Bates was diagnosed with HIV in 1987. In 1990, while spending six months recovering from chemical addictions, his personal papers and videotapes were destroyed, possibly by a friend or landlord. "Pictures, notes, programs, reviews—all gone," he said. Recently, he has been able to make dubs from videotaped documentation held by Fred Strickler, and to secure copies of some photographs. The sum total of his papers and video documentation now fills just six inches of file space and one drawer, down from a dozen individual boxes.

KEY CONTACT PERSON(S)/EXECUTOR OF ESTATE:
Gary K. Bates
2619 Glendale Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90039
323-669-0344
Garybates5@aol.com

HUMAN REPOSITORIES OF THE WORK
(name and contact info, relationship to the artist and the work, assessment):
Bates's choreography lives in his own (still quick) memory. His duets with Fred Strickler live in Strickler's memory as well. Strickler is a professor in the Department of Dance at the University of California—Riverside.

VIDEO DOCUMENTATION
(location, format, condition, assessment):
Video documentation exists of two works: Don Q Pas de Deux (1976), a duet with Fred Strickler, on VHS, a tongue-in-cheek encounter between Don Quixote and Sancho Panza; and Is it Love (1986) from the Lewitzky Legacy concert, also on VHS. The videotapes are held by Bates at his home.

PHOTOGRAPHIC DOCUMENTATION
(location, format, condition, assessment):
A few photographs copied from Fred Strickler's collection are in Bates's private collection.

MOVEMENT NOTATION
(location, type [including notes taken by dancers], assessment):
None identified.

PRODUCTION MATERIALS
(scores, sound recordings, set/costume designs):
None identified.

ORAL HISTORY:
Nina Kaufman, a former student of Bates and an M.F.A. graduate of UCLA, has conducted an oral history with Bates. The soundtapes have been transcribed and two copies made, one held by Kaufman, the other by Bates. UCLA's Oral History Program has agreed to edit the oral history and to include it in their collection, to be housed in UCLA Special Collections and at the Bancroft Library at UC-Berkeley. As of summer 2003, the oral history is not yet in UCLA Special Collections.

PERSONAL PAPERS
(location of newspaper clippings, printed programs, press releases, notes, files, diaries; assessment):
Bates has reconstructed a small number of his personal papers and they are in his possession.

IMMEDIATE NEEDS
(archival assistance? storage? other?):
Bates would like to reconstruct his 35-year dance career by tracking down videotapes and photographs wherever possible. (As mentioned above, Fred Strickler has already shared his documentation with Bates.) Bates is also interested in reconstructing Chronicles, a 15-minute work for three women, set to music by UCLA professor emeritus Paul Des Marais. Video documentation may exist of the work from performances at UCLA and Loyola Marymount University, twenty years ago, and one of the original dancers, Mary Ann Kellogg, lives in the Los Angeles area; otherwise the only source for reconstruction is Bates's memory.

OTHER RELEVANT INFORMATION:
As of July 2000, Bates remains in good health.

In response to a request for reviews of his work, Bates offered the following email message (2 September 2000):

"I have 4 reviews of a work done in September, 1986 for ‘The Lewitzky Legacy' in Los Angeles. It was called Is It Love, music by Daniel Lentz. The concert was one I created to honor Bella and to show how unique her teaching had been to produce such different artistic personalities. I was also Artistic Director of the event. I have a tape of the piece from the concert. I was 46 at the time and began performing less and less after this. Three of the four papers used my picture and all four were complimentary to the work. It was a major concert in its time....

"My first review was in April of 1974. It was a front page calendar photo and major review by Martin Bernheimer. The reason was that it was the LA Premiere of a work by Peter Maxwell Davies called Vesallii Icones at the Monday Evening Concert Series at the Bing Auditorium. It still exists, begun by Schoenberg and (oops my memory is failing me). The work was performed by some of the major musical soloists in Los Angeles. It was a 45 minute solo based on the stations of the cross and the ressurrection of the AntiChrist. It was quite a sensation and was the beginning of my choreographic career and process. It also began a 6 year relationship with a designer from Riverside, Patrick Marca Registrada (aka Scott). From that concert sprung the company Eyes Wide Open Dance Theatre, with whom I danced and choreographed for 5 years (1974-1979).

