MOVERS & SHAPERS: A DANCE PODCAST

MOVERS & SHAPERS:

PODCAST No.92 –

Vangeline

Release Date: 11.21.19

TO DOWNLOAD PODCAST OR LISTEN:

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ABOUT VANGELINE

Vangeline is a teacher, dancer, and choreographer specializing in the Japanese postwar avant-garde movement form Butoh. She is the artistic director of the Vangeline Theater (New York), a dance company firmly rooted in the tradition of Japanese Butoh while carrying it into the 21st century, and the founder of the New York Butoh Institute (as well as the New York Butoh Institute Festival). She is a 2018 NYFA/NYSCA Artist Fellow in Choreography.

Vangeline’s work has been heralded in publications such as the New York Times (“captivating”), Los Angeles Times, (“moves with the clockwork deliberation of a practiced Japanese Butoh artist”) and LA Weekly to name a few. Time OUT Chicago named Vangeline’s, “one of the best Dance Visits of 2011.”  More recently, her solo Hijikata Mon Amour received critical acclaim in New York Butoh Institute Festival 2019.

With her all-female dance company, Vangeline’s socially conscious performances tie together butoh and activism. Her performances have dealt with subjects as varied as feminism, climate change, war and perceptions of gender. Vangeline was the recipient of a six-month artist residency at PS122 Performance Space (“New, New Stuff”); since 2006 she has received 32 prestigious awards from Puffin Foundation, Japan Foundation, New York Department of Cultural Affairs, New York Foundation for the Arts, New York Council on the Arts, Asian American Arts Alliance, Brooklyn Arts Council, and the Robert Friedman Foundation.

She is the founder of the 12-year running, award-winning program “Dream a Dream Project”, which brings butoh dance to incarcerated men and women at correctional facilities across New York State. Widely regarded as an expert in her field, Vangeline has lectured about butoh at Cornell University, New York University, Brooklyn College, CUNY and Princeton University (Princeton Atelier). She has taught and performed internationally  Chile, Hong Kong, Germany, Denmark, France, UK, and Taiwan.

Vangeline is the winner of the 2015 Gibney Dance’s Beth Silverman-Yam Social Action Award. Film projects include a starring role alongside actors James Franco and Winona Ryder in the feature film by director Jay Anania, ‘The Letter” (2012-Lionsgate). She has performed with/for Grammy Award Winning artists SKRILLEX and Esperanza Spalding, and her work is the subject of CNN’s Great Big Story – “Learning to Dance with your Demons”. She is the author of an upcoming book about butoh.

MOVERS & SHAPERS:

PODCAST No.91 –

Michelle Manzanales

Release Date: 11.7.19

TO DOWNLOAD PODCAST OR LISTEN:

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ABOUT MICHELLE

Michelle Manzanales is a choreographer and dance educator originally from Houston, TX. Michelle is the Director of the Ballet Hispánico School of Dance, but lends her artistic voice to all facets of the organization. She began working with Eduardo Vilaro, in 2003 as a dancer for his company Luna Negra Dance Theater of Chicago where she also served as Rehearsal Director in 2006 and as Interim Artistic Director from 2009-2010. Ms. Manzanales has created works for professional dance companies, universities, and schools across the nation including a commission for Ballet Hispánico’s main Company for their 2017 season at The Joyce Theater. Her 2010 homage to Frida Kahlo, Paloma Querida, and 2007 piece, Sugar in the Raw (Azucar Cruda) have been praised by the Chicago Tribune and Chicago Sun Times. “This dance isn’t just about one girl’s experience; it applies to everyone, of any gender, and of any culture,” said CriticalDance of Manzanales’ Con Brazos Abiertos (2017).

MOVERS & SHAPERS:

PODCAST No.90 –

Melissa Riker

Release Date: 10.24.19

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ABOUT MELISSA

Melissa Riker is Artistic Director and Choreographer of Kinesis Project dance theatre. She is a New York City dancer and choreographer who emerged as a strong performance and creative voice as the NYC dance and circus worlds combined during the 90s. Riker’s dances and aesthetic layer her training as a classical dancer, martial artist, theatre choreographer and aerial performer. She creates dances on site – and in context. Riker invents large-scale outdoor performances and spontaneous moments of dance for individuals and corporate clients. Audiences and critics have called Riker’s work “a Marx Brothers’ routine with soul,” “A movable feast.” And from The New York Times, her choreography is: “comically acrobatic, gracefully classical, visually arresting.”

Kinesis Project is a dance organization that produces dance concerts, facilitates educational programs and creates site-specific performances with diverse communities. A company at the forefront of the international discussion of placemaking, art engagement and the cultural imperative of art in public space, Kinesis Project dance theatre invents large scale, space-changing, breath-taking experiences.

Since 2005, Kinesis Project’s work has been experienced in San Francisco, San Diego,Seattle, Boston, Philadelphia, Vermont, Florida and in New York City at such venerable venues as Danspace Project, Judson Church, Joyce Soho, The Minskoff Theatre, The Cunningham Studio, West End Theatre and Dixon Place.  In 2019, the company’s work will be experienced in Seattle, Brooklyn, NY, Riverside Park, supported by New York City Parks, and in Snug Harbor Cultural Center on Staten Island. 

The company dances outside in sculpture gardens, universities, public parks, as well as hosting more than 30 surprise performances all over New York City and the tri-state area as an element of the company’s earned income and outreach programming with volunteer populated flashmobs. Residencies include: Earthdance 2006, Omi International Arts Center 2008, Kaatsbaan International Dance Center 2011, TheaterLab 2014, Adelphi University 2014, John Jay College Rooftop, 2016 and 2017, Seattle Waterfront Park, 2018 & 2019, Snug Harbor Cultural Center, 2019, Riverside Park South, 2019.

