UC Berkeley News Brief

Berkeley dance prof Joe Goode named Guggenheim fellow

From the College of Letters & Science | 07 May 2007

BERKELEY – Choreographer Joe Goode has been named a 2007 Guggenheim Fellow, one of only five choreographers to receive the award this year.

The award was given to 189 artists, scientists, and scholars selected from almost 2,800 applicants. The award provides fellows with funding to help further their creativity and work.

Goode is a professor in the Department of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies. His most recent work, Humansville, will premiere on May 31 at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco. A free lecture on the making of the piece is scheduled for 4 p.m. on Monday, May 7 in the Zellerbach Playhouse on campus.

Humansville is an installation presented in several rooms. Goode writes that the piece explores the modern human experience of becoming saturated with information about human suffering, so much so that we are "stretched too thin - how can we possibly feel it all?"

With Humansville Goode attempts to invent a place where an audience can reflect on its own limitations and where human connection is possible. Dancers will perform around audience members, who may move freely about the space. This is a break from Goode's previous work, which has taken place on a more traditional proscenium stage.