Stephen Petronio
Encyclopedia
Stephen Petronio is an artistic company founder/director, choreographer, and an American dancer based in New York City
.
Born in Newark, New Jersey
, on March 20, 1956. Petronio received a B.A. degree from Hampshire College
in Amherst, Massachusetts
, where he began dancing in 1974. Before pursuing a career in dance, Petronio initially studied pre-medicine before being inspired by the dancing of Steve Paxton
, with whom he studied contact improvisation, and Rudolf Nureyev
. Petronio then went on to become the first male dancer of the Trisha Brown
Company, where he worked from 1979 to 1986, and also where he made his first Pillow appearance in 1980. He founded the Stephen Petronio Company in 1984. The Stephen Petronio Company has toured extensively across the United States and 26 other countries like Canada, Mexico, Europe, South America, Australia, Korea, Russia, and over 35 New York City engagements with 15 seasons at The Joyce.
Stephen Petronio has his own choreographic language. He makes dances that are aggressive, stylish, athletic, and highly sexed. He translates sexuality into movement by initiating a step from the pubic bone. He says, "It doesn't look like sex but you get a very visceral feeling." With his own choreographic language, Petronio is somewhat like Brown where the movements come from any direction from any part of the body. Petronio explains, "Sex is in the middle of everything, and it’s gorgeous" He treats both male and female bodies as functionally equal because to Petronio, sexuality is an out of mind and body experience that brings the dancer to a level of "a source of dignity, spiritual nourishment and self-knowledge"
Petronio has worked with songwriters, musicians, and composers like Rufus Wainwright
(Bud, 2005, Bud Suite, 2006, and BLOOM, 2006), Laurie Anderson
(City of Twist, 2002), Lou Reed
(The Island of Misfit Toys, 2004), Michael Nyman
(Strange Attractors, 1999), James Lavelle
(Strange Attractors II, 2000), Wire (MiddleSexGorge, 1990), Diamanda Galás
(#4, 1997), Sheila Chandra
(Not Garden, 1999), Lenny Pickett (#3, 1986), Nick Cave (Underland, 2003), Fischerspooner (Beauty and the Brut, 2008), Jonny Greenwood (Ghostown, 2010), Ryan Lott (Tragic/Love,2009 and Singing Light, 2010), Nico Muhly (I Drink the Air Before Me, 2009), David Linton (numerous works, 1986–2001), Yoko Ono, and The Beastie Boys.Stephen Petronio Company Repertory
He has also collaborated with visual artists Cindy Sherman
(The Island of Misfit Toys and The King is Dead, 1994), Anish Kapoor
(Strange Attractors II), Donald Baechler
(Extravenous and A Mid-Summer Night’s Dream, 1997), Stephen Hannock
(Not Garden, 1999), and Charles Atlas (Wrong Wrong, 1990) as well as fashion designers Benjamin Cho, Rachel Roy, Tara Subkoff
/Imitation of Christ, Leigh Bowery
, Tanya Sarne/Ghost, Paul Compitus
, Michael Angel, Tony Cohen, Adam Kimmel, Jillian Lewis, and Manolo.
Petronio's long-time collaborator and resident lighting designer is Ken Tabachnick (currently Managing Director of the New York City Ballet
).
Petronio has created original works for numerous companies including Ricochet Dance Company, NDC Wales and Candoco Dance Company, all based in the UK. He has been commissioned to create new works for companies including William Forsythe’s Frankfurt Ballet (1987), the Tulsa Opera (1990), the Deutsche Opera Berlin (1992), the Lyon Opera Ballet (1994), the Maggio Danza Florence (1996), and the Ricochet Dance Company of London (1998
Stephen Petronio received a Guggenheim Fellowship
in 1988, fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts in 1985 and 2004, the first of the American Choreographer Awards in 1987, and a New York Dance & Performance Award (Bessie) in 1986. He has been awarded choreography fellowships from the NEA
from 1985 to 1988, and company grants from the NEA, like the Advancement Program Grant in 1994. He also received the New York State Council on the Arts consecutively since 1988. In 1999 he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
.
Born in Newark, New Jersey
Newark, New Jersey
Newark is the largest city in the American state of New Jersey, and the seat of Essex County. As of the 2010 United States Census, Newark had a population of 277,140, maintaining its status as the largest municipality in New Jersey. It is the 68th largest city in the U.S...
