Chris Elam, (Artistic Director and Choreographer) graduated from Brown University and received his MFA in Dance from NYU Tisch. He has been on faculty at Brown University and The State Conservatory for the Arts in Turkey, and a guest choreographer at 8 universities. Elam is often booked to lecture, most recently at Brown University's speaker series, as a social entrepreneur in the arts. Elam’s study of traditional dances informs the technical and conceptual complexity of his contemporary choreography.
In 1999 Elam spent 7 months with a Topeng dance master in Indonesia, training and performing in temple ceremonies. In 2001 he brought Misnomer to perform and teach in Brazil. In 2002 he spent 6 months on faculty in Turkey. In 2004 he spent 3 months in Havana choreographing on DanzAbierta, a national dance company of Cuba. In 2005 Elam performed in Ireland on a European Cultural City Commission, which led to a commission in Holland in 2006 with the interactive technology group Blue Noise Dept. Elam hasn’t stopped choreographing for more than a 6-month period in 17 years. He graduated in public policy, focused on federal involvement in the arts, and computer science.
“A true original, … one of the most individualistic of modern dance voices today.”
Jennifer Dunning, The New York Times
“Wonderfully strange and unpredictable choreography.”
Brian Seibert, The New Yorker
“Christopher Elam’s Misnomer Dance Theater hit town with a force I haven’t seen since the early days of Mark Morris...Fusion doesn’t begin to describe what’s going on here; Elam is annealing his influences, creating a taut, intense movement language.”
Elizabeth Zimmer, The Village Voice
“Chris Elam has fashioned a distinctive, engagingly bizarre choreographic style. His skill and clarity of vision delight the soul.”
– Deborah Jowitt, The Village Voice
Misnomer Dance Theater finds tenderness, humor, and absurdity in peoples’ efforts to relate to one another. Whether between adolescent sisters, estranged lovers, business partners, or animalistic creatures, Artistic Director Chris Elam invents characters that work hard to form meaningful exchanges, sometimes producing poignant and awkward tenderness, at other moments yielding fiercely dismal misunderstandings.
Elam uses physical illusions as a tool to investigate personal and group transformation. An arm sprouts out of an ear, a person becomes an ostrich, five dancers appear to share a single head and dance a maudlin jig. Assertive contact partnering in which dancers climb upon each other to form improbable human architectures serves to fuse performers into unusual entities.
Drawing from his extensive training in both traditional Balinese and Modern Dance, Elam establishes the human body as a site for cultural exchange. This is achieved by creating wildly kinetic movement that integrates the tense and sculptural quick-action style of Balinese dance with his own broken-flow modern movement.
Managers
Chris Elam, Artistic Director and Choreographer
Melissa Gilliam, Booking Director
Jaki Levy, Director of New Media
Kristen Schifferedecker, Administrative Director
Costumes
Karen Flood
Sarah McMillian
Kaibrina Sky Buck
Web & Graphic Design
Martha Beckman
Joanna Seltz
Abby Gaudette
Photography
Mark Murray
Mark Sadan
Jason Somma
Stage Manager
Zohar Adner
Management Consultant
Samir Bitar
Video
Gabriella Monroy
Jason Somma
Jason Roer
Website Assistance
Ed Davis,
Abbey Dehnert
Animation
OMG Media
Summer Interns
Tina Gao
Benjamin Kimitch
Gabriella Pinto