Dancers from the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater stretch their arms outward, creating a breathtaking visual reminiscent of wings. With their elbows elevated and fingertips extended, they are illuminated in a warm amber glow as they gradually lift their heads from the shadows above.
This iconic portrayal of Alvin Ailey’s Revelations is widely recognized by fans. Ailey first introduced his hallmark piece in 1958, featuring 16 sections infused with vibrant dance and a live vocal chorus. After its debut at the 92nd Street Y in New York two years later, Ailey modified it to 10 sections, yet it still spanned over an hour. In 1962, he further condensed the work into three sections to facilitate its touring across the United States, sacrificing some of its original brilliance in the process. The company has not performed the original 1960 version of Revelations since.
This is set to change in November when Matthew Rushing, the interim artistic director of the company, will unveil a reimagined full-length version of Revelations as part of a performance series linked to the Whitney Museum’s newly opened exhibition celebrating Ailey’s work and legacy. Titled “Edges of Ailey,” this is the first extensive museum exhibit honoring the modern dance pioneer, exploring every aspect of his life, from his upbringing in the South to his relocation to New York, where he established his iconic dance company. Rushing’s creation, Sacred Songs, aims to respect Ailey’s unique approach to movement and its spiritual connection, ensuring it resonates with contemporary audiences.
“In order for me to have started the whole project, I needed a why,” Rushing stated in a recent ARTnews interview. “I needed my own personal why as to why I’m doing this. It wasn’t enough just to say, ‘I want to honor Revelations.’” Initially, he planned to create Sacred Songs in celebration of the 60th anniversary of the 1960 Revelations performance at Lincoln Center in 2020, but the pandemic forced him to abandon those plans.
When Adrienne Edwards, senior curator and associate director of curatorial programs at the Whitney, commissioned a piece from Rushing for “Edges of Ailey,” the concept behind Sacred Songs resurfaced while revisiting Jennifer Dunning’s 1996 biography of Ailey.
Joining the Ailey company as a dancer in 1992, Rushing came on board shortly after the founder’s tragic passing in 1989. He eventually became the rehearsal director in 2010 and was promoted to associate artistic director in January 2020. His longstanding relationship with the work drew him to the spirituals within Revelations. In crafting Sacred Songs, his mission was to revive and bring to life the songs that had been left out over the years.
“Me dancing Revelations for decades, one of the things that kept it fresh for me was the music,” he remarked. “It was just so rich.” Rushing views his new creation as a dance theater production, emphasizing that it must encompass more than just dance. To authentically pay tribute to the original Revelations, the performance also requires a concert element with a choral group. To bring this vision to fruition, he enlisted the expertise of musical director Du’Bois A’Keen.
Rushing approached A’Keen with his ideas, sounds, and feelings he hoped to convey. They experimented with these concepts during a two-week residency at the 92nd Street Y, the same venue where Revelations made its debut over fifty years ago. A’Keen assembled a band and vocalists for collaboration. Rushing’s primary goal was to make the spirituals accessible to younger generations. “In order to make this idea accessible to a new generation, the music had to be reimagined, and there had to be a new sound for today,” he explained. During the two weeks in June, A’Keen rearranged the songs and presented them in a manner that aligned with Rushing’s vision. Although the music might take on a different sound, it remains anchored in three fundamental themes: lamentation, faith, and hope/joy.
“As I dove into these three ideas, I thought about the importance of using music in a cathartic way, as enslaved people used it during their time,” Rushing expressed. “That way of processing their pain and turning it into power through music is a timeless idea.”
Rushing aims to preserve the songs that inspired Ailey’s artistry, regarding them as sacred, which is reflected in the title of the piece. “What makes them sacred and timeless is not just the sound but the spirit that’s captured in the song,” he articulated. “I think that’s what I wanted to do: capture the spirit, the purity of the spiritual.”
He connects the theme of processing pain to the current climate, particularly the aftermath of the pandemic. Music provided solace during periods of isolation. While his playlist may not have featured spirituals, the songs “gave me the strength to literally get up off the bed and continue life,” he said. Rushing began focusing on Sacred Songs earnestly in June, holding weekend rehearsals with dancers. These practices will continue leading up to the work’s debut, scheduled for November 1–3 at the Whitney in its third-floor theater; Sacred Songs will also be part of AAADT’s season and is set to perform at the New York City Center later this year.
