Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company to Present Ellis Island Asian American Heritage Festival

The National Park Service in partnership with Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company presents the Ellis Island Asian American Heritage Festival on Sunday, May 15, 2016, with ceremony and performances starting at 12 noon at The Great Hall at Ellis Island, located on the second floor of the main Ellis Island building.

A full schedule of performances and educational workshops given by notable speakers will celebrate the 2016 Asian American Heritage Month and the 100th Anniversary of the National Park Service with traditional and contemporary Asian American Music and Dance, involving the community in New York and New Jersey.

No admission ticket is required for the event. However, audience members must take a ferry to Ellis Island for the festival. Ferry tickets are available for purchase at www.statuecruises.com.

Program:

Sunday, May 5, 2016 at 12 Noon

Dragon Dance

VIP Speakers in the Great Hall

The Ahn Trio with Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company

Mongolian Horsehead Fiddle Music with Dancer

Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company and the New Asia Chamber Music Society

VIP Speakers in the Great Hall

1:00 Performance in the Outdoor Wall of Honor Area

NJCU Student Music Presentation:

Isaac Ezekiel Del Rosario

Philippine Dance/Music

Children's Orchestra Society

Nai-Ni Chen Community Dance Workshop

Lion Dance

Performers:

Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company

The Ahn Trio - Renowned Korean American Classical Trio

Jigjiddorj Natsagdorj - Mongolian Horse Head Fiddle Virtuoso

Asian American Dragon/Lion Association (Lion Dance Youth group)

Faculty and Students of NJ City University

Children's Orchestra Society (NY-based Asian Youth Orchestra)

New Asia Chamber Music Society

Invited VIP Guest Speakers

Honorable Sue Pai Yang

United State Senator Cory Booker, Robert Menedez

Congressman Bill Pascrell, Albio Sires, Leonard Lance

The Chinese Consulate General

Taipei Economic and Cultural Council

Consulate of Mongolia

Consulate of Vietnam

Organizing Committee

Andrew Chiang - Executive Director of Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company

Corky Lee - Artist, Historian, Photographer

Michael Amato - NPS Chief of Interpretation of Ellis Island/Statue of Liberty National Park

Douglas Treem - NPS Ranger

Regina Andriolo - Board President, Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company

Sue Pai Yang - Honorable Judge, New Jersey

Ariun Sanjaajamts - Mongolian Connections

Simone Nguyen - Member of Asian American Bar Assoc. of NY

Adina Williams - American Museum of Natural History

Advisory Committee

Virginia Ng - OCA NJ Chapter President

Min Kim - NJCU Chair of Music, Dance, Theatre Department

The dances of Nai-Ni Chen fuse the dynamic freedom of American modern dance with the grace and splendor of Asian art. The Company's productions take the audience beyond cultural boundaries to where tradition meets innovation and freedom arises from discipline. The Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company is a vital resource of culture in the eastern United States. Each year, thousands of audiences are transported beyond cultural boundaries to the common ground between tradition and innovation, discipline and freedom, and form and spirit.

Choreographer and Dancer Nai-Ni Chen is an artist whose work defies categorization, as she is continually working on new ideas from influences around the world. Her mesmerizing and dramatic contemporary choreography has gained increasing recognition among domestic and international presenters and festivals. Recently, the Company was honored by a distinctive grant award from both the President's Committee on Arts and Humanities and the Department of State to represent the United States in a seven-city tour arranged by the Tamaulipas International Arts Festival in Mexico.

Presented by some of the most prestigious concert halls in the United States, from the Joyce Theater in New York to the Ordway Center in Minnesota and the Cerritos Center in California, the Company has mounted twenty national tours and seven tours abroad. Ms. Chen's work has been presented by such acclaimed international festivals as the Silesian International Contemporary Dance Festival and the Konfrontations International Dance Festival, both in Poland , the Chang Mu International Arts Festival in Korea and the China International Dance Festival.

The Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company also has the unique honor of having received more than fifteen awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and numerous Citations of Excellence and grants from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. In the First China International Dance Festival in Kunming, Yunan, the China Dance Association presented to the Company its most prestigious honor for companies not based in China, the Golden Lotus Award.

The Company's commissioned dances include American Landscape (New Jersey Performing Arts Center), Peach Flower Landscape (Lincoln Center Institute), Qian Kun (Joyce Theater), Tianji/Dragons on the Wall (Andrew W. Mellon Foundation through the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, and the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust), The Way of Five (Towson University) and Unfolding (Dancing in the Streets).