choreography
Videos available upon request.
2023
There's Only One Bed. A thirty-minute duet in collaboration with Benny Olk investigating the love letters from John Cage to Merce Cunningham. Both an homage to both high- and low-brow queer aesthetics and a process of historic fabulation, this work offers a playful collision between esoteric dance forms, popular culture, and devotion. Presented by SPACE, Portland, ME.
Truly Madly Deeply. A thirty-minute trio that continues Koepke's research into queer hauntology, memory, and displaced physio- temporalities. Presented by SPACE, Portland, ME.
TMDTMI. A fifteen-minute trio navigating iteration, ghost stories, and tightly-woven choreographic structures for small spaces. Presented by Bates College, Martin Andrucki Black Box Theater.
2022
Moods. A fifteen-minute performance for a cast of fourteen. The work is a wilderness of camp and confusion, as the performers practice psychological gesture as a means to discrupt fixed meaning. Presented in Plavin Dance Concert, Bates College, Lewiston, ME.
In Three. A five-minute performance for a cast of three. Each performer is given three distinct scores while the group attends to a series of three global compositional tactics and concerns. Composition emerges through spontaneous somatic improvisations and choreographic interventions. Presented in Experimental Dance Series, University of Maryland, College Park.
Finally, Fairies!. A thirty-five minute performance for a cast of six. The work included an original sound score, a scenic landscape integrated with lighting, media, and costume designs, and archive footage. Presented at the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of my MFA in Dance.
Left: Tristan Koepke in Impasse
Right: Hana Huie and Gabi Woska in Cruel Spiral: Sports Edition
2021
Triple Helix. A ten-minute performance co-directed with Carlo Antonio Villanueva and Andrés Poch. A cast of ten performers variously engage emergent composition through somatic improvisations and live-media augmentation with lights, cameras, projection, and a spontaneous soundscore. Presented in Fall Dance Concert, University of Maryland, College Park.
Impasse. An eighteen-minute performance and film exploring and challenging capacities for resisting, or at least slowing, capitalism’s saturating effects through both the pursuit and interruption of sensual pleasure. 1 dancer. Presented in Body Politics: Corporeality in Performance seminar with Melissa Blanco Borelli, University of Maryland, College Park, streamed virtually.
Cruel Spiral: Sports Edition. A seven-minute film exposing color, texture, and incessant repetition of action. 2 dancers. Presented in The School of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies's Spring Dance Concert, University of Maryland, College Park, streamed virtually.
ghosted2. An eight-minute film, a wrestling match, a practice in patience, and a hardwired journey through failure and frustration. Presented in Body Politics: Corporeality in Performance seminar with Melissa Blanco Borelli, University of Maryland, College Park, streamed virtually.
if slow pizza were a dance only it's not. A seven-minute film condensing a two-hour absurdist repetition of character and rhythm. 1 dancer. Presented in The School of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies's Spring Dance Concert, University of Maryland, College Park, streamed virtually.
The Poisoned Solo. A ten-minute dance film which meditates on hauntology and loneliness swirls and cycles through reminiscence and resistance. 1 dancer. Presented through freeskewl's On The House, streamed virtually.
Climb. A seven-minute dance film created remotely created for and with the teens of Portland Youth Dance. 24 dancers. Presented by Portland Youth Dance in Portland, ME, streamed virtually.
Long Division. A seven minute dance exploring accumulation and persistent layering. 3 dancers. Presented in The School of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies's Shared Graduate Concert, University of Maryland, College Park, cancelled due to COVID-19.
Left: Tristan Koepke in Beverly, Beverly, Beverly
Right: Tristan Koepke in if slow pizza were a dance only it's not
2020
Beverly, Beverly, Beverly. An inquiry into the process and ethics of translating oral history into dance in the age of physical distance. A somatic collage of family history, rich homages to the past, unsettled queer orientation, and the epigenetic legacies labor, trauma, and grief.
I AM IN A BASEMENT. A twenty-four minute performance and film reflecting on creative projects on pause. Small accumulations of memory, emergence, and iteration, connecting across vast distances to echoes of collaboration. 1 dancer. Presented in The School of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies's Spring Dance Concert, University of Maryland, College Park, streamed virtually.
Speaking Terms. a duet of collision and compromise with dance artist Maggie Zepp. Two dancers. Presented by Point Dance Ensemble in Stevens Point, WI.
What's In It For Me?. An eight-minute dance mining empathetic process and teenage angst. Twelve dancers. Presented by Point Dance Ensemble in Stevens Point, WI.
2019
Hana with Gabi by Tristan. An inquiry into expanse, amplification, cruel spirals, and the pleasures of partnership, distance, and catastrophe.
Left: Tristan Koepke and Maggie Zepp in Speaking Terms
Right: Portland Youth Dance in Highlighter
2017
Highlighter, an eight-minute playful romp questioning, place, space, and indoctrination into American exceptionalism. 11 dancers. Presented by Portland Youth Dance in Portland, ME.
2012
Hansel Pinches, a five-minute dance of queer loneliness and celebratory smut. 1 dancer. Presented by Hiponymous in Minneapolis, MN.
2010
Noshguzzler, a one-hour installation exploring religious iconography and excessive consumption. 5 dancers. Presented by 1419 Collective in Minneapolis, MN
Sissies, a six-minute performance incorporating absurdist directives of gender expression. 2 dancers. Presented by Point Dance Ensemble in Stevens Point, WI.
Filthy Habits, a ten-minute performance featuring baby minimalist gesture, baby doll limbs, and grotesque imagery. Presented by 9x22 at Bryant Lake Bowl Theater in Minneapolis, MN.
2009
Bears, a ten-minute performance featuring a grand staircase entrance. Presented by Patrick's Cabaret in Minneapolis, MN.