Dance On Camera and Film at Lincoln Center will present the 52nd edition of the Dance on Camera Festival from February 9 to 12, 2024.
The four-day festival will feature 11 programs screening 36 films from countries around the globe, including eight world and five North American premieres.
“The 52nd Dance on Camera Festival invites New York audiences to traverse a rich, international tapestry of dance films that transcend time, style and form while celebrating innovative artists and stories,” said co-curator Michael Trusnovec. “We’re thrilled to share classical grace alongside the vitality of contemporary expression with all those who seek the beauty of dance, old and new.”
The festival will open with Chelsea McMullan’s feature documentary, Swan Song,.which immerses viewers in the National Ballet of Canada’s 2022 production of Swan Lake, directed for the first time by the company’s artistic director and ballerina, Karen Kain, immediately before her retirement.
“For this year’s festival, it was imperative to the curation team to include visually striking films, such as Violent Textures of Nature by Matthew Strasburger, which draws on intriguing color techniques, skewed environments and their inhabitants, and a trancelike sound score,” said Dance On Camera president and festival co-curator Shawn Bible. “This year, we included more humor dispersed throughout the programs that can be found in films like At the Bathhouse, by Emmy Award-winning director, choreographer and educator Al Blackstone, whose credits also include choreography for So You Think You Can Dance.”
The Dance on Camera Festival will close with the documentary feature Obsessed with Light from filmmakers Sabine Krayenbühl and Zeva Oelbaum. The film explores the work and influence of early-20th-century performer Loïe Fuller, whose dance and theatrical lighting techniques, the festival said, “have inspired the work of contemporary luminaries such as Taylor Swift, Shakira, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Bill T. Jones, among others.”
Co-curator Cara Hagan said, “We are thrilled to close the festival with a celebration of dance trailblazer Löie Fuller. Obsessed with Light encapsulates the goals we put forth to honor how innovators of the past have shaped the art we enjoy today and how they continue to inspire artists of the future, creating a seamless connection between the elegance of classical forms and the dynamic energy of modern creativity.”
The interactive competition #mydancefilm will feature submissions from filmmakers worldwide and be available to the public at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center on February 11 at 4:45 p.m. as part of the festival’s free public programming.
Founded in 1951, Dance On Camera is a not-for-profit whose mission, it says, is “to foster connections between the worlds of dance and film; to promote excellence in dance films; to support filmmakers working specifically with dance and help them develop and augment their skills; and to connect audiences with quality films focused on movement and dance, both new works and works from the historical canon.”
Film at Lincoln Center (FLC) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1969 that, it says, “celebrates cinema as an essential art form and fosters a vibrant home for film culture to thrive.”