Ms. Riker is a 2016, 2017 and 2019 CUNY Dance Initiative Residency Fellow, 2015 LMCC Community Arts Fund grantee, 2019 Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone Grantee. She has been commissioned by The Brooklyn Botanic Garden for a surprise large-scale work and performances of her work Secrets and Seawalls at Omi International Arts Center, Long House Reserve, Gateway National Park in partnership with Rockaways Artist Alliance. Ms. Riker has received commissions from Carson Fox and the Ephemeral Festival in 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 for large-scale outdoor events, NYU in 1998, for an outdoor work long before “flash mob” was coined, 2006 and 2008 grants from the Puffin Foundation for her work Community Movements, a dance work with community volunteers, Fellowships from the Dodge Foundation, Space Grant Residencies from 92nd St Y, The New 42nd St Studio, Gibney Dance Center, Velocity Dance Center, Seattle and The Joyce Theatre Foundation, and grants from The Bowick Family Trust and John C. Robinson to support the continued work of Kinesis Project dance theatre.

MOVERS & SHAPERS:

PODCAST No.89 –

Lucy Sexton

Release Date: 10.10.19

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ABOUT LUCY

Lucy Sexton is a Brooklyn born choreographer, producer, and administrator who works in the fields of dance, theater, film, and advocacy. She is currently Executive Director of the cultural advocacy organization New Yorkers for Culture and Arts, working for equity and support for culture for all New Yorkers. Beginning in 2009, she has served as Executive Director of the NY Dance and Performance Awards, The Bessies, building them for the first time into an independent organization. From 2013-16 she worked as a Consulting Associate Artistic Director of the planned performing arts center at the World Trade Center, conducting field-wide outreach and developing the center’s artistic mission and plan. As a dance artist she works with Anne Iobst; together they create and performe the dance performance duo DANCENOISE which was founded in 1983, had a retrospective exhibit and performance at the Whitney Museum in 2015, and premiered a new piece at NY Live Arts in 2018. In theater, Sexton directed the off-Broadway plays Spalding Gray; Stories Left to Tell and Tom Murrin’s The Magical Ridiculous Journey of Alien Comic; served as dramaturge for Heather Litteer’s Lemonade, and Nora Burns’ David’s Friend; and she produced the Charles Atlas films The Legend of Leigh Bowery for the BBC and TURNINGwith Ahnoni (formerly Antony) and the Johnsons, and Associate Producer for Madeleine Olnek’s Codependent Lesbian Space Alien Seeks Same.

Sexton serves on the boards of Tuesday’s Children, formed after 9/11 and now serving family members of those impacted by terrorism and war worldwide; and the Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen, the city’s largest emergency food provider. She has been honored by Performance Space NY and Danspace Project for her contributions to arts in the city.

MOVERS & SHAPERS:

PODCAST No.88 –

Ivy Baldwin

Release Date: 9.19.19

TO DOWNLOAD PODCAST OR LISTEN:

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ABOUT IVY

Ivy Baldwin is a New York-based choreographer, performer, teacher, and founder of Ivy Baldwin Dance. Since 1999, she has created 17 works for her company, including, most recently, commissions from BAM (Next Wave Festival), Philip Johnson Glass House, the Joyce Theater, Abrons Arts Center, the Chocolate Factory, and the Wooden Floor. Baldwin’s work Keen [No. 2] was nominated for a 2018 Bessie Award for Outstanding Visual Design. Baldwin has received many awards and fellowships, including from the Guggenheim Foundation, Jerome Foundation, New York Foundation for the Arts, MacDowell Colony, Bogliasco Foundation, Yaddo, and Marble House Project, among others. Baldwin has been an Artist-in-Residence with BAM, Movement Research, ArtistNe(s)t (Romania), Manitoga and CPR (currently), and the 92nd Street Y (upcoming). Ivy Baldwin Dance has also been presented in Germany and Romania, and nationally at the American Dance Institute (MD), New Museum of Contemporary Art (NY), the Painted Bride (PA), and REDCAT (CA). In 2020, Baldwin will choreograph and premiere a new work for Same Planet Performance Project (Columbia College Dance Center, Chicago). Baldwin teaches throughout the U.S., including at Barnard College, Rutgers University, The New School, and Bard College, among others. Baldwin holds degrees from North Carolina School of the Arts (BFA) and NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts (MFA).

Ivy Baldwin Dance has been presented in New York City by BAM, Abrons Arts Center, the Chocolate Factory, the Joyce Theater (Joyce Unleashed), Dance Theater Workshop, New York Live Arts, La MaMa, the New Museum for Contemporary Art, Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival/Danceoff!, Dixon Place, 92nd Street Y, Symphony Space, P.S. 122 (Coil and Catch), Danspace Project, Dance New Amsterdam, Movement Research at the Judson Church, and Barnard College, among others; and nationally and internationally at American Dance Institute (MD), Philip Johnson Glass House (CT), REDCAT (CA), Irvine Barclay Theater (CA), Appel Farm Performing Arts Center (NJ), the Painted Bride/Philadelphia Fringe Festival (PA), Tanz im August (Danceoff!) (Germany), and Dans Contemporan International Dance Festival (Romania). The company has enjoyed creative residencies at BAM, MASS MoCA, Mount Tremper Arts, Kaatsbaan International Dance Center, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council.