Alex Klein awarded 2025 Teiger Foundation Grant for upcoming exhibition with Michael Smith and Deborah Hay

Alex Klein, Head Curator and Director of Curatorial Affairs at The Contemporary Austin, has been awarded a Teiger Foundation 2025 Grant for Curators towards a forthcoming exhibition with Michael Smith and Deborah Hay.

Threshold (working title) is an exhibition project consisting of a new video installation and performance by Michael Smith (b.1951, Chicago) in consultation with dancer and choreographer Deborah Hay (b.1941, New York), commissioned by Alex Klein. Smith is known for his long-running alter egos and satirical critiques of white American culture, consumerism, and masculinity, which often blend performance, video, and installation. Hay, a founding member of the Judson Dance Theater, has spent decades developing a distinctive choreographic practice rooted in minimal movement and deep perception, using the limitations of the aging body as a source for experimentation.
 

Deborah Hay

The work will explore movement and agility, humor, patience and tolerance, and the difficulties of adapting to contemporary culture. The exhibition marks a first collaboration for the artists: Smith will be responsible for the visuals, art direction, and script, while Hay will participate as a movement consultant, workshop leader, and choreographer. The look and feel of the installation will be loosely based on an amalgam of different board games. Smith and a cast of performers will enact the seemingly simple tasks of trying to get through one’s day. These actions will be choreographed by Hay, drawing on her extensive experience working with untrained dancers and use of everyday minimal forms. Hay’s work will extend into the gallery through a live performance with untrained performers of a certain age.

“When I arrived in Austin in 2022, I set out to familiarize myself with the local arts ecosystem,” said Klein. “Both Smith and Hay are often associated with New York, but I have come to understand how integral they have both been to the arts scene in Austin. Their work as mentors, friends, teachers, and advocates cannot be overstated, and these communities are the intended first audiences for this work."

 

Alex Klein

Teiger Foundation is the only U.S. foundation dedicated exclusively to supporting contemporary art curators. “We’re excited to support an expanded range of curatorial voices across geography, experience, and institutional scale," said Larissa Harris, Executive Director of Teiger Foundation, "underscoring our belief that critical, ambitious work is happening in every corner of the country.”

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Images

  1. Michael Smith, Excuse Me!?!…I’m looking for the ‘Fountain of Youth’: A Ballet in Three Acts, 2015 (still). Video, color, and sound. Produced in collaboration with choreographer Stephen Mills, Mayo Thompson, and Ballet Austin. Courtesy the artist and Greene Naftali, New York. Photo by Michael P. Garza.

  2. Deborah Hay, My Choreographed Body...revisited, 2019. Commissioned by PEAK Performances at Montclair State University, NJ. Produced by Tanz im August and HAU Hebbel am Ufer. Courtesy the artist and Harry Ransom Center, Austin, TX. Photo by Camille Blake.

  3. Portrait of Alex Klein. Photo by Brian Fitzsimmons.