BREAKING GROUND 2024
Friday, January 26
Special Thanks to our sponsors:
Arizona Commission on the Arts
City of Tempe
Solos Juntos
Dance Film
Choreographer:
Zarina Mendoza
Sound:
"Trentemoller" by Take me into your skin
Lighting Design:
Zarina Mendoza & Norberto Ballesteros
Performers:
Alejandro Salomon, Ignacio Jara, Michelle Calderas
Our dance film delves into the heart-wrenching journey of longing, loneliness, and the universal need for connection.
Zarina Mendoza is a passionate artist, a Mexican immigrant with a desire to share knowledge, culture and points of view through movement. She has a BFA in dance and has been teaching for more than 10 years at International Festivals and Local Studios. She has also imparted her workshop “Power Flow '' inspired by postmodern, improvisation, acrobatic movement, flying low and basic capoeira techniques to professional dance companies in Asia and Mexico. Founder, choreographer and director of Tranze Danza Contemporanea, they have been invited to remarkable international festivals in South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, Costa Rica, United States, Taiwan and Mexico.
De Spirit is Callin...
Choreographer:
Shola K. Roberts
Music:
Mr. Killa - Spirit of Shadow
Sound Edited:
Chester Williams
Lighting Design:
Shola K. Roberts
Performers:
Alecea Housworth, Shayla Eshelman, Shola K. Roberts
This piece pays homage to the culture and practices that continue to sustain Grenadian people. We acknowledge those who have come before us and continue to fuel us in our walk. Listening to that spirit that guides who we really are…. What is evoked when we rely on that Jab Jab spirit? A spirit of resilience and resistance. I am empowerment, I am liberation, I am the spirit and … de spirit is callin…!
Shola K. Roberts is an international performing professional dance artist, dance educator, choreographer, and fitness instructor based in Arizona and Brooklyn, New York by way of Grenada, WI. She serves on the Arizona State University Herberger Institute Music, Dance, & Theatre Faculty, as an Assistant Professor. Shola is also the Founder and Artistic Executive Director of Dance Grenada Incorporated an organization rooted in creating a network for international and local Grenadian dance artists.Most recently, she has been appointed as one of the Directors of the Caribbean American Phoenix Carnival Cultural Organizations of Arizona (CAPAZ) and has been recently featured in the prominent illustrious Essence Magazine for her continuous work with the Dance Grenada Dance Festival. Dance Grenada recently celebrated its 4th year under the theme: The Time is Now: Unification Under Our Grenadian Sun. Shola, a proud Grenadian, and has had the opportunity to work with many renowned dance companies and choreographers. Her credits include performances with Kowteff West African Dance Company under the Artistic direction of Sewaa Codrington, Oyu Oro under the Artistic direction of La Mora, Fritzalyn Hector whom she most recently performed for the 2021 Dance Africa film: Vwa zanset yo: y’ap pale, n’ap danse!, which earned a Bessie Award. Francine Elizabeth Ott and Otis D. Herring, for whom she served as an assistant choreographer. Shola was a part of the 2018 Voices of Congo Square cast, which made its debut in the Orpheum Theater in New Orleans, Louisiana. In 2023, she founded the Shola K. Roberts Dance Company, which made its premiere in Scottsdale, Arizona, with the original choreographed piece entitled ‘The Spirit is Callin…’ Shola is currently a Doctoral candidate in Dance Education at Columbia University. Her research focus is grounded in an Ubuntu pedagogical approach to developing curriculum rooted in the culturally relevant and critical dance pedagogy of Grenada Folk dance in higher education as means to inspire and empower learners. The circles/communities in which they come from, pushing them to use those experiences to influence their development as a holistic citizen in this global community. Her work continues to speak to the empowerment of black and brown bodies as they TELL THEIR STORIES!
Luminescent Solace
BG premiere
Choreographer:
Dana Metz
Music:
"Piel by Arca", "With Me" by Michael Wall and original music composed by Nullin Hasan
Performers:
DeQuan Lewis, Kailin Metz & Kelsey Metz
"Luminescent Solace" is a piece that dives into the journey of finding comfort within the ethereal embrace of light and finding solace in the presence of others through human connections.
Born and raised in Arizona, Dana Metz began her own dance training at the age of eight at Dance Connection. She also studied ballet and modern dance at the School of Ballet Arizona and has worked with some of the industry's top choreographers. Dana has developed her professional career studying Gaga Movement Language, Countertechnique, Giordano Jazz, Progressive Ballet Technique and Progressive Contemporary Technique. One of the most popular teachers in Phoenix, Dana is noted for her innovative style and national award winning choreography. Dana has worked as a dance teacher and choreographer for over ten years. Dana travels extensively throughout the United States, teaching master classes and setting choreography for individuals as well as studios. Dana was named 1st runner - up at the 2010 Capezio A.C.E. competition at the 2010 Dance Teacher Summit and was able to show her own work at the Roseland Ballroom in New York. She also was awarded 1st place at the McCallum Theater Choreography Festival in 2014. Dana has recently set pieces for Convergence Ballet and Wanderlust Dance Project and currently works with her own company Dana Metz Co.
