Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

11am roundtable conversation | 7pm performances

This event brings together accomplished dance artists Eleanor Hullihan, Rashaun Mitchell, Silas Riener and Mina Nishimura for a series of performances and conversations that examine Black Mountain College’s continuing influence on the world of dance. Join us for a roundtable conversation at 11am and dance performances beginning at 7pm.

BMC Dance is curated by Eleanor Hullihan.

Performances:

Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener
Performed by Mitchell and Riener, this performance draws from their embodied “Desire Lines” practice that combines movement, vocalization, and object manipulation into site-responsive, community-oriented performance installations. A desire line in landscape architecture refers to an unofficial route or social trail that breaks protocol with prescribed pathways, sometimes the shortest distance between two points, sometimes simply a good way to follow one’s curiosity. Desire lines represent an accumulated record of transformation in public space, a model for a permissive dance-making process that invites us to reimagine the self and its environment.

Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener are New York-based dance artists who create collaborative performance installations using improvisational techniques, digital technologies, audio scores, and material construction. They use movement to build speculative worlds which expose and reconcile the unfamiliar. Their physical practice synthesizes improvisation, formal dance training, athletic sports, building and construction. Their collaborative process involves the blurring of a professional and romantic relationship. Two very different sensibilities and experiences of race and culture synthesize and clash in ways that suggest comparative models for how to co-exist, assimilate, or reimagine society.

Since 2010 they have created over 25 multidisciplinary dance works including site-responsive installations, concert dances, gallery performances and dances for film. They have been artists-in-residence at Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Mt Tremper Arts, pieter, Jacob’s Pillow, New York City Center, The Watermill Center, MANCC, Headlands Center for the Arts, BOFFO, Center for Ballet and the Arts, Petronio Residency Center, and Baryshnikov Arts Center. Their work has been commissioned by BAM/Next Wave, The Barbican, REDCAT, EMPAC, The Walker Art Center, MCA Chicago, The Wexner, On The Boards, Danspace Project, Madison Square Park Conservancy, The Joyce Theater, The LAB, Marfa Sounding, Gagosian Premieres, SFMOMA, and MoMA PS1. Mitchell and Riener are currently Caroline Hearst Artists in Residence, and inaugural members of NCC Akron’s multi-year Creative Administration Residency.

Photos of Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener by Paula Lobo and Alex John Beck.

Mina Nishimura
Untitled (confined madness / glorious zombie/ colored lines) is a practice of becoming a glorious zombie. No will power. No tangling thoughts. Supported by astral projection practice, peripherals of a performance site and images of marginalized beings, a body will keep being moved around without establishing anything. The work may incorporate colored line drawing in order to dig a well while flying high.

Mina Nishimura is a dance artist originally from Tokyo. Buddhism-influenced philosophical concepts are reflected across her somatic, performance and choreographic practices. She has been performing and collaborating with a number of groundbreaking artists, most recently including John Jasperse, Kota Yamazaki, Dean Moss, Yasuko Yokoshi and Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener. Nishimura is a recipient of Foundation for Contemporary Arts Grants to Artists Award 2019, and was the 2021-22 Renewal Residency Artist at Danspace Project in NY, where she premiered Mapping a Forest while Searching for an Opposite Term of Exorcist in 2022. She currently teaches at Bennington College where she completed her MFA fellowship in 2021.

Photos of Mina Nishimura by Shane Prudente.

Eleanor Hullihan + Zach Cooper
miniatures 2023
A series of miniature studies performed by Eleanor Hullihan and Zach Cooper.

Eleanor Hullihan is a movement artist living in Asheville after many years dancing, teaching and creating performances in NYC. Her work is a journey of uncovering and physicalizing the delicate and magical internal world. She has performed with John Jasperse, Beth Gill, Andrew Ondrejcak, Sufjan Stevens, Jessica Dessner, Sarah Michelson, Miguel Gutierrez,  Jennifer Monson, Tere O’Connor, The Merce Cunningham Trust and Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener among others. Eleanor makes performances with Katy Pyle, Asli Bulbul, Emma Judkins, Adam Schatz, Zach Cooper and Jimmy Jolliff. She has been a contributing writer and curator for Movement Research. She is a movement coach for musicians and actors and maintains a pilates-based teaching practice for professional dancers and non dancers alike who seek deep and subtle support. Eleanor owned and operated two pilates studios in NYC and was on faculty at the American Ballet Theatre’s Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School and Sarah Lawrence College. Eleanor attended UNCSA as a high school student and has a BFA from NYU Tisch Dance.

