PRESS - The Classical Voice North Carolina

Reviews of the "Lena's Bath" touring program, featuring "Lena's Bath", "Alternate Reality", "Half Me, Twice You", "Split Second", "Density", "At ARm's Length", "Lux Eterna" (excerpt)
The Classical Voice North Carolina, Durham, NC
February 18th, 2005 (excerpt)
for the full review go to: http://www.cvnc.org/reviews/2005/022005/elved.html

By Katie Dobbs Ariail

alban elved Does Duke "Occasionally one sees something so fresh in the arts that it banishes cynicism and restores mediocrity-eroded faith. On Thursday, February 17, in Duke's black box Sheafer Theater, that something was alban elved dance company, the small, dynamic troupe from Winston-Salem led by Karola Lüttringhaus. These "wonder women" as they are called in this month's Dance Spirit magazine, made quite an impact last summer during ADF's Acts to Follow local series,... ...
choreographed by Lüttringhaus, whose work is marked by an unpretentious athleticism and a philosophic quality. Although she eschews "movement for the sake of movement" and sees character, and to some extent, narrative, as the driving forces in her work, the dances are closely reasoned sequences that exploit the physics of movement for its emotional resonance. Not pretty but often beautiful, Lüttringhaus' dances depend on the proud power and flexibility of the dancers' bodies – and their joint and mutual willingness to risk themselves. ..."

The Classical Voice North Carolina, Durham, NC
July 17, 2005 (excerpt)

By Kate Dobbs Ariail

alban elved — & "Acts to Follow" — at Duke At Arm's Length is a duet, performed here by Karola Luttringhaus and Lena Rose Polzonetti. The piece explores the relations between two people – how close is close enough, how close is not close enough, how close is a trap, how far is too far away. Intimacy is an oft-turned field for artists, and in many artworks, its struggles and pleasures can begin to seem a little banal, but Luttringhaus's approach is fresh and direct. Because her style involves many lifts and carries – all the women in the company are more than capable of lifting and carrying each other – as well as highly athletic and acrobatic moves, she's got a great vocabulary for this kind of subject. She also has an instinct for the dramatic arc, and she bolsters that major line with dozens of smaller arcs. At Arm's Length curves and curves back, winding to the high point and the wide view, and ends with a lovely image of momentary resolution. Luttringhaus and Polzonetti were very strong together Saturday night. I had seen a section of this piece danced by Luttringhaus and her long-time collaborator Andrea Lieske, and the emotional tenor had been so different that at first I wasn't sure it was the same dance. This says something, I think, about the honesty with which alban elved goes about its work.

for the full review go to: http://www.cvnc.org/reviews/2005/072005/kdaADF12.html

The Classical Voice North Carolina
about Wingspan, an arts in education project with High Schools
March 2006
review (excerpt) by Kate Dobbs Ariail

alban elved Teams with Mt. Tabor HS Dancers
Fresh as spring shoots at winter's end, the youthful dancers from three of Forsyth County's high schools popped up all over the lower galleries of Winston-Salem's Sawtooth Center during their performances in dance troupe alban elved's arts-in-education showcase on March 9. ..... alban elved, led by dancer and choreographer Karola Lüttringhaus, is easily the most inventive modern dance company currently working in North Carolina, and the company's daring and sophistication were not wasted on the girls from Mt. Tabor High School, with whom Lüttringhaus and her colleagues worked this year, or on those from East Forsyth and Glenn high schools, with whom they had worked in the two previous years, thanks to grants from the Arts Council of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County. ......Clearly, the schools in Forsyth take dance education seriously. Teachers Susannah Eichman, Dawn Webster (who sometimes dances with alban elved), and Layla Guffey prepared their students to take advantage of the opportunity to work with professional dancers, and the process seems to have been rewarding for Lüttringhaus and her assistants as well. .....
Whether any of these students will become professional dancers remains to be seen, but they have all certainly learned to dance from their hearts and their heads, and they have acquired the understanding they need to be lifelong lovers of modern dance. This is one arts-in-education program that has been a complete success.
... Particularly notable was Alayna Stroud's intense performance of Lüttringhaus' "Quadruped," an aerial solo. ...

For the full review go to: http://www.cvnc.org/reviews/2006/032006/albanelved.html