Choreographer Ivy Baldwin’s latest work, Keen [No. 2], is a meditation on loss and ritual. This new dance for the Abrons Playhouse builds upon Baldwin’s recent Keen (Part 1) for the Philip Johnson Glass House in New Canaan, CT, and is co-presented by the Abrons Arts Center, The Chocolate Factory Theater, and The Joyce Theater as part of Joyce Unleashed, the Joyce Theater’s off-site series for experimental dance. Performances are June 1–11, 2017 (Thursdays through Saturdays at 8pm, and Sundays at 2pm).

Keen [No. 2] grows out of an open-eyed exploration of that which we uncomfortably avoid: the contours of grief. Juxtaposing ancient rites of mourning with threads inspired by such disparate sources as Paul Klee’s illustrations for Voltaire and Irish traditions of keening and windalls with new rites, inherited and invented, the dancers mine the emotional and physical experience of loss, memory, and holding love. Adhering to and departing from formal dance structures, the dancers cultivate a world that shifts between seemingly opposing states: mundane and otherworldly, human and animal, lamenting and salutary. Keen [No. 2] includes an immersive installation of stark white paper created by acclaimed artists Wade Kavanaugh and Stephen B. Nguyen. Sound design is by Baldwin’s longtime collaborator Justin Jones, with lighting design by Chloe Z. Brown and costumes by Mindy Nelson.