Super DANCE Sunday?

So the next DanceATL meeting is supposed to be on Feb. 5. Which also happens to be Super Bowl Sunday. I don't know that the dance community is hugely into football, but I don't want to generalize too much either. (I seriously wouldn't have known it was even coming up except that a neighbor invited us to a party for it.) That combined with the fact that I really haven't planned this meeting yet (!) leads me to the conclusion that we should move that meeting back at least a week. Actually, looking at the calendar, with the Atlanta Ballet's new Twyla Tharp premiere running and Kyle Abraham at Emory, I'm tempted to move it as far as Feb. 26. Any objections? Any suggestions for performers or topics?
The next daytime meeting is scheduled for March 22, noon-1pm, again at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center. Topic ideas for that one?
I have to say, performers and topics used to sort of hatch out of the ether for me. People would just let me know they were interested. But things are starting to slow down on these types of inspirations after almost two years(!) My thought is that perhaps we can shift the Sunday meetings to being more geared toward artistic questions and investigations, discussions among artists, and the daytime ones can be more business/admin oriented. Yes/no/maybe?
And I'm sorry that I haven't caught up on my overview listing local dance writing in months! I might just have to go ahead and skip the end of 2011 and see what I can do to start over with 2012. It's on my list to-do. As is adding the notes from the last meeting. Maybe that I can do now.
And in the meantime, yay dance!

Off the EDGE schedule

So, you may have all heard something about the contemporary dance event Off the EDGE that's coming to Atlanta (the Rialto and beyond) on Jan. 23-29. Perhaps you even applied to be part of EDGE/Public, just one part of the events that will be going on. Well, now there's a schedule of pretty much everything in a single PDF! To try to clarify what you're seeing:

• the whole shebang focuses on the two performances at the Rialto Center for the Arts on Jan. 27-28, each night a different program. There are student prices and tickets to both nights together are less than purchasing individually, but at this point there's no industry discount to be had. 
• that EDGE/Public I mentioned are site-based works that will be located outside in Woodruff Park right by the Rialto in the hour and a half before the mainstage performances begin. Some are local dance groups like Full Radius Dance, Staibdance, Wabi Sabi and LIFT, and others are artists who work in other mediums. I'll refer you to Cynthia Bond Perry's write up on ArtsCriticATL for more details on this.
• there are three talks (EDGE/Zak) with panels on various topics made up of artists (not all are dancers) including a mix of those from here and those visiting 
• there are a whole slew of artist-to-artist interactions (EDGE/Artist Residencies) for you intermediate/advanced dancers out there. Think master classes with a little more focus on process than technique in most cases. (I'd also like to add CORE's artist-to-artist interaction with a dancer from Lar Lubovitch Dance Company that's listed as TBA will be Jan. 28 from 10:30-12. Unfortunately, it overlaps with another class. The visiting dancers just aren't here for enough time to fit it in any other time. More on that at CORE's site probably tomorrow if I can get it done before the DanceATL meeting!)
• EDGE/Backstage lets high schoolers and others with an interest in theatre tech but not much hands-on experience get, well, backstage. They'll have a chance to see what the tech crews are up to at the Rialto in the very packed days leading up to the performances
• and through it all is a residency with Rina Schenfeld, Israeli dance legend whose bio is posted on the KSU site because she'll be teaching there that week (classes are open but you need to let Ivan Pulinkala know you'd like to attend). She's also giving a talk at Emory and performing a showcase at Goodson Yard (see the schedule for details.) 

So if you can make it tomorrow to the DanceATL meeting from noon to 1 p.m. we'll be talking about all this and more! DanceATL wants to make sure we can have a presence at as many of these events as possible to let people know we're here. So, if you have cards for any upcoming events, please get them to us now so we can have them for the dance table that travels to lots of these (hopefully well-attended) events! Contact info@danceatl.org for more info on how to get them to us. But for questions on this whole EDGE thing, I'll let you go to the source and email edge.artist@gmail.com. Yay dance!

Atlanta Dance overview for 2011

So last year I listed most of everything that happened in 2010 in sort of loose chronological order. Now here's an attempt to list things from 2011 (this time alphabetically, sort of by performer) but wow, there was so much, I can't be sure I everything got in! It's also a little tricky since mostly it's by season on peoples' calendars instead of calendar years. Mostly I'm just condensing everything I can from the Dance Calendar that's on DanceATL.org.  Let me know if I left things out! Happy Holidays!