, on March 20, 1956. Petronio received a B.A. degree from Hampshire College
Hampshire College
Hampshire College is a private liberal arts college in Amherst, Massachusetts. It was founded in 1965 as an experiment in alternative education, in association with four other colleges in the Pioneer Valley: Amherst College, Smith College, Mount Holyoke College, and the University of Massachusetts...
in Amherst, Massachusetts
Amherst, Massachusetts
Amherst is a town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States in the Connecticut River valley. As of the 2010 census, the population was 37,819, making it the largest community in Hampshire County . The town is home to Amherst College, Hampshire College, and the University of Massachusetts...
, where he began dancing in 1974. Before pursuing a career in dance, Petronio initially studied pre-medicine before being inspired by the dancing of Steve Paxton
Steve Paxton
Steve Paxton is an experimental dancer and choreographer. His early background was in gymnastics while his later training included three years with Merce Cunningham and a year with José Limón. As a founding member of the Judson Dance Theater, he performed works by Yvonne Rainer and Trisha Brown...
, with whom he studied contact improvisation, and Rudolf Nureyev
Rudolf Nureyev
Rudolf Khametovich Nureyev was a Russian dancer, considered one of the most celebrated ballet dancers of the 20th century. Nureyev's artistic skills explored expressive areas of the dance, providing a new role to the male ballet dancer who once served only as support to the women.In 1961 he...
. Petronio then went on to become the first male dancer of the Trisha Brown
Trisha Brown
Trisha Brown is a postmodernist American choreographer and dancer.Brown was born in Aberdeen, Washington, and received a B.A. degree in dance from Mills College in 1958. Brown later received a D.F.A. from Bates College in 2000. For several summers she studied with Louis Horst at the American Dance...
Company, where he worked from 1979 to 1986, and also where he made his first Pillow appearance in 1980. He founded the Stephen Petronio Company in 1984. The Stephen Petronio Company has toured extensively across the United States and 26 other countries like Canada, Mexico, Europe, South America, Australia, Korea, Russia, and over 35 New York City engagements with 15 seasons at The Joyce.
Stephen Petronio has his own choreographic language. He makes dances that are aggressive, stylish, athletic, and highly sexed. He translates sexuality into movement by initiating a step from the pubic bone. He says, "It doesn't look like sex but you get a very visceral feeling." With his own choreographic language, Petronio is somewhat like Brown where the movements come from any direction from any part of the body. Petronio explains, "Sex is in the middle of everything, and it’s gorgeous" He treats both male and female bodies as functionally equal because to Petronio, sexuality is an out of mind and body experience that brings the dancer to a level of "a source of dignity, spiritual nourishment and self-knowledge"
Petronio has worked with songwriters, musicians, and composers like Rufus Wainwright
Rufus Wainwright
Rufus McGarrigle Wainwright is an American-Canadian singer-songwriter. He has recorded six albums of original music, EPs, and tracks on compilations and film soundtracks.-Early years:...
(Bud, 2005, Bud Suite, 2006, and BLOOM, 2006), Laurie Anderson
Laurie Anderson
Laura Phillips "Laurie" Anderson is an American experimental performance artist, composer and musician who plays violin and keyboards and sings in a variety of experimental music and art rock styles. Initially trained as a sculptor, Anderson did her first performance-art piece in the late 1960s...
(City of Twist, 2002), Lou Reed
Lou Reed
Lewis Allan "Lou" Reed is an American rock musician, songwriter, and photographer. He is best known as guitarist, vocalist, and principal songwriter of The Velvet Underground, and for his successful solo career, which has spanned several decades...
(The Island of Misfit Toys, 2004), Michael Nyman
Michael Nyman
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...
(Strange Attractors, 1999), James Lavelle
James Lavelle
James Lavelle is a DJ, electronic recording artist and record label boss.-Early years:Born into a family with a strong tradition of music, Lavelle first began by learning the cello with his grandmother in Oxford....
(Strange Attractors II, 2000), Wire (MiddleSexGorge, 1990), Diamanda Galás
Diamanda Galás
Diamanda Galás is an American avant-garde composer, vocalist, pianist, organist, performance artist and painter.Galás has been described as "capable of the most unnerving vocal terror", with her three and a half octave vocal range. She often screams, hisses and growls...
