Jody Sperling

Jody Sperling is an American dancer, choreographer, and dance scholar based in New York City. She is the Founder/Artistic Director of Time Lapse Dance, a dance company that gives a postmodern twist to vintage genres, from the fin de siècle spectacles of Loie Fuller, to circus and music hall entertainments.

Sperling combines research with imagination, to craft inventive, visually lush, and often humorous dances. Sperling’s works in the style of early modern dancer Loie Fuller are a mainstay of the repertory; other dances draw inspiration from such eclectic imagery as sideshow contortion acts, partner acrobatics, hula-hooping, low-flying trapeze, burlesque, Degas ballerinas, magic-lantern shows, mermaid myths, and more.

Background

Sperling has gained an international reputation as an expert on Loie Fuller and as a contemporary interpreter of Fuller’s style of dancing. She has lectured and/or performed at colleges, universities, festivals, and conferences in the United States, Canada, France, Ireland, Italy, The Netherlands, and Russia. Sperling’s interest in Fuller began in 1997 with The Butterfly Dance, [http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/dihtml/divideos.html#vc013] a collaboration with film choreographer/dance historian Elizabeth Aldrich commissioned by the Library of Congress.

Loie Fuller style works

Since then, Sperling has created five Fuller-inspired solos—The Serpentine Dance (after the 1891 original), The Magic-Lantern Dance (a collaboration with the American Magic-Lantern Theater), her signature work Dance of the Elements, La Nuit set to the music of John Cage, and her virtuosic Debussy Soirée. Recentlywhen, Sperling has expanded the Fuller vocabulary into group works: Ghosts (to premiere in 2008); the trio Roman Sketches (2007), co-commissioned by Vermont Performance Lab, LLC. and Marlboro College, and excerpts of which are in the repertory of the Netherland’s renowned Introdans youth ensemble; and the septet Ballet of Light [http://timelapsedance.com/rep_light.htm] (2007), a reinterpretation of Fuller’s 1908 original, commissioned by the University of Wyoming with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts/American Masterpieces program.

Other works

Sperling’s interest in history also encompasses other eras: she has performed Yvonne Rainer's 1960s landmark Trio A, while 16th-century galliard steps served as inspiration for her dance Orlando. Sperling has served on the Board of Directors of the Society of Dance History Scholars and is a regular presenter at the Society’s conferences. She holds an MA in Performance Studies (New York University, 1996) and a BA in Dance and Italian (Wesleyan College, 1992). In addition to her proficiency in Fuller-style dancing, Sperling is also a hoop dancer/instructor, and also has studied and made dances for low-flying trapeze. Sperling’s articles have appeared in "Dance Magazine", "The Village Voice", "The SDHS Conference Proceedings", and other publications, including the six-volume "International Encyclopedia of Dance" (Oxford University Press, 1998).

External links

* [http://timelapsedance.com TimeLapseDance.com]