NAME: Jenkins, Margaret

BIRTH DATE/LOCATION:
12 December 1942, Berkeley, Calif.


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Margaret Jenkins (left) and Rinde Eckert in Shorebirds Atlantic. Photo: Keb Probst, courtesy Margaret Jenkins.

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  • identification & bio
  • key contact
  • human repositories
  • video documentation
  • photographic documentation
    		•
  • movement notation
  • production materials
  • oral history
  • personal papers
  • immediate needs
    		•
  • other relevant information
  • overview of works
  • bibliography
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    IDENTIFICATION AND BIO:
    Choreographer Margaret Jenkins has been making work in the San Francisco Bay Area for over thirty years. In 1988 she collaborated with performance artist Rinde Eckert on Shorebirds Atlantic, which depicted one character (played by Eckert) contemplating suicide as a means of escaping an incurable disease, and another (played by Jenkins) who "wondered whether she would assist him as requested or rescue him at the last moment," according to New York Times dance critic Jack Anderson. Jenkins identifies AIDS as the implied reference. Jenkins choreographed movement for the duet that, according to Anderson, "emphasized birdlike flappings of the arms and motions reminiscent of swimming. These gestures also conveyed a sense of the characters’ insecurity." Shorebirds Atlantic premiered in Singapore, and has been performed numerous times throughout the United States, and was also featured in a 2003 program that celebrated the thirtieth anniversary of Jenkins’s company. In this most recent revision, dancer Kathleen Hermesdorf was added to the piece as a third character who watched as a distanced and omniscient figure. An adaptation of Shorebirds Atlantic was made for KQED’s "Alive From Off Center" and was broadcast nationwide in 1990.

    Jenkins began her early training in San Francisco before moving to New York to dance in the companies of Jack Moore, Viola Farber, Twyla Tharp, and others. She was on the faculty of the Merce Cunningham Studio and restaged Cunningham’s dances for companies in the United States and Europe before returning to San Francisco to establish her own company in 1970. Since that time, Margaret Jenkins Dance Company has toured nationally and internationally to critical acclaim. Jenkins has been awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, the San Francisco Arts Commission Award of Honor, the Bernard Osher Cultural Award, and two Isadora Duncan Awards as well as receiving numerous grants from local, state, and federal agencies, and commissions throughout the United States, Europe, and Asia.

    KEY CONTACT PERSON(S)/EXECUTOR OF ESTATE:
    Margaret Jenkins
    3973A 25th Street
    San Francisco, CA 94114
    415-826-8399
    415-826-8392 fax
    mj@mjdc.org

    HUMAN REPOSITORIES OF THE WORK
    (name and contact info, relationship to the artist and the work, assessment):
    Margaret Jenkins (see above)

    VIDEO DOCUMENTATION
    (location, format, condition, assessment):
    In addition to the video documentation held by Margaret Jenkins Dance Company (VHS 1/2 in.), the San Francisco Performing Arts Library and Museum (SFPALM) holds two VHS 1/2 in. recordings of the work from 1988 and 1989. SFPALM also has video documentation for the following of Jenkins’ choreographies (all VHS 1/2 in. with printed programs and/or associated press clippings): Age of Unrest, All the Rage (collaboration with Kronos Quartet, Remy Charlip and Ellie Klopp), First Figure, Inside Outside, Sightings (a commission for Oakland Ballet, in collaboration with Ellie Klopp), Whatever Happened to Tina Croll?, and Woman Window Square.

    PHOTOGRAPHIC DOCUMENTATION
    (location, format, condition, assessment):
    Margaret Jenkins Dance Company holds black-and-white 8 x 10 photographs of Shorebirds Atlantic taken by Bonnie Kamin. SFPALM does not list a photograph file for Margaret Jenkins Dance collection in its online catalog.

    MOVEMENT NOTATION
    (location, type [including notes taken by dancers], assessment):
    Jenkins holds choreographic notes from the work in her personal files.

    PRODUCTION MATERIALS
    (scores, sound recordings, set/costume designs):
    Margaret Jenkins Dance Company holds all production materials for the work including costumes, sound recordings, and lighting design.

    ORAL HISTORY:
    SFPALM holds two audio recordings on cassette (both analog, stereo) of radio interviews with Alan Farley from 1980 (31 min.) and 1981 (28 min.).

    PERSONAL PAPERS
    (location of newspaper clippings, printed programs, press releases, notes, files, diaries; assessment):
    Margaret Jenkins Dance Company maintains extensive files for such items. SFPALM does not list such files in its online catalog.

    IMMEDIATE NEEDS
    (archival assistance? storage? other?):
    None identified.

    OTHER RELEVANT INFORMATION:
    None identified.

    OVERVIEW OF WORKS PERTAINING TO HIV/AIDS
    (title, premiere date, music, production notes, performers):
    Shorebirds Atlantic (1988)—composer, text and costume design: Rinde Eckert; choreography by Margaret Jenkins; lighting design: Alexander V. Nichols; performed by Eckert and Jenkins; Singapore, commissioned by University of California, Berkeley, Cal Performances.

    In 2003, Kathleen Hermesdorf was added as a third performer when Shorebirds Atlantic was performed as part of the thirtieth anniversary of Margaret Jenkins Dance Company

    BIBLIOGRAPHY:

    • Anderson, Jack. 1989. "Portraits of Symbiotic Relationships." New York Times (22 April).
    • Gere, David. 1989. "Collaboration is Her Dance Partner." New York Times (16 April).
    • Roca, Octavio. 2003. "Jenkins Choreographs Thirty Years of Magic into Spectacle." San Francisco Chronicle (26 April).
    • __________. 2003. "Jenkins’ Moves Span Continent: Modern Dance Company’s Thirty Year Anniversary Celebrated at Fort Mason." San Francisco Chronicle (20 April).
    • Rockwell, John. 1988. "Jack of All Stage Arts." New York Times (17 November).
    • Tucker, Marilyn. 1992. "It’s Home Sweet Home for Jenkins Troupe New Seven-Week Baywide Tour." San Francisco Chronicle (3 May).
         		 
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