Desire Motor:
An NYC-based dance-theater performance project.
“Beth Graczyk invites us to remember that change is indeed possible - that how we feel right now is not set in stone - that it and we will shift. She reminds us that we each have the capacity to transform from moment to moment as she does - through every breathtakingly, detailed second of her crafting of space and time.” – Amy Miller, Senior Company Director at Gibney
Thirst, 2018
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One Of You Is Fake, 2017
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Beast, 2016
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“Penelope engages! She inspires! You sit, rapt, suddenly reacquainted to your BEING, eyelids presenting themselves as miracles, skin reawakened and aware of cloth and air. You embody possibility. I crave her.” – Alicia Walter, Chef and Enthusiast
Thirst at CPR - excerpt from Beth Graczyk on Vimeo.
Artist Statement
As a dance-theater artist, I’m fascinated by the continuum of ways humans dislocate or blend their innate internal desires with an external reality. I investigate how these internal/external perceptual fissures influence the way we engage with self and other.
Through my performance research I concoct sensation-based worlds built by observing and amplifying the hidden, the unseen, and the ignored, in an attempt to bring into focus stories and ideas located in the periphery. I enmesh the audience as simultaneously active participants and outside observers, through the interplay between the imagination, the human body, and inanimate objects.
I actively seep my knowledge of science and nature into scenarios that introduce instability to awaken the viewers desire to question information and its source. I use absurdity and humor to crack open ideas in an effort to generate a kaleidoscope of perspectives and sensations of any one thing using my queer-identified, shape-shifting and non-binary body.
A recurrent theme in my work is the interplay between presence and absence, happening in the space between the known and the unknown. I welcome the indeterminate, the improvised, and the causally linked in live performance. I am alive. I am LIVE.
As a dance-theater artist, I’m fascinated by the continuum of ways humans dislocate or blend their innate internal desires with an external reality. I investigate how these internal/external perceptual fissures influence the way we engage with self and other.
Through my performance research I concoct sensation-based worlds built by observing and amplifying the hidden, the unseen, and the ignored, in an attempt to bring into focus stories and ideas located in the periphery. I enmesh the audience as simultaneously active participants and outside observers, through the interplay between the imagination, the human body, and inanimate objects.
I actively seep my knowledge of science and nature into scenarios that introduce instability to awaken the viewers desire to question information and its source. I use absurdity and humor to crack open ideas in an effort to generate a kaleidoscope of perspectives and sensations of any one thing using my queer-identified, shape-shifting and non-binary body.
A recurrent theme in my work is the interplay between presence and absence, happening in the space between the known and the unknown. I welcome the indeterminate, the improvised, and the causally linked in live performance. I am alive. I am LIVE.
Biography
Beth Graczyk is a Brooklyn-based choreographer, performer and a scientist. Graczyk has performed throughout the United States and internationally in Japan, Ecuador, France and India for the past 17 years. Concurrently, she has contributed to 10 science publications in the field of cancer research. She co-directed the performance company Salt Horse in Seattle with Corrie Befort and Angelina Baldoz from 2008-2016. After moving to NYC 4.5 years ago, Graczyk launched a solo project called Desire Motor. The inaugural solo Beast, was produced by Gibney’s Work Up 3.0 program, and presented through Movement Research, CPR's Spring Movement Festival, Greenspace and toured to the Harrisburg Dance Festival (PA) and Corridor Festival (WA). Her 2nd solo, One of You Is Fake, was presented by La MaMa Moves Festival in 2017, and supported through a Marble House Residency in Dorset, Vermont and the NAP program in Kutztown, PA. One of You Is Fake was selected for Oye Group’s Avant-Garde night, Movement Research at the Judson Church, and the 2018 One Catches Light Festival at Jack in Brooklyn. Work-in-progress of her most recent solo, Thirst, was presented through Pioneers Go East Collective at Judson Art Wednesdays and for PSOH at CPR this past fall. Graczyk has had the honor of performing as a dancer for many incredible choreographers including Raja Kelly, Sara Shelton Mann, Mark Haim, Scott/Powell Performance, K.J. Holmes, and most recently for Jen Salk/Chase Angier in Aix en Provence, France. Graczyk works part-time as a Research Specialist at Rockefeller University.
Beth Graczyk is a Brooklyn-based choreographer, performer and a scientist. Graczyk has performed throughout the United States and internationally in Japan, Ecuador, France and India for the past 17 years. Concurrently, she has contributed to 10 science publications in the field of cancer research. She co-directed the performance company Salt Horse in Seattle with Corrie Befort and Angelina Baldoz from 2008-2016. After moving to NYC 4.5 years ago, Graczyk launched a solo project called Desire Motor. The inaugural solo Beast, was produced by Gibney’s Work Up 3.0 program, and presented through Movement Research, CPR's Spring Movement Festival, Greenspace and toured to the Harrisburg Dance Festival (PA) and Corridor Festival (WA). Her 2nd solo, One of You Is Fake, was presented by La MaMa Moves Festival in 2017, and supported through a Marble House Residency in Dorset, Vermont and the NAP program in Kutztown, PA. One of You Is Fake was selected for Oye Group’s Avant-Garde night, Movement Research at the Judson Church, and the 2018 One Catches Light Festival at Jack in Brooklyn. Work-in-progress of her most recent solo, Thirst, was presented through Pioneers Go East Collective at Judson Art Wednesdays and for PSOH at CPR this past fall. Graczyk has had the honor of performing as a dancer for many incredible choreographers including Raja Kelly, Sara Shelton Mann, Mark Haim, Scott/Powell Performance, K.J. Holmes, and most recently for Jen Salk/Chase Angier in Aix en Provence, France. Graczyk works part-time as a Research Specialist at Rockefeller University.