21c Museum Foundation Presents
Dan Dutton's The Faun
The Faun Dance Performance
Thursday January 31st, 2008, 8pm
Friday February 1st, 2008, 2pm
Friday February 1st, 2008, 8pm
Atrium Gallery
The event is free and open to the public with limited seating
Perforance lasts about 55 minutes
The poet-artist with the barefoot mind returns to the 21c Museum to portray the
myth of The Faun. Heralding from classical fables and fantasies, The Faun
is a dance performance-installation based on the Greek myths of Pan and the nymphs.
This performance in particular will be his "Club Faun" which incorporates a cross
between a Japanese tea house, a Noh theater stage, and an electronic dance club.
The lyrics are adaptations from the sagas of Nonnus, Ovid, Sappho, and the Homeric
Hymn to Pan wherein the dance and music emanate from the sculptural stage. The performance
consists of 11 short parts and will be accompanied by original electronic music
recordings.
About The Faun
"A couple of falls ago friends invited me to spend Thanksgiving with them in the
cave country of South West France, and arranged for an archaeologist to take us
into three of the caves to see the prehistoric paintings. Seeing those paintings
was a childhood dream come true, and a catalyst to begin work on The Faun. The subject
is such a fascination that I feel as though my muse decided to reward me with a
special treat.
The earliest images we made of ourselves are only partly human. They have or wear
horns and tails - they have something in common with the herds of bison and reindeer
that surround them. By 5,000 or so years ago, according to PIE linguists, this horned
half-man/half beast "guardian of the herd" also had a name, Pehuson, and was on
his way to becoming the Greek god Pan.
... catching a glimpse of something wonderful that might be, even in a hazy daydream,
is a beneficial gift. Exposed to the perilous vanity of such dreams, panic or patterns
are our only response. The Faun's gift is self-perpetuating - just as I was about
to grasp the matchless nymph Syrinx, burning with new desires, the frame changed
and I was left with the raw material of art."
— Dan Dutton
About The Artist
Born in 1959 in Somerset, KY, Dutton resides and works on his family homestead.
Aside from Dutton's exhibition of
Ballads of the Barefoot Mind
at 21c in 2006, Dutton has written and performed the now-renowned performances The
Stone Man, which premiered at the Kentucky Center, and The Four Operas of the
Secret Commonwealth. The Four Operas was aired on KET between
1995 and 2000, in which one part of the series was nominated for an Emmy.