Pauline Jennings

“This is how modern dance should be: beautiful and edgy all at once.”

Rebeca Martin, Dance Informa

Pauline Jennings is a contemporary choreographer, performing artist, educator, and community builder currently based in Vermont. She is compelled to create works for stage, video, hybrid photography, public sites, and interactive installation that attempt to viscerally capture the excitement, confusion and fear accompanying our rapidly changing society. In her often collaborative work, it is important that both the performers and audience partake in a journey together – neither party quite knowing all of the details at the start of a performance, but discovering them together along the way. Developing emergent forms, responsive systems, and modes of audience interactivity has enabled her to choreograph in this manner. Emergent work further demonstrates and attempts to viscerally capture the excitement, confusion and fear that accompany our rapidly changing society. Through her work, Pauline hopes that viewers will have an opportunity to reflect upon and take a more active role in determining their own evolution.

Last July, Pauline participated in a series of residencies at New York Live Arts and GALLIM where she created choreography for the mixed-reality performance, Lizardly. Under the direction of Heidi Boisvert and Kat Mustatea, Lizardly premiered at New York Live Arts as part of the MAXlive2021: The Neuroverse festival. The work will also presented as part of the Performing tech / Live Artery festival  at New York Live Arts (Jan. 2022).

Recently, the duet for film, Skiers ,was selected and awarded as part of the 2022 VDA Dance on Film Festival. The duet, directed by Heather Theresa and Jennings, with choreography by Jennings and Joshua Lacourse, will also be featured at the 2022 Junction Dance Festival.  Skiers is part of a larger work, neighboring|towns, which was developed with assistance from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts and premiered at The Hamiltonian (Washington DC, 2019)

Throughout the pandemic, Jennings developed the Random Site Series. Through a hybrid art form, movement poetry, the RSS experimented with photography and site-specific movement to prompt the question: How does one year feel? Through personal reflection and a fierce dive into familiar landscapes including self, home, and surrounding geography, Jennings challenges herself and viewers alike to consider pursuing adventure, practicing curiosity, and making discoveries within the seemingly mundane.

Jennings’ prior choreographic works have been presented in festivals and showcases internationally, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Merce Cunningham Studio, EMPAC, Museumsquartier Wien, Hamiltonian Gallery (Washington, DC), Lake Studios (Berlin), Institut Intermédií (Prague), Eastern Bloc (Montreal), Primo Piano LivinGallery (Lecce), and Museum of Contemporary Art and Planning Exhibition (Shenzhen). Jennings currently teaches dance at Saint Michael’s College and has lectured and taught at New York University – Shanghai, the University of Applied Arts (Vienna), University of California at Berkeley, Arizona State University, Amherst College, Dartmouth College, and College of Santa Fe. Jennings holds an MFA from Mills College.

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