Miguel Gutierrez

Welcome to the Jungle (Working Title)

Work in progress showing
Thurs | July 23 | 7:30pm
Gannett Theater
Free and open to the public

At Bates, Miguel will begin a new project inspired by his first sabbatical as a UCLA professor this past winter. During this time, he traveled through Uruguay, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Cuba, and Puerto Rico to immerse himself in the local dance and performance communities.

Miguel is also delving into the political histories of these nations, noting that many have weathered military dictatorships that utilized repressive playbooks similar to current trends in the U.S. Through this work, he asks what might be yielded by examining these parallels and considering the ways in which artists persist and create in times of crisis.

About the Artist

Miguel Gutierrez (he/him) is a multi-disciplinary artist who makes epic dances and melancholy music and writes ranty essays. Recent work includes Bad Girls, a commission for the Trisha Brown Dance Company that premieres in 2027, Super Nothing, which was created through the Randjelović/Stryker Resident Commissioned Artist program at New York Live Arts, and Frankenstein, a dance created for visual artist Avram Finkelstein at Smack Mellon. His two records – SADONNA: The Album, where he performs sad covers of Madonna songs, and sueño, which features his original songs – are available on all streaming platforms. Miguel’s work has been presented internationally for over twenty years, most recently at ODC/SF, On the Boards, CAP/UCLA, MCA Chicago, American Dance Festival and he was a selected artist in the 2014 Whitney Biennial. He is a Guggenheim Fellow, a United States Artists Fellow, and has received a Foundation for Contemporary Art award, a Doris Duke Artist Award, a Frankie Award, and four New York Dance and Performance “Bessie” Awards. He has received project support through the National Performance Network, MAP, and the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project. His writing has appeared in BOMB online, Small Press Traffic’s The Back Room, InDance, SLUTS anthology from Dopamine Press, and in Entanglements, a monograph on collaborative work by Luke George and Daniel Kok. His podcast, Are You For Sale? examines the ethical entanglement between dance making and funding. He is an Associate Professor of Choreography in UCLA’s department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance and splits his time between Los Angeles, Brooklyn, San Francisco, and the world. www.miguelgutierrez.org