In her contentious essay, Croce, one of the finest dance critics of the 20th century, railed against what she called victim art: By working dying people into his act, Jones is putting himself beyond the reach of criticism. I think of him as literally undiscussable – the most extreme case among the distressingly many now representing themselves to the public not as artists but as victims and martyrs.
Croce's essay brought fame to the dance and its creator. And by working exasperated outrage into her act, she opened up dance and criticism to the masses. For Jones, who said the essay was like having scalding water poured on him, it means he and Croce are forever linked.
Still/Here, which premiered in France and opened at Brooklyn Academy of Music in 1994, was set into motion by a series of survival workshops that Jones held with people with life-threatening diseases. (There were no dying people onstage in the production.)
That's kind of weird, isn't it? Croce, 90, was not available for comment. The art critic Jed Perl, a good friend, said she has always stood by her view of Still/Here.
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