WHYY interview and performance with Hellmut Gottschild and Karen Bamonte

In this 1985 footage, dancer and choreographer Hellmut Gottschild is interviewed about his work with his dance company Zero Moving, his solo work, and his long career as a leader within the field of expressionist dance. Three works from Zero Moving's repertoire are also excerpted in this footage. Wolf Dances (originally titled Beginning with Wolves) is based on a repeating and accumulating series of gestures, movements, and vocalizations that evoke a sense of insistence and wildness. The second work, Meet the Pigs, thematizes unbridled consumption, competition, and authoritarianism. The final piece, Soft Wear, is a dance theater piece based on the energetic manipulation of six suits that contrasts with an ongoing duet in which the dancers appear to be more vulnerable. The piece speaks to the constrictive uniformity of consumerism, which it reduces to absurdity through the frenetic movements of the dancers in the suits. The piece also suggests imagery of immigrants and of an older Eastern European world.