Debut-iful Dance Season

New TITAS Presents season guarantees dance moves Dallas has never seen

The forthcoming 2015-2016 TITAS Presents season at AT&T Performing Arts Center is full of Dallas debuts and legendary choreographers. Dubbed "Breaking Normal," it features 10 regular season shows and one special event.

Of the 10 regular season performances, nine of them are new to Dallas, providing some fresh blood for performing arts patrons to enjoy. Everything takes place at Winspear Opera House or Dallas City Performance Hall.

The season kicks off September 18 and 19 with the previously announced Twyla Tharp Dance 50th Anniversary Tour. It was co-commissioned by TITAS Presents and debuts in Dallas. No particulars have emerged, but because it's coming from the dance legend, it's sure to be spectacular.

Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion makes its Dallas debut on October 29 and 30. Labeled as "urban funk meets modern dance," this is a world premiere for the troupe, choreographed by MacArthur "Genius" Award recipient Kyle Abraham.

Akram Khan Dance Company comes to Dallas City Performance Hall on November 6 and 7. The British-born Khan, whose family is from Bangladesh, is known for choreographing work that takes the audience to new and unexpected places through human themes and exploration. This performance, titled "Kaash," is a collaboration with famed artist Anish Kapoor and composer Nitin Sawhney.

BodyTraffic, performing January 22, 2016, at Winspear Opera House, starts the new year in style. In just three short years, the troupe has garnered much attention in the dance world thanks to its stylized and confident performances, not to mention work by some of the world's most sought-after choreographers.

Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan debuts on February 5, 2016, at Winspear Opera House in a collaboration with the Crow Collection of Asian Art. The performance, titled "Rice," features dancers trained in Qi Gong and internal martial arts enacting a human drama parallel to the life cycle of rice.

All-male company BalletBoyz puts on a debut performance on February 13, 2016, at Winspear Opera House. Their work has been hailed as original and innovative, and their founders, Michael Nunn and William Trevitt, have been credited with making dance accessible to a wider audience through their stage and television work.

The French duo Mr. & Mme Revé, aka Mr. & Mrs. Dream, debut a dreamlike performance on March 18 and 19, 2016, at Dallas City Performance Hall. The two dancers use virtual reality backgrounds, like a claustrophobic home or a mountain landscape, to create a 3D environment that morphs before your eyes.

March will be French month, as La Compagnie Hervé Koubi Dance makes its debut on March 25 and 26, 2016, at Dallas City Performance Hall. As choreographed by Koubi, the performance by 12 male Algerian and West African dancers combines capoeira, martial arts, urban and contemporary dance to seemingly defy gravity.

Canadian troupe Kidd Pivot Dance Company debuts a new work on April 21 and 22, 2016, at Dallas City Performance Hall. Using movement, original music, text and rich visual design, their newest work, "Betroffenheit," is said to be an innovative, boundary-stretching hybrid of theater and dance.

TITAS' annual Command Performance Gala takes place May 7, 2016, at Winspear Opera House. Twelve artists from leading companies command the stage in a night that also showcases newly commissioned works created specifically for the gala performance.

Complexions Contemporary Ballet, comprising 16 dancers of different ethnic and dance backgrounds, wraps up the season on May 21, 2016, at Winspear Opera House. The performance features new works and complex, rich choreography.

Tickets for TITAS Presents regular season performances begin at $12. Performance tickets to TITAS Presents Command Performance also begin at $12. TITAS Presents subscribers receive discounted pricing depending on the number of shows they purchase and priority seating.

Currently, patrons may purchase either the full season subscription or a minimum of six titles on a flex-subscription plan. Individual tickets, should they remain available after subscription sales, will be made available at a later date.

Tickets can be purchased online at www.attpac.org/titas, by phone at 214-880-0202 or in person at the AT&T Performing Arts Center information center at 2353 Flora St.

Mr. & Mrs. Dream perform at Dallas City Performance Hall on March 18 and 19, 2016.

Photo by Pascal Elliott, courtesy of AT&T Performing Arts Center

Mr. & Mrs. Dream perform at Dallas City Performance Hall on March 18 and 19, 2016.

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Lawsuit news

Artist sues FIFA for $25 million over painted-over Dallas whale mural

Facebook/Wyland

Artist Wyland's Whaling Wall mural being painted over for a FIFA World Cup-related mural in Dallas.

The artist who painted a giant mural on a building in downtown Dallas of life-sized swimming whales has filed a $25 million lawsuit against soccer's international governing body and others, saying they illegally painted over his work to promote the city's upcoming World Cup matches.

The artist Wyland says he hand-painted the sprawling mural that covered roughly 17,000 square feet (1,580 square meters) across two of the building's walls.

The mural stood for nearly three decades before workers began painting over it last month, causing an uproar among residents who admired the mural's grand scale and message of ocean conservation.

The area’s World Cup organizing committee said in a statement that, in place of Wyland's mural, new artwork is planned "that captures this current historical moment and reflects the energy, unity, and global spirit surrounding the World Cup 2026.” It said a portion of Wyland's mural would be preserved.

Wyland filed suit Monday, June 1 in U.S District Court in Dallas saying that World Cup organizers, along with the building's owner and management company, painted over his mural without his consent or even notifying him. He says their actions violated a 1990 federal law passed to protect visual artists from destruction of publicly displayed works.

Wyland is seeking at least $25 million in damages. His lawsuit says world soccer's governing body, FIFA, and other defendants “hastily and irrevocably destroyed a civic landmark” to promote the World Cup.

“Though FIFA claims they were working to develop art for the host city, in truth, they defaced an historic fixture of the host city,” the artist's lawsuit says.

A FIFA spokesperson said Tuesday the federation “has no involvement in this whatsoever” and referred a reporter to the tournament's local organizing committee.

A spokesperson for the North Texas FWC Organizing Committee declined to comment. The committee isn't named as a defendant in the lawsuit.

A spokesperson for Slate Asset Management, which manages the building where the mural was painted over, said in a statement that local World Cup organizers asked Slate in March to donate the mural space for “a new public art installation.”

“Slate is not being compensated in any way for the use of the wall space and was told by the local groups that Mr. Wyland had been notified,” the management company's spokesperson said in an email.

Dallas is hosting more World Cup matches than any of the other sites in the event co-hosted by the U.S., Canada and Mexico, with nine matches set to be played at AT&T Stadium in suburban Arlington, home of the Dallas Cowboys.

Wyland's Dallas mural, titled “Whaling Wall 82,” was finished in 1999 and is among more than 100 similar murals known as Whaling Walls the artist painted around the world to promote the conservation of ocean life.

An online petition protesting the mural's destruction and calling for protecting of public artwork in Dallas has received more than 2,600 signatures.

Wyland's lawsuit alleges violations of the Visual Artists Rights Act, a 1990 federal law that protects artwork of “recognized stature” even if someone else owns the physical artwork.

A judge cited that law in 2018 when he ordered a property owner to pay a group of New York graffiti artists $6.7 million for whitewashing dozens of their spray-painted murals on buildings that once housed a factory in Queens. The ruling was upheld on appeal.

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