CONDER/dance to Host 2016 Breaking Ground: Contemporary Dance and Film Festival

A dramatic combination of technical artistry, physical power and unbridled creativity, the 2016 Breaking Ground Festival returns to take over the Tempe Performing Arts Center January 29-30.

The Festival, now in its ninth year, brings dancers, choreographers, digital artists, and the community together for a weekend of high art and energy, with some of the most vital voices in contemporary dance.

Among the highlights of this year's Breaking Ground are premiere dance works from LA's WHYTEBERG, NYC's Bare Dance Company and San Francisco's project agora. Two award-winning filmmakers, Marlene Millar and Marianne M. Kim, master classes led by head-lining performers, and the return of "tiny dances" as contemporary dancers perform in the Gallery of Tempe Center for the Arts.

Tickets for Breaking Ground 2016 are $25 for adults and $18 for students when purchased more than 24 hours in advance. Tickets will be $28 adults and $23 students at the door. Tickets are on sale now at http://tca.ticketforce.com.

BREAKING GROUND 2016

ROSTER OF

SELECTED CHOREOGRAPHERS AND FILMMAKERS

Shaun Boyle

Shaun Boyle is a dance practitioner and educator with research interests in ballet, modern/contemporary dance, and choreographic practice. Her choreography has been showcased in the United States and Europe at venues such as the Joyce Soho Theater and the Ailey Citigroup Theater in New York, The Bonnie Bird Theatre and The Robin Howard Theatre in London, Officina Giovani in Italy, and Markgrafentheater in Germany. Currently Shaun is an assistant professor in the Dance Department at the University of California, Irvine. At Breaking Ground, Shaun will premiere her latest work "Grid."

Rebecca Bryant

Rebecca Bryant insists on "making art about complex ideas," creating danceworks that combine movement, video, sound and objects. With the eye of a visual artist, Bryant's dances draw on improvisational methods and performative states. Her piece for Breaking Ground is the recently premiered work"MANUFACTURED," a multimedia ensemble dancework exploring how empathy can created or destroyed through movement, image, and language. Using props, speech, projected text, both subtle and evocative dance, "MANUFACTURED" treads the line between privilege and compassion.

Daniel Burkholder

One of the leaders in contemporary dance, Daniel Burkholder makes his first appearance at Breaking Ground this year. His work has been seen at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts , 92nd Street Y, the Tribeca Performing Arts Center, the Contemporary American Theater Festival along with numerous indoor and outdoor spaces through out the Mid-Atlantic Region. He has taught at the West Coast Contact Improvisation Festival, the Wild Meadows Improvisation Intensive, University of Maryland College Park, American University, George Washington University, University of Maryland Baltimore, numerous studios and as guest teacher for Cirque du Soleil. Daniel is currently an artist-in-residence at Lombardi Cancer Center/Georgetown University Hospital.

He brings his new piece, "Dance #14" an interactive dance performance which combines dance with spoken word and storytelling, and a unique audience interaction to draw an intimate relationship between performer and viewer.

Carley Conder

CONDER/dance

A new group work for CONDER/dance, "Map of Broken Glass" explores in movement and visual imagery the process of creating art from shards. Like fragments of memory, the dancers forcibly reduce ideas and then reassemble into new forms through unceasing contact and energetic exchange. Close collaboration with filmmaker Perry Allen gives this piece a multi-dimensional outlook on what it means to construct and manage identity. This work was created during Conder's performance residency at the nueBOX residency program.

Recognized as "2015 Best Dancer" by the Phoenix New Times, Carley Conder is Artistic Director of CONDER/dance, founded in Arizona in 2003. She is currently a Faculty Associate for the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts at ASU and Adjunct Faculty at Scottsdale Community College.

Mike Esperanza's Bare Dance Company

Born in Manila, Philippines and raised in Southern California, Mike's background in graphic design allows his dances to capture both the physical intricacies of movement and visual elements of composition, creating "dance of the new millennium: shape-shifting, vernacular-blending." -- Explore Dance.