Drinking of Them Like Wine
Re-imagined for BG24
Choreographer:
Candy Jimenez
Music:
"Traveling Light" by Ivo Dimchev, "Cry to Me" by Solomon Burke
Costume Design:
Candy Jimenez
Performers:
Juan Carlos Gutiérrez García, Jordan Clark, Jenny Gerena, Candy Jimenez, Jenna Lyn Endicott, Nicole L. Olson, Kalli Sparish, Zephyr Tuipulotu
An exploration on the nature of tears. Crying and laughter because of increased emotion causes a release. A sort of calm after the storm.
THIS IS A GREAT PLACE FOR YOUR TAGLINE.
Candy Jimenez studied at Arizona State University and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. She has earned her BFA, M.Ed, and is currently an MFA in Dance candidate from Hollins University. She has performed solos by New York choreographer Pamela Pietro, and Neta Pulvamacher as well as California choreographer Chad Michael Hall. Candy choreographs and presents her work throughout the country as well as France. Her work is about the human experience, acknowledging the individual myth, and valuing tribulations. Her artistic practice is about perseverance, coexisting with nature, and valuing all living beings. She is passionate about connection and purpose.
A Message from Mx. Black Copper
Choreographer:
j. bouey
Music:
“Summon the Fire” and “Blood of the Past” by The Comet Is Coming
Performer:
j. bouey
Mx. Black Copper, a transdimensional hyper-empathic being, projects their consciousness back to our time from the future. Upon their arrival, they sense the troubling atmosphere of our time causing them to reflect the fury and grief of the planet.
Free Palestine! End Genocide Now! We Dance for O’Shae Sibley!
j. bouey, is a 2023 Bessie Award Outstanding Performer recipient, the founder of The Dance Union Podcast, initiator of the NYC Dancers COVID-19 Relief Fund and The Dance Union Town Hall For Collective Action to support the dance community through numerous world-changing events. As a creator, j. is a recent 2021-2022 Jerome Fellow and is a 2022/2023 Movement Research Artist in Residence. j. bouey was also recently a Gibney 2021 Spotlight Artist, Artist-In-Residence at CPR – Center for Performance Research, and 2021 Bogliasco Fellow. j. was also a 2018 Movement Research Van Lier Fellow, and 2018 Dancing While Black Fellow. j. is currently a collaborator with nia love. They were also a former performer with Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, danced with Germaul Barnes’ Viewsic Dance, Maria Bauman’s MB Dance, Dante Brown, Antonio Brown Dance, Christal Brown’s INspirit Dance, and apprenticed with Emerge 125 (formerly Elisa Monte Dance) under the artistic direction of Tiffany Rea-Fisher.
INTERMISSION
RP
Choreographer:
Alfonso Cervera
Music:
Panoptica, Angelica Maria, and ASMR family recordings. Edited by Alfonso Cervera.
Performer:
Alfonso Cervera
Retinitis pigmentosa, is a rare, inherited degenerative eye disease that causes severe vision impairment, often beginning in early childhood. Cervera's work places his family at the forefront as he archives and revisits shared moments with Maria Casanova and Denise Cervera's lived experiences. Through movement-based explorations, Cervera attempts to acknowledge past events and bring awareness to his family's disability.
I want to thank my sister Denise Cervera and my mom Maria Casanova for giving me permission to share and create a work that archives their story.
Currently an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University, Cervera identifies as a Queer first-generation Mexican American choreographer, performer, educator, curator, and activist. Along with his degree, he holds professional certifications in Asana Yoga, Reiki Healing, and is the Executive Director of a non-profit titled Show Box L.A. His research and specialization as an independent movement practitioner focuses on the conversation between queerness, Ballet Folklorico, and Afro-LatinX social dances in a contemporary auto-biographical embodied experience that he calls Poc-Chuc. Poc-Chuc, an emerging and inclusive dance technique developed by Cervera, weaves these techniques as a pedagogical tool to create representation for marginalized communities.
THIS IS A GREAT PLACE FOR YOUR TAGLINE.
Amenoia
Student Artists
Choreographer:
Ashley Koclanis and Liam Hemminger
Music:
"Restrictus" by Mario Batkovic and "Unchained Melody" by The Righteous Brothers performed by The Fleetwoods
Costume:
Ashley Koclanis and Liam Hemminger
Performers:
Ashley Koclanis and Liam Hemminger
anemoia - n. nostalgia for a time one has never known. This duet explores two potential realities. One in which two strangers, drawn together by mutual needs, share a comforting connection that unfolds to a crippling dependence. One in which they never have the chance to try. They are left to question, “If I knew how it ended, would I still choose it?”
Ashley Koclanis is a dancer, choreographer and teacher originally from Southern California. She is a sophomore at Arizona State University pursuing her BFA in Dance Performance. She has performed in numerous dance productions, including Transitions, and Spring Dance Fest, in works created by Kyla Kabat, Brayden Guentzel, Kayla Farrish, and others. She just recently performed her first college group piece in November.
