August

Wanting to post but not really wanting to write...so here's what you get for tonight:

Andrew Alexander's preview for brooks emanuel (be dance) in Creative Loafing
And his mention for the PLOT artists' talk, both at poem 88

an article in Dance Informa about Dance Truck

season preview for Crossover Movement Arts

fall dance preview from Cynthia Perry in Access Atlanta

Ok, I didn't watch this season of SYTYCD, and of course it's always a controversial subject with dancers (love it, hate it, etc.) but since she IS from Georgia, here's an interview with Melanie Moore

Eyedrum reopens in Castleberry Hill (it's not a dance specific venue of course, but they hosted plenty in the old space)

Notes from Aug. 7 meeting

Thanks to everyone who came to the meeting! Thanks to Expression for performing, CORE for hosting, Aly for notetaking and Andrew Alexander for listening. I hope you all found it valuable. Please get in touch to let me know if there are ways to improve the process as we move forward to the next meeting on Oct. 2.
Performance by Expression Dance, upcoming performance Aug 27-28 at Beacon

Introductions

Claire H. – CORE upcoming show The Point, Sept. 17-18, will be free thanks to underwriting from sponsors in Decatur, Gathering Wild 27 at Fabrefaction

Brooks Emanuel – Aug 12^th @Poem 88 at 8&9pm / Beacon remounting the Elemental Project

Joe Winter – C4atlanta.org working on the arts and culture census, mailing list trading mechanism, will be doing another upload for new members so you can still join in

Jenna Knight – Ferst center dance series, Azure Barton in October, Joe Goode, Bridgeman/Packer Dance and Pilobolus / all will have community master classes

Paula Winter- past local choreographer and dancer (30 years ago)

Nicole Livieratos – Gardenhouse Oct 15 in Rabun County, something with Lucky Penny in the fall

Blake Beckham – Just wrapped up PLOT, DanceTruck at time based art festival in Portland, OR, Nov 5 Art on the Beltline, Dirty South Tour, The Lucky Penny=a new entity that will serve as a presenter, next project on 11.11.11

Blake Dalton – CORE Fieldwork at Emory featuring dancers and writers Aug. 14. Crossover season kickoff Aug. 12-13, FLUX on 30^th of September, Art on the Beltline at Wren’s Next, Nov 13 at Zentropy at Old 4^th Ward park, potentially a project with Luminosity, open freestyle poling and dance classes at CORE Studios

Nathan Henderson & Mary Mattman – Expression Dance Co. on August 26&27 at Beacon

Aly Brock – WabiSabi at the Garden, Atlanta Ballet Season opens in October, Brooks & Co Transition, DanceATL update

Amy Gately- Room to Move A Rothko inspired piece

Joe Futral – Working on several theatre projects, Matt Kent is going to be new co-Artistic Director for Pilobolus so Wormhole is in re-think

Douglas Scott– MAD Festival applications are available through Sept. 15, contact him for one, also new website for the festival modernatlantadance.org

Andrew Alexander - Creative Loafing Arts Issue coming up

Amanda Thompson – Zoetic FLUX piece with Crossover and Onur Topal-Sumar, recent piece with Flux at The Centennial Olympic Fountain, working on Dekalb arts day for Leadership Dekalb with Sue Schroder

Discussion

What is unique about working in Atlanta, what unique challenges/advantages?

Amy – performance space that is tailored for dance, affordable, information on alternate venues, difficult to get reviewed (Andrew recommended that companies stay in touch with their arts writers)

Jenna - desirable stop for touring artists

Blake D – strong sense of community and support, there’s a geographic challenge

Blake B – ‘Small pondedness,’ untapped spaces, untapped collaborations with artists across boundaries.

Amanda – The city is assessable, the resources that it has that are concentrated in pockets (because of transportation issues) like Decatur

Aly – funding obstacles for smaller companies

Joe F. – The city of potential, obstacles with space, the fundraising engine behind different art forms is more common through theatre, etc.,

Paula  - the problems of today are the same as 30 years ago

Joe W – series of interviews with Artistic Directors, one mentioned the future of theatre is site specific as well. Discussed the evolution of dance, adding to the mix – site specific and new technologies

Brooks – the obstacles are damaging to the growth of the dance community. Most importantly space and funding.

Nicole – you can be left alone to do your work, can be good and bad. There aren’t a lot of opportunities for new artists

Jenna – Building new audiences is difficult for dance.  Jonah Bokaer, for example, was difficult to attract audience to, perhaps because dance is difficult to describe.

Blake D. – difficult to build word of mouth when most performances are one weekend.  Traction issue.

Blake B. – Invest in the quality of what we are doing, if your art inspires then the audience will be converted into dance audience

Douglas – disappointed in the support of the MAD Festival

Claire – discussed ‘engaging dance audiences’ at Dance/USA conference: 9 different projects, from crossover audience projects with audiences of other art forms to online engagement platforms. Testing out things that work and can be pilot projects for other groups to borrow from. Webinar presentations available about these and other audience engagement projects on the Dance/USA website http://www.danceusa.org/engagingdanceaudienceswebinars

COLLABORATION – a big cross-over with the visual arts audience, knowing your work, figure out what you are as an artist – then the audience will define itself, dance is foreign to audiences and it makes it difficult without them having a reference point, if we are serious about building audiences we have to take quality seriously and focus on enhanced criticism, question and answer after performances

Andrew recommends sharing information at least 3 weeks out, stay in touch,

Joe F. - If dance is going to have a vibrant future it is going to take the community pushing each other, challenging each other to find what works, and being honest about what doesn’t.