knight in an intimate and personal solo inspired by his time as an artist and the women in his life—his mother and Martha Graham. Utilizing dance, text, and video, the performance lays bare what it takes physically and psychologically to pursue a life in dance and touches on Knight’s upbringing and what drew him to dance from an early age. The Drama is written and performed by Knight, with choreography by Knight and Jack Ferver, and video design by Jeremy Jacob.

The Drama was commissioned by the Works & Process and DANCECleveland, and developed over a series of Works & Process LaunchPAD residencies at Bridge Street Theatre, Modern Accord Depot, and the Watermill Center. The work was also developed during Knight’s research fellowship at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in 2023. The Drama will premiere at the Guggenheim in January 2025, followed by performances in Cleveland, OH, in February 2025.

Lloyd Knight joined the Martha Graham Dance Company in 2005 and performs major roles of the Graham repertory including Appalachian Spring, Embattled Garden, and Night Journey, among others. Knight was nominated for a Bessie Award for best performer in 2022; and Dance Magazine named him one of “Top 25 Dancers to Watch” in 2010, and one of the best performers of 2015. Knight has starred with ballet greats Wendy Whelan and Misty Copeland in signature Graham duets, and has had roles created for him by such renowned artists as Nacho Duato and Pam Tanowitz. Knight has performed as a principal guest artist for The Royal Ballet of Flanders, directed by Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, as well as with Twyla Tharp Dance. Born in England and raised in Miami, FL, he trained at Miami Conservatory of Ballet and New World School of the Arts. He was a 2023 Dance Research Fellow at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts.

Jack Ferver is a New York-based writer, choreographer, and performer. Their genre-defying performances, which have been called “so extreme that they sometimes look and feel like exorcisms” (The New Yorker), inhabit while indicting psychological and sociopolitical issues, particularly in the realms of queerness, gender, and power struggles. Ferver’s work has been presented in New York City at New York Live Arts, The New Museum, The Kitchen, Crossing the Line Festival, Abrons Arts Center, Gibney Dance, Performance Space 122, Performa 11, Danspace Project, and Dixon Place, as well as at Mass MoCA (MA), the Richard B. Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College (NY), Portland Institute of Contemporary Art (OR), the Institute of Contemporary Art at MECA&D (ME), ICA (MA), Fusebox Festival (TX), Diverse Works (TX), Temperance Hall (Australia), and Théâtre de Vanves (France). They have collaborated with their partner, the visual artist and filmmaker Jeremy Jacob, on performances and short films that draw from both artists’ research into cinema, queerness, memory, and AIDS. The duo’s most recent film, NOWHERE APPARENT, was presented by All Arts in 2023. Ferver is a recipient of a Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists. They teach at Bard College.

Jeremy Jacob is an award-winning filmmaker and visual artist. Working in a variety of mediums, Jacob examines queer desire, often obfuscated, through the romantic and skeptical visions circulating within the American imaginary. Born on an industrial chicken farm in central Minnesota, Jacob’s work explores the conflict between work and play, reality and fantasy, private and public through the lens of American fairytales and princess fantasies as potential portals for self-realization and democratic nation-building. Jacob’s work has been presented by The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Palazzo Grassi, Bard College, The Zuckerman Museum of Art, Cindy Rucker Gallery, Projekt 722, Montserrat College of Art, New York Live Arts, American Ballet Theatre, and the New York Public Library, among others.

Featured Photo: Lloyd Knight, photo by Erick Munari