A choreographer and videomaker, Lerner—together with Rosane Chamecki—has been the co-artist director of chameckilerner. During the 25-year collaboration, chameckilerner has created a body of work that includes dance performances, video, and installation pieces; chameckilerner started experimenting with film in 2008. Their first short video, Flying Lesson, won the Dance on Camera Festival at Lincoln Center. Other videos include The Collection, commissioned by Robert Wilson’s Watermill Center; Conversation with Boxing Gloves between Chamecki and Lerner, commissioned by PERFORMA 09; Samba#2 and Eskasizer (a four-channel installation) through a residency at EMPAC, Troy, NY; among others. Their video work won a series of prizes at international film and dance festivals around the world. Lerner is the recipient of various fellowships and grants, including the prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship, The Foundation for Contemporary Arts, NYFA, NYSCA, NEFA, Jerome Foundation, Rockefeller MAP Fund, among others. Most recently, she was a 2019 artist in residence at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, a Gibney DiP Residency Artist, and finished a commission to Barnard College students in spring 2019. SLC, 2019-
Previous Courses
Dance in Frame
Component—Spring
Dance in Frame is a course about “why and when” to convey a choreographic idea into a video. In our experience, the important questions are simple: When does one’s concept ask for the language of video making? What are the tools available in video that would not only facilitate the work but also demand that the work be made specifically for the screen? To answer these questions, one needs to understand that neither the media nor dance is subjugated to the other. The same understanding of dance must be extended to video and experimental film. During the course, we will screen and analyze works from early experimental films made in the 1920s to early video art works for the 1960s and, finally, videos and installations of our contemporaries in order to illustrate different approaches and guide the students’ own works. Throughout the semester, students will be given a series of hands-on assignments, both individually and in groups. The exercises are designed not only to develop a familiarity with the camera—exploring concepts of framing, camera move, planes, and deconstruction of space/time—but also, and more importantly, to contemplate and witness the possibilities of creating informal pieces and investigating how video can transfigure and uniquely represent what is being observed. These exercises build toward the complexion of a larger video project, incorporating approaches introduced throughout the term and including the presentation or installation of each piece. The class welcomes dancers, performers, video makers, photographers, or anyone else interested in this process.