Choreographed by Alex Ketley

Music: Hildur Gudnadottir, Ethel and Valgeir Sigurdsson

Antique Collodion Wet Plate Photos by Mark Sink and Kristen Hatgi

Commissioned and Performed by BNC Colorado (2010)

BNC Colorado initiated a project where Colorado based Visual Artists would create a new work in collaboration with national choreographers. Alex collaborated with renowned photographers Mark Sink and Kristen Hatgi. The work in many different capacities, but Alex was drawn to the work they do with a 160 year old camera and a technique called Collodion Wet Plate Photography. The image is literally seared onto a piece of treated glass. The images inspired the project to look at time, antiquity, and ritual.

World dance Reviews
November 2011

“In "The Offering," Ketley uses huge projections of Sink's and Hatgi's photographs and places four male and four female dancers - Colby Foss, Jason Franklin, Julie King, Damien Patterson, Meredith Strathmeyer, Sarah Tallman, Elizabeth Towles, and Sean Watson - on white marley before them. Those dancers never directly interact with the projections, instead moving in ensembles, trios and nested male/female duets in choreography Ketley "found" from the photos. The duets are often presented four at a time with unison pairs within them. Much of the time most of the ensemble is totally still as others form compelling combinations in movement. The results are a visual delight that goes way beyond that dance or the photos.”