CREATED 2014
COMMISSIONED BY: The Dau Family in honor of Elizabeth Hoffman and David Mechlin, Treacy and Darcy Beyer; The American Dance Festival with support from the SHS Foundation and the Charles L. and Stephanie Reinhart Fund; and by the National Endowment for the Arts, which believes a great nation deserves great art.
COLLABORATORS: Created by Robby Barnett, Renée Jaworski, Matt Kent, and Itamar Kubovy in collaboration with Shawn Fitzgerald Ahern, Benjamin Coalter, Matt Del Rosario, Eriko Jimbo, Jordan Kriston, Jun Kuribayashi, Derion Loman, Nile Russell, and Mike Tyus. Sound composed by Ed Bilous.

Performed by three dancers balanced on a two-foot wide column, “On the Nature of Things” explores the power of iconic bodies to tell a story about the birth of desire and its intertwined connection to shame and revenge. The title is inspired by the 2,000-year-old Roman poem “De Rerum Natura” by Lucretius, who argued that physics and chance governed the world, rather than frightening godly powers. The score is an adaptation of Vivaldi’s Cum Dederit and Violin Concerto, No.9 with additional music by Edward Bilous and Michelle DiBucci.