Two Rising Young Performers Make Local Debuts

Coming to the Wexner Center Performance Space in May: Cynthia Hopkins, a New York music/theater artist who belts out tunes like a young Patsy Cline while taking audiences on an imaginative whirlwind journey through her past, and Rachid Ouramdane, a dance artist from France whose incisive solo piece deals with young people’s obsessions with death. Their May performances mark the area debuts of both artists. Tickets for both shows are $16 general public, $13 members, and $10 students, and are available at the Wexner Center Ticket Office (614 292-3535) and Ticketmaster (614 431-3600) or Ticketmaster.com. Both will be presented in the Wexner Center Performance Space located at 1871 North High Street (capacity 100).

Cynthia Hopkins Accidental Nostalgia: An Operetta About the Pros and Cons of Amnesia Thursday-Friday, May 4-5 at 8 pm; Saturday, May 6 at 2 & 8 pm; Sunday, May 7 at 7 pm

“Will haunt the audience long after the lights have faded to black.”—Village Voice

New York-based Cynthia Hopkins—writer, composer, singer, and actor—takes the audience on a witty and tumultuous journey in her Obie- winning autobiographical performance. She smartly transcends typical clichés of repressed memories and dysfunctional childhoods and instead opts for humorous insight and flights of her imagination. Artfully wrought alt- country songs expand upon her confessional, clinical, and mystical musings, as she belts outs the tunes like a young Patsy Cline, backed live by her band, Gloria Deluxe. In addition to creating full-length pieces of her own, Hopkins has worked as a composer, musician, and performer for many projects for other groups. For more information about these projects and the band Gloria Deluxe (which has produced five full-length albums) visit www.gloriadeluxe.com.

While at the Wexner Center, Cynthia Hopkins and performer/technicians Jim Findlay and Jeff Suggs will meet with students of OSU’s Department of Theatre to discuss the ideas behind Accidental Nostalgia.

Rachid Ouramdane/Association fin novembre Les morts pudique (Discreet Deaths) Thursday-Saturday, May 18-20 at 8 pm

“Technically sophisticated, conceptually fascinating, brilliantly danced and disquieting as only the best art can be.”—New York Times

French-born of Algerian descent, Rachid Ouramdane (pronounced ra-SHEED oor- AHM-daan) is at the forefront of Europe’s new generation of conceptual dance thinkers and performers who are bringing vital new ideas to the stage. His latest solo work Les morts pudique (Discreet Deaths) is based on Roland Petit and Jean Cocteau’s popular ballet Le Jeune Homme et La Mort and resonates with strange and compelling force as it investigates obsessions with death and its imagery among today’s youth. Spurred by an Internet search on these subjects, Ouramdane references the web-fanned spread of suicide, goth subcultures, young offenders facing the death penalty in the U.S., and a Palestinian suicide bomber. Plasma video screens frame the set to echo the media’s ever-present obsession with these phenomena. Since graduating from the Angers Contemporary Dance Center in 1992, Ouramdane has worked both as a dancer and artistic advisor with such artists as Hervé Robbe, Odile Duboc, Meg Stuart, Julie Nioche, and Christian Rizzo. The artistic mission of the Association fin novembre, established in 1996 by Julie Nioche and Rachid Ouramdane, is to explore and produce artistic projects that view the human body as the creative catalyst.

While at the Wexner Center, Rachid Ouramdane will meet with students in OSU’s Department of Dance for a technique masterclass and discussion.

SEASON AND EVENT SUPPORT Major support for the Wexner Center’s 2005–06 performing arts season is generously provided by Vorys, Sater, Seymour and Pease LLP, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Columbus Foundation. Significant contributions are also made by Altria Group, Inc., Morgan Stanley, Nationwide Foundation, and Ron and Ann Pizzuti. The Wexner Center’s 2005–06 dance season is presented in part by Huntington Bank. Additional funding is provided by the Ohio Arts Council, the Corporate Annual Fund of the Wexner Center Foundation, and Wexner Center members. Preferred accommodations: The Blackwell Inn. Les morts pudique is funded in part by FUSED: French U.S. Exchange in Dance, a program of the National Dance Project / New England Foundation for the Arts and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in New York with lead funding from Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and French American Cultural Exchange. This presentation of Accidental Nostalgia is one of a series of programs designed by the National Performance Network (NPN). NPN is an independent organization begun by Dance Theater Workshop and is comprised of arts organizations in 42 cities and 27 states. NPN is made possible through major funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency). For further information, visit the NPN website at www.npnweb.org or write: National Performance Network, 1712 Baronne Street, Ste. 1712, New Orleans, LA 70112.