Zach Cooper is a Grammy award winning composer, producer and songwriter based in Black Mountain, North Carolina. He has contributed to works by Leon Bridges, Jazmine Sullivan, Jon Batiste, Moses Sumney, Billy Porter, and Ellie Goulding, among others. Zach is also a founding member of experimental soul group King Garbage. His work has been featured in Pitchfork, The Fader, Rolling Stone, and Guitar World magazine, and he’s released records with RVNG Int’l, Styles Upon Styles and Mike Patton’s Ipecac Recordings.

Kids’ Comedy Tour: Wildly funny, this educational and entertaining tour features the perfect blend of Asheville’s history and kid-centric comedy. Geared specifically toward the 5–12 year old crowd, you’ll explore the town with our famously outlandish tour guides leading the way.

• Perfect for birthday parties
• Makes for memorable school field trips
• Tickets are $27 per person
• Beverages available for purchase at the LaZoom Room
• Departs from 76 Biltmore Avenue

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

Freshen Up Comedy Showcase is the first monday of every month. The showcase highlights the best local comics from the Freshen Up Open Mic that happens every Monday at Noble Cider downtown.

Local comics come out each week to try all of their new material and the best come back for the showcase.

Ryan Gordon hosts Freshen Up and this month we also feature secret guests!

.

no cover, but $10 donation is encouraged

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

The Campfireball is an immersive storytelling show created live and in the moment out of stories from the audience. No two shows are alike, none will ever be seen again!

A delightful evening of music and comedy by two local favorites, David Cody and Mike Lytle. David and Mike are talented musicians, published songwriters, and long-time favorites of friends and fans throughout Western North Carolina. Now they are teaming up to bring both music and comedy to audiences in our region and beyond.

David Cody and Michael J are a new musical comedy duo very much in the vein of The Smothers Brothers, who were talented musicians who also enjoyed bringing joy and laughter to audiences of all ages.

Tonight’s event will be rare opportunity to be part of a video shoot for the duo. You will get a behind the scenes look at the process of making a video, while also experiencing the hilarity and musical brilliance of the duo.

So, be prepared to see:

• camera men moving in and out to get just the right shot;
• multiple takes of segments to capture key moments from various camera angles;
• starts and restarts which are part of all videos, films, tv shows, etc

Plus, you will also be in the video yourself. Your smiles and laughter will be key parts of the final product.

So, come enjoy music, come enjoy laughter and come celebrate two of the Swannanoa Valley’s own as they launch a new phase of their careers.

A delightful evening of music and comedy by two local favorites, David Cody and Mike Lytle. David and Mike are talented musicians, published songwriters, and long-time favorites of friends and fans throughout Western North Carolina. Now they are teaming up to bring both music and comedy to audiences in our region and beyond.

David Cody and Michael J are a new musical comedy duo very much in the vein of The Smothers Brothers, who were talented musicians who also enjoyed bringing joy and laughter to audiences of all ages.

Tonight’s event will be rare opportunity to be part of a video shoot for the duo. You will get a behind the scenes look at the process of making a video, while also experiencing the hilarity and musical brilliance of the duo.

So, be prepared to see:

• camera men moving in and out to get just the right shot;
• multiple takes of segments to capture key moments from various camera angles;
• starts and restarts which are part of all videos, films, tv shows, etc

Plus, you will also be in the video yourself. Your smiles and laughter will be key parts of the final product.

So, come enjoy music, come enjoy laughter and come celebrate two of the Swannanoa Valley’s own as they launch a new phase of their careers.

 

The 15th Annual Asheville Comedy festival! Featuring comedians from all over the country. No two shows are the same. Every show features a different lineup of the countries fastest rising stars in the comedy world.

ACF and Modelface Comedy are partnering together to bring you a secret lineup of comics from all over the country, plus your local favorites in the first of a series of three late night showcases.

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

ACF and Modelface Comedy are partnering together to bring you a secret lineup of comics from all over the country, plus your local favorites in the first of a series of three late night showcases.

Learn Asheville’s history, discover hidden gems, and laugh at LaZoom’s quirky sense of adventure.

• Guided comedy tour bus of historical Asheville
• 90-Minutes – tours run daily
• 15-minute break at Green Man Brewing
• $39 per person (ages 13+ only)

Kids’ Comedy Tour: Wildly funny, this educational and entertaining tour features the perfect blend of Asheville’s history and kid-centric comedy. Geared specifically toward the 5–12 year old crowd, you’ll explore the town with our famously outlandish tour guides leading the way.

• Perfect for birthday parties
• Makes for memorable school field trips
• Tickets are $27 per person
• Beverages available for purchase at the LaZoom Room
• Departs from 76 Biltmore Avenue