It’s Showtime NYC! Pyramid by Cal Hunt and Johnathan Moore
Courtney “Balenciaga” Washington’s MasterZ at Work Dance Family
Rotunda Dance Party: Ladies of Hip-Hop All Styles Battle
Friday, January 10
7 pm: Theater
8:30 pm: Rotunda Dance Party

See two Works & Process commissions centered on street dance by It’s Showtime NYC! and MasterZ at Work Dance Family. Then step up and step into the Ladies of Hip-Hop All Styles Battle in the rotunda.

New Yorkers are, by nature, archaeologists. Be it graffiti, hieroglyphics, or freestyle dance on the street, lived stories are shared to those willing to pause and take in the messages. See the world premiere of Pyramid, commissioned by Works & Process, featuring It’s Showtime NYC!, a company of dancers with a history of performing on New York’s streets and subways. Created in collaboration with composer and cellist Johnathan “Akuma” Moore, with dance dramaturgy by BRAT, Pyramid is an original music composition and dance work through which the composer and the company dancers each investigate the notion, “This is how you sound to me.” Moore’s composition animates each dancer’s struggles and triumphs as live building blocks of the pyramid, choreographed by It’s Showtime NYC! Artistic Director Cal Hunt. In his cello composition, Moore incorporates techniques typically employed by funk bassists, such as layered electronic loops, freeing himself to join the performance as a bonebreaker or flexN artist.

The evening also spotlights Black trans femme choreographer Courtney Washington, Mother Balenciaga—the founder of the Kiki House of Juicy Couture, a leader of the House of Balenciaga, and founder of MasterZ at Work Dance Family. Washington’s new Works & Process commission fuses street dance, street jazz, ballroom, vogue, and hip hop and is inspired by chance encounters at New York City diners and stories told over shared meals.

To close the evening, step up and step into the Ladies of Hip-Hop All Styles Battle in the rotunda. Founded by Michele Byrd-McPhee, Ladies of Hip-Hop Dance Collective (LDC) is an all-female intergenerational dance collective that creates dance works illuminating the strength, power, and diversity of women in hip hop. Ever present in the work are the freestyle, cipher, and call-and-response origins of street and club dance culture.