We are delighted to welcome back Jermaine Spivey & Spenser Theberge in late November for the premiere of a new work, Position 3, in collaboration with filmmaker John de Menil. In this piece, the duo, accompanied by a third performer, the camera, complexifies the relationship between identity and perception by playing with the way their flesh, their projected selves and the audience’s impressions co-exist in space and time.

Spivey & Theberge’s work is based in improvisation, and Position 3 is a multidisciplinary representation of how their spontaneous sense of performance coordinates across mediums to reveal personal truths.

Inspired by John Cage’s words, “Every something is a celebration of the nothing that supports it,” Position 3 at once avoids and confronts, all in an effort to shine a light on the nothing that we call something.

Position 3 is a co-production of NAVEL & The Sharon Disney Lund School of Dance at CalArts

Jermaine Maurice Spivey was born in Baltimore, Maryland where he began his dance training at the Baltimore School for the Arts before graduating with a BFA in dance from The Juilliard School in May 2002. In recent years he has been a member of choreographer Crystal Pite’s company, Kidd Pivot. Jermaine has also performed as a guest artist with the Hofesh Shechter Company, and most recently with The Forsythe Company from 2013-2015. Jermaine is a 2001 Princess Grace Awardee and a 1998 National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts 1st Level Awardee.

Spenser Theberge is a performer and creator based in Los Angeles. A former dancer with Netherlands Dance Theater and The Forsythe Company, Spenser now works as a freelance artist, his work presented across North America, Europe, and Asia. Spenser is a proud faculty member of CalArts Sharon Disney Lund School of Dance.

John de Menil is a writer and filmmaker based in Los Angeles. Born and raised in New York City, John roots for the Mets and drinks his coffee light and sweet. He received an MFA in directing from the American Film Institute in 2014, where his short film Pyromance was an official selection to AFI Fest 2015. Recently he served as cinematographer and producer of the feature film A Thousand Junkies, which was released by The Orchard in 2018. John collaborated with Spenser and Jermaine on their previous performance at NAVEL, Rather This, Then, and he very much enjoys watching them dance.

Image by John de Menil