The Let Go

Interdisciplinary artist Nick Cave creates a dance-based town hall—part installation, part performance—to which the community of New York is invited to “let go” and speak their minds through movement, work out frustrations, and celebrate independence as well as community. The reimagined Wade Thompson Drill Hall allows for social gatherings and is activated by “chase,” a multi-colored, 100-foot-long mylar sculpture that glides across the dance floor.

Up Right Performances
On weekday evenings Cave will orchestrate a cast of dancers in his signature Up Right performances, a call to arms where the soundsuits are engaged in a transformative journey to face the forces that stand in the way of selfhood. Practitioners and initiates perform new site-situated choreography by Cave and dancer and choreographer Francesca Harper that celebrates self-determination in a grand procession around “chase,” accompanied by the melodic voices of baritone Jorell Williams and Vy Higginsen’s Sing Harlem Choir with additional musicians.

Installation Hours
During weekends, visitors and community organizations such as yoga practitioners, hula-hoopers, church choirs, and school groups from across all boroughs are invited to express themselves through movement within the installation to music curated by some of New York’s leading DJs played as a soundtrack or mixed live. Participants will be engaged by dancers leading games of Twister, Soul Train lines, a special line dance called “The Let Go” created for the installation, soundsuit invasions, and other dance-based encounters. Also on display in the Armory’s historic rooms are a collection of Cave’s soundsuits, wearable sculptures that create a second skin to conceal race, gender, and class to force the viewer to observe without judgment. Weekend DJs include Ana Matronic (June 9), Johnny Dynell (June 10), Joe Claussell (June 16), JD Samson (June 17), Noise Cans (June 23), Sabine Blaizin (June 24), Sammy Jo (June 30), and Tedd Patterson (July 1).