19 MONUMENTAL POSES: Workshop with Martha Graham Company

Friday, October 14th, 2022

Village Preservation and the Martha Graham Dance Company present 19 Monumental Poses, a collaboration as a part of Village Preservation’s outdoor public art exhibition “VILLAGE VOICES 2022.”

Dancers from Graham 2 will host a free workshop on Friday, October 14th from 2 PM – 4 PM in Gansevoort Plaza at Little West 12th Street.  Join in and have an opportunity to learn Martha Graham’s 19 Poses at the VILLAGE VOICES installation A Monument to Choice. 

Taken from groundbreaking, seminal Graham works, the 19 Poses embody power, determination, resilience, and more.  They are a perfect compliment to the Monument to Choice, and the workshop will include a photo session on the monument for anyone so inspired.

A Monument to Choice is a physical platform which carries the inscription, I Stand for Choice. It is an experiential installation, a part of VILLAGE VOICES 2022, where people can rise up to show their support in standing for choice in all its meanings and iterations; it is a destination to make a statement.

To honor all the Village trailblazers who raised their voices for our right to vote, to live the lives we choose to live, and to stand up in the present to voice our determination to fight for the hard won civil rights achievements of our forebears at this critical juncture in our collective history, the Martha Graham Dance Company will recreate and teach to the public the 19 Poses for the 19th Amendment, originally created for the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment that granted women the right to vote in the United States. The public program will take place at A Monument to Choice in Gansevoort Plaza at Little West 12th Street.

“Our Village forebears were courageous leaders and change-makers of civil rights and cultural movements,” said Leslie Mason, member of Village Preservation’s Board of Trustees and a lifelong Village resident. “Advocacy in all its forms is in the DNA of our community. With this installation, we celebrate the courageous change-makers, amplify their voices, and hope to carry their examples forward.”

“The 19 Poses is intended to connect the public – in the ephemeral and visceral way dance does – to historical and contemporary ideas of the feminine,” says Janet Eilber, Artistic Director of the Martha Graham Dance Company. “It provides a lens through which to consider Graham’s transformative views of women in concert with the immediate and personal creations of today.

Location: A Monument to Choice in Gansevoort Plaza at Little West 12th Street. 38 Gansevoort St, New York, NY 10014

Accessibility and Seating: Please note that this is a movement workshop held outdoors in the plaza. Join in the movement workshop or one can come just to watch. Please note seating is not guaranteed. Thank you.