MMAC Announces Workshop with Attila Joey Csiki

Manhattan Movement & Arts Center presents a Workshop with Attila Joey Csiki featuring Lar Lubovitch repertory from Tuesday, April 5 to Saturday, April 9, 2011, from noon to 1:30pm from Tuesday - Friday and from 1:30 - 3pm on Saturday. The workshop will take place at the Manhattan Movement & Arts Center at 248 W. 60th Street, NYC (between Amsterdam and West End Avenues) in the Lincoln Center area. The cost for a single class is $25 and the cost for the entire workshop is $110. Registration is available at http://www.manhattanmovement.com/event/lar-lubovitch-repertory-workshop.

Attila Joey Csiki will instruct a Repertory workshop series of Lar Lubovitch's diverse choreography. Lar Lubovitch has been hailed by The New York Times as "one of the ten best choreographers in the world," and the company has been called a "National Treasure" by Variety. Lar's dances are renowned for their musicality, rhapsodic style and sophisticated formal structures. His radiant, highly technical choreography and deeply humanistic voice have been acclaimed throughout the world. This workshop will include repertory from 1978 through 2009.

Attila Joey Csiki trained with the National Ballet of Canada Academy. After receiving a scholarship to the School of American Ballet, Attila moved to New York at age 13. Attila's professional experience transitioned his career to Tokyo, Japan to work with some of the world's most recognized choreographers, including Jiri Kylian, Sir Peter Wright, William Forsythe, Nacho Duato, Mauro Bigonzetti, Antony Tudor and Kenneth McMillan. In Japan, Attila performed with such companies as Noism by Kanamori Jo, New National Ballet, K Ballet, Star Dancers Ballet and the Japan Ballet Association. In 2005 Attila moved to France to become a soloist with Du Capital Ballet of Toulouse.
After returning to the U.S., Attila danced as a guest artist with leading American companies such as The Joffrey Ballet, Ballet Concierto de Puerto Rico, Dance Form Productions, Thomas/Ortiz Dance, and Rasta Thomas' Bad Boys of Dance. In 2008, Attila joined the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company. In addition to his current season with Lar Lubovitch, Attila continues to guest perform internationally with such companies as Semper Opera Dresden, Verona Festival Italy, Honk Kong ballet and Shanghai Ballet. Currently Attila continues to teach Lubovitch's Repertory worldwide and is looking forward to his upcoming tour with the Lubovitch company.

Born in Chicago, Lar Lubovitch was educated at the University of Iowa and the Juilliard School in New York. His teachers at Juilliard included Antony Tudor, José Limón, Anna Sokolow and Martha Graham. He danced in numerous modern, ballet, jazz and ethnic companies before forming the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company in 1968. Lubovitch made his Broadway debut in 1987 with the musical staging for the Stephen Sondheim/ James Lapine musical, Into the Woods, for which he received a Tony Awardnomination. In 1993 he choreographed the highly-praised dance sequences for the Broadway show The Red Shoes. The final ballet from that show joined the repertories of American Ballet Theatre and the National Ballet of Canada. For his work on that show, he received the 1993-94 Astaire Award from the Theater Development Fund. In 1996 he created the musical staging (and two new dances) for the Tony-Award-winning Broadway revival of The King and I. Most recently he devised the musical staging for Walt Disney's stage version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame in Berlin. In 2004 he was honored with the Elan Award for his outstanding choreography.

In 2007, to supplement the activities (creating, performing and teaching) of the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company, he founded the Chicago Dancing Company, a nonprofit organization whose mission is to present a wide variety of excellent dance and build dance audiences in his native Chicago. Initiated by Chicago-born Lubovitch (and our Chicago-based dancer Jay Franke), the Chicago Dancing Festival (CDF) was launched in cooperation with Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) and the City of Chicago. The official premiere of the festival was a free one-night-only dance concert at the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. More than 8,000 people attended the performance, which featured dancers from seven leading American companies. For 2008, CDF will be expanded to include three days of programming. For his visionary risk-taking in establishing the Festival, Lubovitch was named "2007 Chicagoan of the Year" by the Chicago Tribune.

About Manhattan Movement & Arts Center
Manhattan Movement & Arts Center was developed by Rose Caiola as the home of the Manhattan Youth Ballet, a graded, pre-professional ballet academy and performance company. Ms. Caiola, a former dancer and actress, founded the academy in the fall of 1994 as Studio Maestro at 48 W. 68th Street, and today serves as the youth ballet's executive artistic director.

The school is modeled after the European academies and adheres to the French School of classical ballet technique. Under the direction of Francois Perron, managing artistic director, the Manhattan Youth Ballet has acquired a reputation for excellent teaching in an intimate and individually supportive environment. The school's graduates have danced professionally with American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet, Nederlands Dans Theater, Ballet de España, San Francisco Ballet and Complexions.

As the ballet academy grew, the search for a larger space inspired in Ms. Caiola a highly personal vision of a studio and theater complex that would encompass all aspects of dance education and performance.

mmac opened its doors in June 2008, occupying a dramatic bi-level space within The Element, a luxury high-rise condominium. In addition to the Manhattan Youth Ballet, mmac's studios and theater host daily adult dance and fitness classes, the mmac Kids program, summer intensive programs, as well as an array of performances and special events.

For more information about mmac, visit www.manhattanmovement.com.