• 2 Kids and a Dream: SHE Created It
• African American Dance Review
• Atlanta Ballet: Sleeping Beauty, Fusion, Ignition, Four Seasons, Nutcracker
• Atlanta Dance Connection: Grace, Elegance & Energy
• Ballethnic: Flyin' West, Urban Nutcracker
• BE (brooks emanuel) dance at Poem 88
• Beacon Dance: At once now and then, Earth, Water Study
• Brooks and Company Dance: Ugly Duckling, Shorts 6
• Catellier Dance Projects: Tempo, Dance in Progress
• CORE Performance Company: The Point and Navigating the Hallway in addition to Salons and Lunchtimes in the Studio
• Corian Ellisor: WikiDance, Magnetic Drift and Be(a)stie
• Crossover Movement Arts: The West Zen, Pressure and Iron and Steel, Freestyle Polers Take the Fourth Ward, 
• D’air: Untamed, FLUX
• Dance Truck: Noelle Stiles, PLOT
• Emily Christianson: Shaken
• Expression Concert Dance Company had their inaugural performance with choreography by their director and other locals like company member Mary Mattman, Corian Ellisor and Sharon Sibley
• Ferst Center at Georgia Tech: Step Afrika!, Doug Varone and Dancers, Jonah Bokaer, Nrityagam, Aszure Barton and Artists
• FLUX: gloATL, D’air and Zoetic performed in three spaces in Castleberry Hill (I love when I can just walk out my gate and find art. It's the best night to live where we live down here! Well, the art strolls that happen monthly are also art, technically, but unfortunately they don't usually include dance.)
• Full Radius Dance: Walking on my Grave, MAD Festival
• Gardenhouse Dance: Layers at the ACAC, Proximity
• Gathering Wild: 27, Anatomy of a Song
• The Georgia Ballet Rhythm and Rhapsody
• Giwayen Mata: Salute to our Men
• gloATL: this is a world, chapter iii: this is a world, FLUX, liquid culture, maa’, float, everything and the Goodson Yard space was announced as their home and regular classes started there as CITY wide, in addition to summer and winter intensives
• Helen Hale created a piece for the Magnetic Drift show, and a romp in the outdoors for the Beltline in Anti-Manners
• Inman Park Dance Festival celebrated its 11th year
• LIFT: Men. Dance. Life. had their second annual show at the Hertz
• Lori Teague: Dance in Progress
• Project 7: Wall to Wall, Masquerade
• Refuge Dance Company: Progress
• Rialto: Dance Africa Atlanta (part of NBAF), Ron K. Brown Evidence, Paul Taylor Dance Company
• Room to Move Dance: The Lemon Table
• SIDEWAYS: Breaking Bounds, Once Upon a Holiday
• Staibdance: Dance in Progress at Emory
• The Lucky Penny: a new presenting organization created by the fantastic energy of the duo Malina Rodriguez of Dance Truck and Blake Beckham. They started out with an artist talk with visiting NY performing artists The Blow, then really brought it with a huge event the 11.11.11 Spectacular Spectacular! two days full of artist talks, master classes, performances and more
• Zoetic: Catch & Release, UNDONE, performance at MODA 

Celebration time!

I hope everyone had a really great Thanksgiving! I did, right after CORE had our Navigating the Hallway show, which together with the holiday means it's been a while since I've posted anything...and I'm not going to catch up on everything right now. Sorry!

But I would like to put out a last minute invitation to join us for a holiday party (with optional ice skating) in lieu of our regularly scheduled meeting this Sunday, December 4 from 4-6 pm at Park Tavern. Very low key gathering there, and not expecting big crowds, frankly, since it's so last minute. But if you don't mind letting us know if you'll be coming with an email to info@danceatl.org. (Just in case it's a bigger group and we might need to arrange things.) Being Southern, I personally have only ice skated once in my entire life (on a first date in college...) but Aly really wants to skate, so why not? It's fun, right (despite the bruises!)

And for the more business-oriented meeting, we have a space at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center (thanks for hosting, ACAC!) on Thursday, January 12 from noon to 1 pm. to discuss Off the EDGE and Atlanta Spaces.  Bring a lunch and we'll discuss the EDGE events in late January and their relationship to the community, and the development of the Atlanta Spaces project with our partners at C4. And the next meeting in February is totally up in the air as of yet (hm, does that mean it's time to get aerial dancers involved? haha, I'll look into it!)

Yay dance and happy holidays!

Career Transitions for Dancers free workshop this Sat.

