Kyle Abraham’s Dance Company Brings Groundbreaking Choreography to Diana Wortham Theatre

Choreographer and 2013 MacArthur Fellow Kyle Abraham’s New York-based dance company, Abraham.In.Motion, brings a fresh, unique vision to the Diana Wortham Theatre with its groundbreaking work, When the Wolves Came In, Tuesday & Wednesday, March 24 & 25, 2015 at 8:00 p.m.
Abraham.In.Motion was just named one of The Boston Globe ‘s Top 10 Dance Picks in the nation (2014), won the prestigious Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award in 2012, and has been cited as “25 to Watch” by Dance magazine and one of New York’s “Best and brightest creative talents” by OUT magazine.
Timely and relevant to the current national spotlight on race and equality, Abraham.In.Motion’s When the Wolves Came In takes its inspiration from jazz legend Max Roach’s iconic 1960 protest album, We Insist: Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite. This album, originally intended to be released in 1963 to mark the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, was released in the fall of 1960 due to the severity sparked by the sit-ins in Greensboro, NC, and the urgency of the growing civil rights movement in the U.S. and South Africa.
Kyle Abraham began working on When the Wolves Came In after a visit to the Hector Pieterson Museum in Soweto, South Africa. While there, he became fixated on the power of perception, and the ways that the 13-year-old Pieterson’s death in a 1976 anti-Apartheid protest shines a spotlight on questions of personal choice and collective rights in the struggle for freedom today.
“I keep going back to Roach’s response when asked about the song, ‘Freedom Day,’” says Abraham. “[Roach said] ‘Freedom itself was so hard to grasp…we don’t really understand what it really is to be free.’

Pre-Performance Discussions: Kyle Abraham and Abraham.In.Motion company members will lead a pre-performance discussion at 7:00 p.m. prior to the March 24 and 25 performances in The Forum off of the main lobby. Free to ticket holders. Seating is limited and offered on a first come, first served basis. We regret that we may not admit patrons to the discussions after 7:10 p.m. Info: 828.257.4530.

The entrance for the Diana Wortham Theatre at Pack Place is marked by the location of the theatre’s marquee between 12 and 14 Biltmore Avenue. Patrons enter the theatre through the breezeway between Marble Slab Creamery and White Duck Taco and into a large interior courtyard with multiple glass doors to the theatre’s main lobby and box office. The intimate theatre seats just over 500 and boasts exceptional acoustics and sightlines, making it the premier performance space in Western North Carolina. To obtain more information on the Mainstage Series or to purchase tickets, call the theatre’s box office at (828) 257-4530 or visit:  www.dwtheatre.com.