The New Ecstatic 2.0, a duet created in collaboration with dancer Cori Kresge, is an examination of the changing nature of ecstatic dance forms, as affected by cultural shifts in the meaning of “out-of-body” states within the everyday. Originally presented at Danspace Project in October 2013, Skaggs and Kresge will expand the work, further delving into the layers of trauma and its effects After a ten-year exploration of meditative dance in a post-9/11 world, Skaggs emerged with a new work, The New Ecstatic, which signaled a return to her earlier investigations of precision and abandonment in the body, but within a new frame — the post-disaster landscape. Inspired in part by the rage and abstraction found in Martha Graham’s Steps in the Street and other anti-war dances by Graham, Skaggs sought a way to channel her energy into her choreography. The New Ecstatic 2.0 is at once stark and supple, strident and nuanced. Incorporating new sections that play physically extreme movements against simpler vocabulary, The New Ecstatic 2.0 looks at how the body navigates everyday experiences of grief, joy, boredom, rage, and freedom in a world defined by extremes. Laurie Uprichard has been fascinated with Sarah Skaggs' work for more than 25 years. She presented earlier pieces at Danspace Project and at Dublin Dance Festival. In a reversal, or mirror image, of the usual Travelogues modus operandi, Laurie missed Sarah's 2013 Danspace concert while she was living in Paris.