Get ready, larger than life figures covered in buttons, human hair, feathers, stuffed animals and other salvaged flea market items will be dancing through Detroit soon. Starting in June, Nick Cave will not only be outfitting professional dancers in his signature Sound Suits, but also local Detroit citizens, including high school students.
“Here Hear,” Cave’s upcoming show, will feature thirty Sound Suits and seven newly commissioned pieces. The works will be exhibited at the Cranbrook museum in Detroit from June 20 until October. However, this exhibit is only one part of Cave’s vision. This spin of his 2013 piece “Hear NY,” a performance held in Grand Central Station, takes Cave’s trademark themes of collaboration with place to another level. Pop-up dance shows and free public performances will occur around the city throughout Cave’s Detroit residency. Cave is inserting himself in Detroit at a pivotal time, as the city struggles to rebuild. “My dreams for the city are big, because I believe it is important for Detroit to be dreaming ambitiously at this moment about its own future,” Cave said in a statement. In July Cave will partner with LBGTQ youth from the Ruth Ellis Center in Highland Park and create Up Right Detroit, then in September he will join forces with students from the Detroit RiverFront Conservancy and the Detroit School of Arts to unveil Heard Detroit, in which high school dancers will don Sound Suits. “As a city we’re not just observing, we are participating,” Laura Mott, the curator of Contemporary Art and Design at the Cranbrook museum, told the Observer. You can learn more about his upcoming projects at his website.
h/t: Observer