"Our first concert opened the now defunct Rug Concert Series at the Dorothy Chandler Pavillion on Sunday afternoons in the summer of 1974. We were the opening company with John Clifford's Los Angeles Ballet following us. We created a riot of great fun and made a big splash. It also received a front page article in the Calendar section of the Times in July (?) of 1974. Our next review and concert was in September, 1974 at the now defunct Vanguard Theater in West Hollywood, a tiny stage on which we did a series of stark solos. I did the first version of Indio, a piece based on the loss of real time/space that happens when you drive long distances in the desert. It had platform shoes and a helmet and shorts and was somewhat violent. The figure dives off the stage and back on in a series of rolls that were a bit showy, but it was very well received. Bella, however, had many a laugh over it on her travels around the country I was told later by the company.

"During the time of the company I co-choreographed several works with the 6 members of Eyes Wide Open. Phrasing and Trellis were the two earliest. Later I was Artistic Director of and co-choreographer of an evening length work called Proximity in 1977 (I believe) performed at Schoenberg Hall as part of their 3 in Shoenberg series. Segal called it 'flirting with genius.' The company was continually surprising and sometimes shocking the LA dance world. We were always trying something new and with 6 very creative dancers/choreographers it wasn't hard to do.

"On Valentine's day in 1976 we did a concert which had ten pieces (8 of which were premieres). I danced in 6 or 7 of them. I also created Don Q Pas de Deux for Fred Strickler and myself. It was a big success for the company and was performed many times and asked for by producers of concerts around California. Fred and I performed it for a society of Cervantes scholars at Claremont Colleges and they talked to us for 45 minutes afterward - spellbound. Lewis [Segal] was very effusive as was Donna Perlmutter.

"In 1978 I created a work for three of the women in the company called Chronicles premiered in a concert of Eyes Wide Open at Loyola Marymount University. The music was a striking piece by Paul des Marais on the UCLA faculty. He is a good friend of Lew Thomas. It was one of my favorites and began my search to develop a movement vocabulary from the inner dialogue of one's (mine) thoughts and feelings. It was at once very like the German Expressionists and yet extremely abstract and minimal. That became the crux of most of my search from then on.

"During this time I was a guest artist with Dance/LA, Lynn Dally and Dancers and several other companies. I also taught at UCLA, Scripps College and UC-Irvine. In 1977 we opened the Pacific Motion Dance Studios in Venice and I also taught there. I was Chair of Dance at Scripps from 1978-81. The company was in residence at Idylwild for several summers.

"Eyes Wide Open was constantly sought after for concerts. We never had to solicit them. We were in all the early Dance Kaleidoscope concerts of LAADA and I was asked to perform in several (1979-80) as a soloist. In the 1979 work I shocked the audience by leaving through the back and into the woods. In 1980, I meandered and rolled down the staircase from the woods onto the stage and won the first Vanguard Award for solo choreography (yes, the same Vanguard as the theatre of yore).

"I left California in 1981 - 1984 and moved to Florida. I taught for a while in Miami and West Palm Beach but was not very happy with the students or my life. It was during this period that I drank and drugged more heavily,without anything to stop me. A series of broken affairs and the loss of a creative community which I had been in the center of here was too much for me."

PARTIAL LIST OR OVERVIEW OF WORKS:
(title, premiere date, music, production notes, performers):

Cinderella at Midnight (1973)—The Cockettes, San Francisco.

Visallius Icones (1974)—music by Peter Maxwell Davies; premiered at Bing Theatre, Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

Indio (1974)—solo.

Indio Phaze IV (1975)—solo.

Don Q Pas de Deux (1976)—duet for Bates and Fred Strickler; Lynn Dally and Dancers, Los Angeles.

Proximity (1977)—co-choreographed with members of Eyes Wide Open Dance Theatre, Los Angeles.

Chronicles (1978)—trio for Kathe Howard, Melanie Snyder and Mary Ann Kellogg; Eyes Wide Open Dance Theatre, Los Angeles.

Untitled (1979)—solo for Mary Daval; Eyes Wide Open Dance Theatre, Los Angeles.

Untitled (1979)—solo for Jean Isaacs; Three's Company, San Diego.

Untitled (1980)—solo for Bates; Dance Kaleidoscope, Los Angeles.

Untitled (1981)—solo for Bates (won first Vanguard Award for solo choreography); Dance Kaleidoscope, Los Angeles.

Is It Love (1986)—solo for Bates; music Daniel Lenz; Lewitzky Legacy concert.

Beneath the Tears (1988)—two duets co-choreographed and performed by Iris Pell and Gary Bates; music by Arvo Prt; Iris and Gary: A Concert of Works by Iris Pell and Gary Bates, Santa Monica College.

From the Horses' Mouth (1999)—Dance Kaleidoscope, Los Angeles; created movement solo and text for group piece conceived and directed by Tina Croll and Jamie Cunningham.