The Brutal Joy: A Performative Lecture by Justine A. Chambers

This performative lecture speaks to and with the conceptual and historical underpinnings of Justine A. Chambers' most recent choreographic project, The Brutal Joy, currently touring internationally. Chambers discusses dance and personal style as counter archives; the processes of ritualization and individuation; and the oscillation between the compositional structure of the riff, the vamp and the break as a means to self-actualize in the present to allow a dance of future possibilities to surface. Emerging from traces of childhood memories of family gatherings on the South Side of Chicago, The Brutal Joy: A Lecture unfurls Black vernacular line dance and Black sartorial gesture, in the lineage of Black dandyism, as intellectual discourse, reverie and devotion to Black Living.
Chambers’s choreographic practice is grounded in empathic and collaborative creation, diasporic practices as knowledge reservoirs, and outward-facing activations of a cumulative bodily archive of the everyday. In this work, intergenerational inheritances of movement and personal style are tools for reclaiming Black existence and value through self-determination and collective ritual. Gesture, gait, gaze, rhythm, sonic texture, and shadow serve as materials for imagining otherwise.

Choreography and performance: Justine A. Chambers
Sound design and performance: Mauricio Pauly
Lighting design and performance: James Proudfoot
Dramaturgy: Vanessa Kwan
Garments by: Old Fashioned Standards
Hair by: Liam Murley

All entrances to the Studio Loft are accessible.  Wheelchair accessible seating locations are available where patrons can remain in their wheelchairs or transfer to theatre seats.  Accessible seating will be arranged upon arrival.  Courtesy wheelchairs are available upon request, call 720.865.4200 upon arrival. You will need to provide them with the make, model, and color of your vehicle, as well as your location.  They will then contact the House Management team to meet you with a wheelchair.  Wheelchair accessible parking is located in the DPAC Garage on levels 3, 4, and 5; there is also curbside drop off at 14^th Street between Curtis and Champa.