Benedict Nguyen

Benedict Nguyen is a writer, dancer, and arts advocate currently based in the South Bronx, NY. They're a member of the National Center for Choreography's year-long laboratory on dance writing.

Beyond the title itself, there’s something about the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA)’s exhibition Judson Dance Theater: The Work is Never Done, running from mid-September 2018 to early February 2019, that brought up meta thoughts about what work I’m doing. What could this writing, this work, do?
Simone Forti. Huddle. 1961. Performance. Committee on Media and Performance Art Funds. Performed in Judson Dance Theater: The Work Is Never Done, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, September 16, 2018–February 3, 2019. Performers: Martita Abril (top), Vanessa Vargas, Alexis Ruiseco-Lombera, Lindsay Londs Reuter, Samuel Hanson, Christiana Cefalu, Elizabeth Hart, Laura Pfeffer, Miguel Ángel Guzmán. Digital image © 2018 The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo: Paula Court.
For the Whitney, it seems that the newness of Mauss’s perspective as a visual artist looking at ballet’s resonances is one that offers rich potential to create a new artistic form. Particularly, Mauss set out to examine the relationship between modernist ballet and the New York avant-garde visual art world in the 1930s – ’50s.
Nick Mauss (b. 1980), Transmissions, March 16–May 14, 2018. Whitney Museum of American Art. Performer pictured: Anna Witenberg, March 13, 2018. Photograph © Paula Court.
What about all the artists who don’t register on the curatorial grid? The recently defunct Createquity has published a lot of research on who gets to be an artist and how saturated the field is with aspiring creatives. Many dance makers are finding space to present or perform their own work outside of the usual venues.

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