New York Live Arts Launching Arts and Ideas Festival

New York Live Arts, the movement-based arts group led by the choreographer Bill T. Jones, is expanding its footprint by introducing an annual festival of arts and ideas. The inaugural festival will run from April 17-21 and explore the work of the neurologist Oliver Sacks, Mr. Jones, the executive artistic director of Live Arts, is planning to announce on Friday.

“Perhaps more than anyone in recent history, Dr. Sacks has contributed to our growing understanding of the role of creative expression within the mind-body connection,” Mr. Jones said in a statement from Live Arts.

The “Live Ideas” festival will have a different theme each year that will be presented through conversations and performances, including film and dance. “The Worlds of Oliver Sacks” will begin with a conversation between Dr. Sacks and Lawrence Weschler, the director of the New York Institute of the Humanities at New York University and the guest curator for this yearâ™s festival.

“We thought that the series would be a way of furthering our mission,” said Jean Davidson, chief executive officer of New York Live Arts, in an interview on Thursday. “A lot of the artists we present have something in common: they are known for their conceptual rigor and active engagement with social and political currents. In asking how do we build an audience and how do build an entry point we thought, what if we have a week-long festival more focused on ideas”

New York Live Arts was created in 2010, when the boards of Dance Theater Workshop and the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company voted unanimously to merge their organizations.

The events confirmed for the festival include a newly commissioned short film by Bill Morrison; using original archival footage of Dr. Sacks working with patients; a production of “A Kind of Alaska,” a play by Harold Pinter based on Dr. Sacks’ book â! €œAwakenings”; a new dance-theater work by the choreographer Donna Uchizono that delves into the themes of perception; and a ballet score based on “Awakenings,” from the composer Tobias Picker with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

All events will take place at the New York Live Arts’ theater and studios in Chelsea. Some events are free and others range in price from $10 to $60. More information will be available at www.newyorklivearts.org, beginning Friday morning.