MANHATTAN — Shen Wei, a Chinese choreographer based in New York City, knows how to fill a big space.
Wei, who choreographed the opening ceremony for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, has spent the past 16 months as an artist-in-residence at the Park Avenue Armory creating an ambitious site-specific work for the soaring 55,000-square-foot Wade Thompson Drill Hall that looks like a 19th-century European train station.
The piece, "Undivided Divided," had its world premiere at the Park Avenue armory Tuesday, where Shen Wei Dance Arts will be performing it and two other pieces through Dec. 4 to celebrate its 10th anniversary season.
For "Undivided Divided", audiences will be immersed in the performance as they are invited to move throughout the space filled with digital projections and the company's 32 topless dancers covered in wet paint, painting as they move.
"They'll be part of the performance space during the time then they are inside the performance rather than distant from the performers," Wei told NY1. "And the more closely they feel the artwork, not just by visual effective communication, but also by the sound, also by the energy close by or even the smells of the dancer's body or the feelings."
The performance also included two of the company's most celebrated works, "Rite of Spring," a 2003 work set to Stravinsky's famous composition and "Folding," a piece from 2000 that combines melodies of John Tavener and traditional Tibetan Buddhist chants.
The Park Avenue Armory, at 643 Park Ave., near East 67th Street, is ending its season with two other site-specific dance performances.
Elizabeth Streb's STREB Extreme Action will perform a new large-scale piece, "Kiss the Air!," from Dec. 14 through 21, which will incorporate ziplines, ladders, trampolines, hoops, and bungee cords that dancers will use to fly over the audience and a pool of water.
The Merce Cunningham Dance Company's final performances after 60 years will run from Dec. 29 to Dec. 31. Called "Park Avenue Armory Events," the series draws from collages the company has mounted in unusual spaces around the world over the last six decades, including two in the drill hall, a 1983 performance and a 2009 public memorial for the legendary dancer and choreographer Cunningham.