Liam Hemminger is a dancer and choreographer originally from Wisconsin. He is an Arizona State University alumni with a Bachelor's in Computer Science with a minor in Dance Performance. He has performed in numerous dance productions, including Breaking Ground, Transitions, and Spring Dance Fest, in works created by Kyla Kabat, Brayden Guentzel, Kayla Farrish, and others. His latest work is a contemporary duet created in collaboration with Ashley Koclanis.
Technogenesis
Choreographer:
Eric Mullis
Music:
Eric Mullis, Technogenesis
Costume Design:
Eric Mullis
Performers:
Madeline Badgett, Emilee Harney (2/26) Taylor Railton, Mikaela Laxton (2/27)
Technogenesis is an experimental dance technology piece in which the dancers embody the logics of software programs.
The choreography for this piece was developed by recording improvisations with a digital camera and motion capture suit, editing the footage/data in software programs, and tasking the dancers with learning the results. The piece was supported by an Art and Technology grant from the Knight Foundation.
Eric Mullis is a dance artist and scholar whose choreography has been featured in the North Carolina Dance Festival, The Fact/SF Summer Dance Festival, at UrBANGUILD Kyoto, and at Performance Philosophy, Amsterdam. He is a Fulbright Scholar who, in 2021, conducted research on dance and the philosophy of technology at Taipei National University of the Arts in Taipei, Taiwan. His scholarship on dance technology has been published in Dance Research Journal, A.I. and Society, and the International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media. Eric has authored of two books, Pragmatist Philosophy and Dance: Interdisciplinary Research in the American South and Instruments of Embodiment: Costuming in Contemporary Dance. He is the Director of Goodyear Arts (an artist-run art gallery and performance venue in Charlotte, North Carolina) and is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Queens University of Charlotte.
or things left behind
BG premiere
Choreographers:
Keith A. Thompson & Carley Conder
Sound:
"Elegy for Solo Violin" by Igor Stravinsky, "Passacaglia in G Minor (after G.F. Handel)" by Johan Halvorsen
Text:
Recalled from the memories of the dancers, musicians and choreographers
Lighting Design:
Jordan Daniels
Costume Design:
Cari Smith
Performers:
Alix Chappell, Leah Friedman, Juan Carlos Gutiérrez García, Isiah Johnson, Simon Lace, Kelsey Metz
This collaborative project investigates things forgotten and things recalled. Our guiding principle was to explore "things left behind" ... in our childhoods, in our memories and in our lives. How do these artifacts/foods/places/songs from the past help us understand who we are today?
Special thanks to team of collaborators! Our musicians, Chino and Michael; our costume designer Cari and lighting designer Jordan.
Carley Conder is Artistic Director of CONDER/dance, founded in Arizona in 2003. Based in Tempe, Carley has invested her time and talents towards providing opportunities for contemporary dance artists in Arizona. CONDER/dance enjoys artist-in-residence status at Tempe Center for the Arts and Carley’s recent projects include creative collaborations with the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation and AQUA collaboration with UC Santa Barbara. Carley’s choreographhic work has been presented at Dixon Place (NYC), Center for Performance Research (Brooklyn),WestBeth Theater (NYC), John Ryan Theater (Brooklyn), and the Diavolo Space (Los Angeles). She was profiled in "Phoenix's 100 Creatives" by the Phoenix NewTimes and chosen as “Best Dancer of 2015” by the Phoenix NewTimes. Carley has been the recipient of arts funding through the City of Tempe, Arizona Commission on the Arts, Target Arts Grants and the Consulate General of Israel. Carley is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Dance in the School of Music, Dance and Theater at Arizona State University.
Keith A. Thompson is a multifaceted contemporary dance artist currently serving as Assistant Director of the Dance program and Associate Professor within the School for Music, Dance, and Theatre at Arizona State University, as well as their Center for Race and Democracy´s inaugural faculty resident artist. He danced internationally for the Trisha Brown Company (1992-2001), including serving as her Rehearsal Assistant (1998-2001); has performed with Bebe Miller Company; and is frequent performer, choreographer, and rehearsal director with Liz Lerman. As a teacher, he has taught master classes and workshops for Sasha Waltz & Dancers (Berlin), Tanzwerkstatt Europa Festival (Munich), the TsEKh Summer Dance School (Moscow), the International Dance Festival (Kyoto, Sapporo, Tokyo Japan), and the Korea Dance Festival (Seoul), as well as been on the faculty at the Florida Dance Festival, the American Dance Festival, served on the artistic panel for DTW’s Fresh Tracks (New York), as an adjudicator for the American College Dance Festival Association, and more. Since 2006, he has served as Artistic Director of danceTactics performance group, where his choreography has been featured in New York at Dance Theater Workshop´s Guest Artist Series, Dixon Place, Dance New Amsterdam, and the Dance Now Festival, as well as Harvard University, the University of Maryland College Park, the Dance Boom Festival (PA), the Jersey Moves Festival (NJ), the Aging in America Conference (CA), the Montpelier International Dance Festival (France), the Edinburgh Festival (UK), and Theater X (Japan). Keith received his MFA Research Fellowship in Dance from Bennington College (Vermont) in 2003.
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