(#4, 1997), Sheila Chandra
Sheila Chandra
Sheila Chandra is an English pop singer of Indian descent.-Indian-Western pop fusion period:Sheila Chandra first came to public attention as an actress, playing Sudhamani Patel in the BBC school drama Grange Hill from 1979 to 1981.As a teenager she formed the band Monsoon with Steve Coe , and...
(Not Garden, 1999), Lenny Pickett (#3, 1986), Nick Cave (Underland, 2003), Fischerspooner (Beauty and the Brut, 2008), Jonny Greenwood (Ghostown, 2010), Ryan Lott (Tragic/Love,2009 and Singing Light, 2010), Nico Muhly (I Drink the Air Before Me, 2009), David Linton (numerous works, 1986–2001), Yoko Ono, and The Beastie Boys.Stephen Petronio Company Repertory
He has also collaborated with visual artists Cindy Sherman
Cindy Sherman
Cindy Sherman is an American photographer and film director, best known for her conceptual portraits. Sherman currently lives and works in New York City. In 1995, she was the recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. She is represented by Sprüth Magers Berlin London in and Metro Pictures gallery in...
(The Island of Misfit Toys and The King is Dead, 1994), Anish Kapoor
Anish Kapoor
Anish Kapoor CBE RA is a British sculptor of Indian birth. Born in Mumbai , Kapoor has lived and worked in London since the early 1970s when he moved to study art, first at the Hornsey College of Art and later at the Chelsea School of Art and Design.He represented Britain in the XLIV Venice...
(Strange Attractors II), Donald Baechler
Donald Baechler
Donald Baechler is an American artist. He attended the Maryland Institute College of Art from 1974–77, and Cooper Union from 1977-78. Dissatisfied with New York City, he proceeded to the Staatliche Hochschule fuer Bildende Künste Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main, Germany."At Cooper Union I met...
(Extravenous and A Mid-Summer Night’s Dream, 1997), Stephen Hannock
Stephen Hannock
Stephen Hannock is an American painter known for his atmospheric landscapes––compositions of flooded rivers, nocturnes and large vistas which often incorporate text inscriptions that relate to family, friends or events of daily life...
(Not Garden, 1999), and Charles Atlas (Wrong Wrong, 1990) as well as fashion designers Benjamin Cho, Rachel Roy, Tara Subkoff
Tara Subkoff
Tara Lyn Subkoff is an American actress and fashion designer from Westport, Connecticut. She has acted in over a dozen movies, most recently 2006's The Notorious Bettie Page....
/Imitation of Christ, Leigh Bowery
Leigh Bowery
Leigh Bowery was an Australian performance artist, club promoter, actor, pop star, model and fashion designer, based in London. Bowery is considered one of the more influential figures in the 1980s and 1990s London and New York art and fashion circles influencing a generation of artists and...
, Tanya Sarne/Ghost, Paul Compitus
Paul Compitus
Paul William Compitus is a fashion designer and educator, and is noted for his sexy, avant-garde, surreal and often futuristic style.-Life and career:...
, Michael Angel, Tony Cohen, Adam Kimmel, Jillian Lewis, and Manolo.
Petronio's long-time collaborator and resident lighting designer is Ken Tabachnick (currently Managing Director of the New York City Ballet
New York City Ballet
New York City Ballet is a ballet company founded in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and Lincoln Kirstein. Leon Barzin was the company's first music director. Balanchine and Jerome Robbins are considered the founding choreographers of the company...
).
Petronio has created original works for numerous companies including Ricochet Dance Company, NDC Wales and Candoco Dance Company, all based in the UK. He has been commissioned to create new works for companies including William Forsythe’s Frankfurt Ballet (1987), the Tulsa Opera (1990), the Deutsche Opera Berlin (1992), the Lyon Opera Ballet (1994), the Maggio Danza Florence (1996), and the Ricochet Dance Company of London (1998
Stephen Petronio received a Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...
in 1988, fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts in 1985 and 2004, the first of the American Choreographer Awards in 1987, and a New York Dance & Performance Award (Bessie) in 1986. He has been awarded choreography fellowships from the NEA
National Endowment for the Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current...
from 1985 to 1988, and company grants from the NEA, like the Advancement Program Grant in 1994. He also received the New York State Council on the Arts consecutively since 1988. In 1999 he was awarded a grant from the Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award.