Austin McCormick: Beautiful People 2011
By TOM MURRIN
Austin McCormick, the 27-year-old choreographer and artistic director of the Brooklyn dance-theater group Company XIV, is a "huge fan" of Louis XIV; hence, the name. "It was under him that dance, theater and design were combined into lavish spectacles," he says.
Last year's Nutcracker Rouge was his company's sixth production since it was founded in 2006, and showcased McCormick's knack for reinterpreting classical stories with sexiness and elegance. "In our version, we conceptualized it to be a baroque burlesque piece," he says, "I
would call it '17th-Century dance hall,' a fusion of corsets and pasties." His show featured the Sugar Plum Fairy descending from the ceiling on a stripper pole.
McCormick was raised in Santa Barbara, California and moved to New York in 2002 to attend Juilliard, where, he says, "I began to fuse baroque movement with classical ballet and modern
techniques."
It was also at Juilliard where he met Laura Careless, the principal dancer in Nutcracker Rouge, and the star of a one-woman show premiering this month, Lover. Muse. Mockingbird. Whore. "Careless is my muse," he says. What is particularly intriguing about the new show is its source material: Charles Bukowski poems. "We're looking at the female archetypes in his poetry, and we're making a narrative inspired by those women," he says. The music? Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and recordings of Bukowski reading his poems. Then, come September, McCormick will be taking on Pinocchio. "I'm collaborating with some incred- ible street dancers in the title roles,"
McCormick says. "It will be a dark, decadent Felliniesque production."
AUSTIN WEARS SHIRT AND PANTS BY PRADA, VINTAGE CORSET AND RING BY STOWELLEN.
GO BACK TO SEE MORE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE OF 2011
Last year's Nutcracker Rouge was his company's sixth production since it was founded in 2006, and showcased McCormick's knack for reinterpreting classical stories with sexiness and elegance. "In our version, we conceptualized it to be a baroque burlesque piece," he says, "I
would call it '17th-Century dance hall,' a fusion of corsets and pasties." His show featured the Sugar Plum Fairy descending from the ceiling on a stripper pole.
McCormick was raised in Santa Barbara, California and moved to New York in 2002 to attend Juilliard, where, he says, "I began to fuse baroque movement with classical ballet and modern
techniques."
It was also at Juilliard where he met Laura Careless, the principal dancer in Nutcracker Rouge, and the star of a one-woman show premiering this month, Lover. Muse. Mockingbird. Whore. "Careless is my muse," he says. What is particularly intriguing about the new show is its source material: Charles Bukowski poems. "We're looking at the female archetypes in his poetry, and we're making a narrative inspired by those women," he says. The music? Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and recordings of Bukowski reading his poems. Then, come September, McCormick will be taking on Pinocchio. "I'm collaborating with some incred- ible street dancers in the title roles,"
McCormick says. "It will be a dark, decadent Felliniesque production."
AUSTIN WEARS SHIRT AND PANTS BY PRADA, VINTAGE CORSET AND RING BY STOWELLEN.
GO BACK TO SEE MORE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE OF 2011
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