In realizing Sacred Songs, Rushing collaborated with dancers from Ailey Extension, a group of non-professionals engaged in various careers—from neurosurgeons to police officers—who also share a passion for dance.
Their diverse backgrounds infused a fresh collaborative spirit into the rehearsal process, beginning with profound discussions on the themes represented in the spirituals.
As the dancers convened in the studio, Rushing prompted them, “What are the hard questions of the day?” One dancer responded, “Am I enough?”; another remarked, “Will I fulfill my purpose?”
These introspective questions shaped the creative process, with their inquiries being woven into a musical work featured in Sacred Songs, honoring their contributions and encapsulating this moment of collaboration. “To hear the song, it takes me back to that day where people were so vulnerable and so open, sharing some of their hearts,” Rushing recounted. Initially, he envisioned choreographing two versions of Sacred Songs for the season—one with the Extension dancers and another with the AAADT company—intending to elevate the performance. However, throughout rehearsals, he discovered that no other level existed beyond what he achieved with the Extension dancers. By embracing the simplicity he found in that collaboration, Rushing believes he is honoring the inherent simplicity present in Ailey’s body of work.
“I am seeing that the simple movement is working for both the professional and non-professional, and it’s beautiful,” he reflected. “I think it has a lot to do with his humanity.”
While Ailey’s essence permeates the work, Rushing emphasized his intention not to mimic the late dancer’s movements exactly. Naturally, some of Ailey’s movements linger, as Rushing has embodied his works for decades—it’s part of him. “There are certain moments where I allowed it to happen, and then certain moments I was like, ‘A little too similar. Let’s rethink that movement quality,’” he noted. “Edges of Ailey” is divided into ten sections displayed across the Whitney’s fifth floor. Among the themes explored in the exhibition are Ailey’s engagement with Black spirituality, liberation, the Great Migration, and the influence of Black music. Throughout the exhibit, visitors can observe how the visual arts shaped the dances Ailey ultimately created through his notebooks.
“Once we had really gone through all of his personal notebooks, which took a lot of time in those thousands of pages of paper, I was really blown away and actually deeply, profoundly encouraged by what we found there, which was this deep and abundant interest in the visual arts,” Edwards, the Whitney curator, shared.
Edwards’s curation draws inspiration from her six-year exploration of these notebooks, which are currently on long-term loan at the Black Archives of Mid-America in Kansas City, courtesy of Allan Gray, a local community figure to whom Ailey bequeathed the notebooks. Edwards recalled Ailey referring to dance as “movements full of images” and emphasized that Ailey’s dancers often discussed how he “insisted that they go to art museums when they were on tour. Wherever they went, he was like, ‘You need to go to an art museum.’”
While visitors can visually experience artistic inspirations within the exhibition at the Whitney, they can also see these connections in the performance series. The series will feature weeks where the Ailey company conducts classes and workshops from the Ailey Extension program, performances by its two repertory companies, AAADT and Ailey II, and showcases from The Ailey School. Additionally, Edwards commissioned renowned dancers, including Rushing, Trajal Harrell, Bill T. Jones, Ralph Lemon with Kevin Beasley, Sarah Michelson, Okwui Okpokwasili with Peter Born, Will Rawls, Yusha-Marie Sorzano, and Jawole Willa Jo Zollar.
For Rushing, the exhibition highlights who influenced Ailey and whom Ailey has influenced. Some connections are apparent, like himself, but others are less expected, such as Lemon, “showing the edges of Ailey that maybe we are not familiar with, the touchpoints and the lives that have been affected,” he remarked.
Artist Mickalene Thomas, for instance, first experienced Revelations after relocating to New York in 1995. Dance swiftly integrated into Thomas’s artistic practice and life. For the exhibition, she has produced a work centered on Katherine Dunham, the legendary dancer whom Ailey honored at Carnegie Hall in the late ’80s. In her artwork, Thomas layers three images of Dunham through double exposure, causing them to blend into one another and capturing the choreographer in mid-flight, enveloped in orange tones and cross-hatched textures.
Revelations serves as a reference point for all. Rushing rarely uses the term “touchstone,” but makes an exception for Ailey, whose work, while accessible, has significantly shaped today’s artistic landscape.
“If you are Black and dancing since his arrival, whether you’re with or differentiating yourself from him and his choreography, you’re still going through him,” Edwards concluded. “You’re still going and contending with that legacy.”