A.I.M by Kyle Abraham

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Ian Douglas

A.I.M by Kyle Abraham

“She was thirty-four. He was thirty-seven. He was twenty-seven. He was twelve.” Carrie Mae Weems’s stark spoken-word litany invokes a list of African Americans killed by law enforcement as three eerie faces drawn in black and white by visual artist Titus Kaphar stare out at us, each countenance a composite of many others with multiple eyes, noses, and mouths. In their midst, the graceful, elegiac turns of choreographer Kyle Abraham’s sextet contrasts with audio of a police shooting in Meditation: A Silent Prayer. Abraham’s American Dance Festival program also includes the dance maker’s first on-stage solo piece in nearly a decade: INDY (no relation), a prismatic psychological profile in which a character grapples with issues involving gender and sexuality. We’ll also see guest choreographer Andrea Miller’s shadowy, state and Abraham’s fierce Show Pony, originally a solo work retooled as a duet for company stars Tamisha Guy and Marcella Lewis, before the bass-driven club-dance vibe of Drive. —Byron Woods