The Making of Americans

“…an intensely visceral and emotional experience…” – Dance Theater Journal

“I make work about dancing and the intersection between dancing and other things that I care deeply about.” – Juliette Mapp

Drawing on Gertrude Stein’s visionary novel The Making of Americans, Juliette Mapp creates a powerful yet intimate new dance. The Making of Americans is an homage to Juliette’s mother’s family, immigrants from Albania, who settled in Gary, Indiana, home to the largest steel mill in the United States. The work also draws inspiration from Michael Jackson, a native of Gary, and other music born of the industrial Midwest.

The Making of Americans features video design by John Jesurun. The piece will be performed by Vanessa Anspaugh, Aretha Aoki, Levi Gonzalez, Molly Lieber, Kayvon Pourzar, Anna Sperber, Vicky Shick, and Mapp with lighting design by Jeff Nash and original music by Barbez.

The Making of Americans is commissioned by Dance Theater Workshop’s Commissioning and Creative Residency Program with support provided by Jerome Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, and donors to The Fund for Continuing Innovation. The Making of Americans was developed, in part, during a creative residency provided through a partnership between the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography at The Florida State University and Dance Theater Workshop with support from the National Endowment for the Arts. This project is made possible in part by support from the National Performance Network (NPN) Performance Residency Program. For more information: www.npnweb.org