Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company - Mainstage Concerts

Incense - 2002 - Town Hall, NYC
2 female dancers and 2 male dancers
Choreography: Nai-Ni Chen
Music: Joan La Barbara - Costume: Karen Young

This dance was originally inspired by the sculpture titled Nine Muses by Carlos Dorian installed at Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, New Jersey. The choreographer also draws ideas from the offering of incense in the long corridors of an ancient temple in her childhood. The raising white clouds of the incense is said to bring the believer's prayer from their hearts to god's ears. The music reminds her of the mystical elements of nature and the more abstract, formal elements that gives structure to our faith and thus our lives.