I'm playing this up because it's really just a fantastic opportunity for dancers who need help with their careers. Free lunch? free career counseling? discount on tickets to wonderful dance show? Great! Yay dance!
Here's the info:

A very unique New York City-based non-profit that serves ONLY dancers -- Career Transition For Dancers (CTFD) -- is conducting a free-of-charge workshop happening next Saturday, Nov. 19, at the Rialto from 11 am - 2 pm.  (Lunch is provided.)  CTFD offers professional career counseling, information and resources, and scholarship/grant $$ to enable and empower dancers to define longer-range career possibilities while they are dancing and beyond.   This 26 year old program was started by Agnes de Mille and representatives of the major performing unions.  Visit CTFD's website at www.careertransition.org.

For more information and to register for the event, visit the Dance Canvas website. And when you register, you'll get a discount code for tickets to the Ron K Brown/EVIDENCE performance happening that evening the 19th at the Rialto. 

 

Each year CTFD takes their programs and services on the road to cities with a significant dance presence. Their seminars introduce dancers to a career counseling methodology so they can begin assessing their options either while they are still performing or thereafter. To date, CTFD has reached over 3,700 dancers in 30 cities across the nation.   

Dance criticism...some of it and opinions about it

A post on The Ballet Bag about "The Future of Dance Criticism" has a funny take to close the article--criticism as therapy? This, she says, is because you feel better when you can argue with the critic. The author's point really, though, is that the professional critic these days holds some measure of attention not because they're respected as an authority due to their position at a printed publication (such as in the past) but more because they are a consistent voice in the midst of all the faster and louder internet noise. This would've been true before too, that in reading reviews to many shows over time by the same writer, you can come to know this person's "prejudices and partialities" as the author puts it, and can judge if you'd like a show based on your understanding of their taste. If you know that a person's taste is totally opposite of yours in many ways, if they pan a show, you can guess you'll probably love it, and vice versa.

And on that note, whether you agree with them or like to get your therapy from arguing with them, here are some recent press pieces for dance in town.

Reviews for Atlanta Ballet's recent performance of The Four Seasons and EDEN/EDEN (previews are in the previous post):

• reviews by Cynthia Perry in the AJC and ArtsCriticATL.com
• review by Andrew Alexander for Creative Loafing

Georgia Ballet's Gershwin evening, specifically Balanchine's "Who Cares?", reviewed by Cynthia Perry.

Dance Canvas has announced the choreographers chosen to be part of this season's showcase performances on Jan. 20-21 at the 14th Street Playhouse.

Creative Loafing's fall arts issue focused on artists in various genres, and the "spritely" Helen Hale was the profile they included for dance.

There's also a preview from Andrew Alexander for last Sunday's show at the Rialto, ASPHALTE, by the French "compagnie derniere minute" with choreography by Pierre Rigal. And a  preview by Catherine Maddox in CL for Atlanta Dance Connection's show last weekend, "Dark Allure".

And for upcoming Art on the BeltLine events by a slew of dance companies, Andrew says we dancers are starting stage one of our takeover of the city. Yay dance!

What nice weather we're having...or, well, it was

Let's see, there are a few things to mention that would otherwise go in an enews (and have mostly already been posted to Facebook) but I'll put here just to get them out there:

• Full Radius looking for dancers 
• Jordan Matter is looking for dancers for photos for his book Dancers Among Us. Let's prove him wrong that we haven't responded (his blog post "Where's the love Atlanta") and show him some love (and show some of our beautiful dancers and spaces in his book!) 

And some of the coverage from these last couple weeks in Oct. (possibly not in real chronological order, sorry):

• Interview by Cynthia Perry with Atlanta Ballet's dancer Anne Burton Avery about The Four Seasons, coming up this weekend
• Preview of The Four Seasons by Andrew Alexander for CL
• Preview of Beacon Dance's Water Study at Emory
• Preview  in CL of Zoetic's show Undone and preview with photos in BURNAWAY
• Emily Christianson's Shaken: preview and review in CL
• Aszure Barton and Artists: Creative Loafing interview/preview by Andrew and ArtsCriticATL interview/preview by a new writer to the site, Chelsea Thomas (welcome to writing about Atlanta dance! glad to have you here!)
• FLUX Preview by Cynthia Perry and Postmortem in BURNAWAY and What did you think of? in CL, both by Andrew Alexander

And the dance table is at the Atlanta Ballet show this weekend, so you can take things to drop off there if they haven't otherwise made their way to us. And next weekend we've got ASPHALTE at the Rialto. Let me know if you're interested in volunteering for the table. Thanks and yay dance!