Dance - Hot fusion

Any collaboration between artists from different disciplines can be a tricky arrangement, but this weekend choreographer D. Patton White is playing with fire, so to speak.

Into the Inferno teams White, artistic director for Beacon Dance, with composer Allen Welty-Green and installation artist Scott D. Silvey for a collaboration that melts the boundaries between performance and visual art.

The piece is the third installation in “The Elemental Project,” a project Beacon Dance mounted with Dancers Collective in 1998.

“[White’s] vision when we started the project was to involve local artists and have local musicians be part of the piece so that it pulled all of the performing arts elements together,” says Ken Bartlett, executive director for Dancers Collective. Thrown into the fire is a mixture of dancers, actors and musicians, sharing the stage with visual works by Silvey.

“It’s sort of a cross-pollination of the audiences,” Bartlett says. “People that are going to come to hear the actresses or singers may have never been to a contemporary dance piece before. They’re having a sort of total theatrical experience.”

Into the Inferno will heat up the outdoor performance space at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, with artists using fire as a metaphor for food and renewing the soul. While the show doesn’t involve advanced pyrotechnics per se, there will be actual fire on stage to set the mood.

“The Elemental Project, Year Three: Into the Inferno will be performed May 3, 4, 6 and May 8-13 at The Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, 535 Means St. 8:30 p.m. $12 adults, $10 students and artists. 404-233-7600.??