MorDance Unwritten Review
May 30, 2026 | New York Live Arts – New York, NY, USA
Morgan McEwen is building an institution. With twelve years of directing the NYC-born MorDance under her belt, her company will soon be breaking ground in Dobbs Ferry.
The Hudson River Landing building will be transformed into an arts hub featuring rehearsal studios, artist gathering spaces, and a 150-seat black box theater – thanks to a well-deserved one-million dollar grant to support the construction.
The nature of live art means it is perpetually at odds with permanence. Suspended in a fixed moment in time, dancers and choreographers are lucky if the memory of a show stays etched in the audience’s minds past bedtime. A theater of one’s own is a dream come true, and a catalyst for legacy.
The company’s theater is just the cherry on top of over a decade of civic engagement. Women-founded and led, the company promotes their use of dance and community engagement
“to expand access to the arts, uplift underrepresented voices, and create spaces”.
Embodied through dance education scholarships, after-school programs, student workshops, free programs, and partnerships with schools and museums, MorDance shows a true commitment to intertwining the community and arts.
You may also like...
Philadelphia Ballet Romeo and Juliet Review: A Masterpiece of Prokofiev, Juliano Nunes, and a Company at Full Power
Philadelphia Ballet Romeo and Juliet Review: This production understands that Shakespeare's tragedy does not survive on romance alone.
Miami City Ballet ¡Vamos! To the Beach Review: When the Party Never Quite Starts
Miami City Ballet ¡Vamos! To the Beach Review: The dancers were the saving grace in a lineup that felt weaker than its promised unforgettable season finale.
MorDance Unwritten Review
It is invigorating to witness a company so faithfully subscribed to a belief in dance as a stimulant for change. McEwen echoes the sentiment in her contemporary choreography which is grounded in current issues ranging from climate change to politics. In her 2025 work, Trees, she explored nature and connectivity. In the company’s most recent endeavor, Unwritten, she tackles the U.S. Constitution, imagining it as a living, breathing document.
The two-act program is divided by distinct music and costumes.
The first features an original score by Caroline Shaw (a composer frequently used by global choreographers Justin Peck and Pam Tanowitz). Shaw’s trademark vocalization lends itself to the overarching theme of the written word, leaning into the creation phase of the transformative document. Six dancers are dressed in white costumes featuring long-sleeved turtle-necked leotards, mesh pants, and corsets.
In the second act, the music switches to Michael Wall and Angélica Negrón’s techno-percussive arrangements (also original scores) and the garments are identical to those in act one but in rich teal rather than white.
The teal costumes could represent our technicolor present-day life and the white, a blank slate beneath the forefathers’ quills.
The symbolism is up for interpretation. More philosophical than concrete, most of the work is delivered in that manner: exploratory rather than a direct answer. Passages are long but the dancers are all sharp, athletic, and generous artists who tackle the marathon with steady intensity.
Shapes and patterns are only briefly explored, pushing the work toward a stream of consciousness, but a few standout moments left meaningful impressions.
Throughout the piece, the dancers interacted with a set of tables in various ways but in act one, they were lined up across the stage to make a single, narrow platform. Set to silence, the dancers moved in unison, making delicious swishing noises as their pant fabric glided across the tables.
In act two, the group merged into a tight flock featuring mechanical arm and head movement, becoming more machine than human.
The piece ends with the dancers tossing thousands of sheets of paper, made of recycled materials, in volcanic bursts overhead or lofty arcs. In a work imbued with ambiguous symbolism, the appearance of the literal props in the eleventh hour was a bit dubious but the added theatrical texture served as beneficial punctuation.
McEwen stated “Artists are more than entertainers” during the pre-curtain chat. “More” is the key here.
More dance.
MorDance.
True to name, the company proves they can move beyond the walls of a theater.
Featured Photo of MorDance Artists in Morgan McEwen’s Unwritten. Photo by Erin Monteleone.
