Brooklyn's performing arts venues have become a laboratory for work that refuses easy labels. Ambitious stages across the borough are commissioning genre-defying performances that fold together theater, dance, music, and visual art into something new.

The programming draws adventurous audiences willing to be challenged, and increasingly the attention of the wider art world. The fictional company Meridian Movement premiered a wordless, hourlong piece this spring that critics struggled to categorize and couldn't stop discussing.

The avant-garde has always carried financial risk, and these productions depend heavily on grants and patrons. But Brooklyn's stages have carved out a reputation as the place where the boldest performance ideas in New York get their first airing.