Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company In Collaboration With Flushing Town Hall Present Virtual CrossCurrent Choreographic Festival

Flushing Town Hall will celebrate New York's diverse and vibrant Asian American dance scene when it presents Part One of the Virtual CrossCurrent Choreographic Festival on Friday, June 26 at 7:00 PM. Produced by the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company andfocused exclusively on emergent choreographers, the festivalwill include performances and panel discussions with the participating artists and selection committee.

The June 26 event will present "The Absent Umbra" by dance artist Rourou Ye and "The Inner Light" by Yuki Ishiguro, artistic director of the Yu.S.Artistry dance company.
Audiences can tune back in for Part Two of the festival on Friday July 3 to view works by Chaery Moon, Barkha Patel, and Chien-Ying Wang.

The festival's goal is to increase the visibility of Asian and Asian American dance, foster cross-cultural dialogue, and provide a more equitable context for discussing dance and its role in New York communities.

"Flushing Town Hall has been a strong advocate of arts equity since 1979. We support local, immigrant, and International Artists, developing partnerships and collaborations that enhance our efforts in supporting the global arts community," says Ellen Kodadek, Flushing Town Hall's Executive & Artistic Director. "We have partnered with the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company for six years now and this year's festival was to take place at Flushing Town Hall but was moved online due to COVID-19 theatre closure. We are thrilled to partner with Nai-Ni Chen's company once again and to bring these inspiring choreographers to a global audience."

Nai-Ni Chen has been hailed as a "spiritual choreographer" by Dance Magazine and is the recipient of multiple choreographic fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and New Jersey State Council on the Arts. She has created more than 80 original works over the last 30 years of choreographing in the United States and has traveled to more than 12 countries with The Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company since its inception in 1988. Hers is one of the few professional dance companies led by an Asian American woman.

"I am really proud to see the diversity and the strength of the artists who applied. We had a difficult time selecting these works that we are going to present," says Nai-Ni Chen. "Please join us!"

Nai-Ni Chen is joined on this year's festival committee by Miki Orihara and Peiju Chien-Pott.

Miki Orihara is known for her Bessie Award-winning career with the Martha Graham Dance Company. She has performed on Broadway, and with Elisa Monte, Siti Company, PierGroupDance, Lotuslotus and in productions by Rioult Dance, Twyla Tharp, Anne Bogart and Robert Wilson. She is a sought after teacher and coach working with the Kirov Ballet, Japan's New National Theater Ballet School, the Ailey School, New York University, The Hartt School, L'ete de la Danse (Paris) and is Dance Director for Mishmash*Miki Orihara and Martha Graham Dance technique DVD(2018). Orihara is currently the curator /director of NuVu Festival.

Peiju Chien-Pott joined the Graham Company in 2011. She received the Positano Premia La Danza 2014 award for Best Contemporary Dancer, was named one of the year's "Best Performers" in 2014 and 2017 by Dance Magazine, was an honoree of the "Women's History Month" by Hudson County and received a 2017 Bessie award for Outstanding Performer. Ms. Chien-Pott has created lead roles by many of the world's most celebrated choreographers including Nacho Duato, Mats Ek, and Andonis Foniadakis. She graduated with a BFA. from Taipei National University of the Arts, and has since been honored with their Outstanding Alumni Award. She recently received an Outstanding Dance Artist Award from the government of Taiwan.

Rourou Ye, who is presenting her work in Part One of the festival on June 26, is a dancer, choreographer and educator. Her early training was in Chinese dance, followed by studies in American and European dance and theater practices. Five years ago, she left her position as an instructor and choreographer in the Musical Theater department at one of China's top conservatories and came to the US to make work. Rourou holds a BFA in Choreography from Shanghai Theater Academy and MFA in Dance from Sarah Lawrence College. Her work has been presented by GIBNEY, Danspace Project, Movement Research, CPR, The Field, Dixon Place, Bronx Academy of Art and Dance, LMCC, Austin Dance Festival, and in China by Shanghai International Dance Festival, Shanghai Conservatory of Music, Beijing Dance Festival, and China Dance Forward (Hong Kong).

Yuki Ishiguro, a Japanese native also presenting his work in Part One of the festival on June 26, has trained in styles as diverse as ballet and break dance. He moved to New York in 2009 to study contemporary dance. Yuki has worked and toured with Roxey Ballet, Catapult entertainment, and Emery LeCrone Dance, among others. In 2018, Yuki started his own company Yu.S.Artistry, fiscally sponsored by New York Live Arts. His work has been presented at Booking Dance Festival at Jazz at Lincoln Center, DUMBO Dance Festival, the MAD Festival at Nazareth college, Come Together Dance Festival at Suzanne Roberts Theater, and International Dance Festival by Nickerson Rossi Dance at Performance Garage in Philadelphia. In 2019, he showcased his evening-length show "Shifting Tides" at the Actors Fund Arts Center.

While Flushing Town Hall's FTH at Home!virtual programs are presented to audiences free of charge while the venue is temporarily closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, viewers are invited to make a tax-deductible donation to the nonprofit's Step Up for Flushing Town Hallcampaign to help supplant the loss of earned revenue from ticket sales.