In 2005, Mike was awarded the "Dance: Creation for Performance" grant presented by Dance/USA and the Irvine Foundation. With this distinguished award, BARE Dance Company began. Mike Currently teaches at Peridance, Steps on Broadway and serves as a guest teacher at Broadway Dance Center.

Marianne M. Kim

Marianne M. Kim is a Korean American artist and educator working in performance, video art, and multimedia installation. Her most recent screendance work has been presented at the International Screendance Festival at American Dance Festival, Dance Camera West in Los Angeles, San Francisco Dance Film Festival, Festiva Agite y Sirva in Mexico, Fundacao Oriente Museu in Portugal, and Cine Corps in France among others. Currently Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Art & Performance at Arizona State University's New College.

Marianne M. Kim will be screening er work "Martiality Not Fighting" which follows a young Chinese dancer performing the role of conscientious objector struggling with the trials of war. Battling his conscience, the choreography combines postmodern dance and the martial arts of "Ba Gua Zhang."

Martiality, Not Fighting trailer

Bliss A. Kohlmyer + Kara Davis / project agora

Bliss Kohlmyer and Kara Davis are the co-artistic directors of "project agora," a San Francisco-based art organization with work featuring interdisciplinary collaborations.

The company's piece presented at Breaking Ground, "Conver(sa)tions," weaves improvisational structures inside choreography, as the duet of dancers explores the boundary-blurring possibilities of the interpersonal. Using different modes of communication, the complexities of hearing, translating, understanding, and responding are revealed.

WHYTEBERG is a Los Angeles based duo created by Gracie Whyte and Laura Berg as a platform for their collaborative work. WHYTEBERG also self-produces Crumbs, an ongoing series of one-take dances utilizing distinct Los Angeles neighborhoods as a backdrop.

For Breaking Ground, WHYTBERG will present "Gemini," a piece exploring the unique, often opposing qualities of two dancers. With original animation by Jacob Streilein projected behind the dancers, the piece infuses the audience with a fast-paced and thoroughly entertaining change of scenery.

Marlene Millar

Montreal filmmaker Marlene Millar created her first award winning film "The Woman and the Sink" in 1989. Since then she has continued to produce acclaimed arts documentaries and dance films with Philip Szporer at their production company Mouvement Perpétuel. Their work has been presented internationally, and combines myriad sources, from dance and stereoscopic animation to public installations. Marlene is deeply committed to promoting the arts and engaging new audiences through a blend of documentary and art filmmaking, as well as exploring emerging technologies.

Millar will be screening her short film, "Lay Me Low" which has received numerous awards including Best of Festival, Third Coast Dance Film Festival; Best Screendance Short, San Francisco Dance Film Festival 2015; Prix Lumière, Cinédanse, Québec; Best of Festival, Utah Dance Film Festival; and Prix spéciale du jury, Des Arts / Des Cinés, Saint Étienne.

Lay Me Low trailer

Gina Ricker + Julie Miller

Raised in Virginia, Julie Miller trained in Europe and completed her dance degree in Scottsdale, Arizona where she also danced with HP Lab. Since moving to NYC has had the pleasure of working with Regina Nejman and Company, Aaron Mcgloin Dance, Lindsey Mandolini, Carte Blanche Dance Performance, Kelley Donovan and Dancers and Caleb Hammond. Gina Ricker is a contemporary dance artist currently based in New York City. She graduated with a 1st Class Honors BA in Contemporary Dance from Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London, UK.

Originally from Arizona, Gina has performed and presented work in the US, UK, and Europe. Valuing authentic and genuine movement, her creative work and movement practice often look into abstracting human relationships and social interaction from various perspectives.

Nadar Rosano

Making his 3rd appearance at Breaking Ground, Nadar Rosano is a dancer and independent choreographer who currently lives in Tel-Aviv. His work has been presented around the world, from Korea to Poland, Cyprus to Germany. He received second prize in the 21st International Dance Competition for Choreography in Hanover, Germany and second prize at the International Dance Competition in Dusseldorf Germany. In 2013 Rosano was invited by the International Artist Razvan Mazilu to create a full evening solo piece for Odeon Theatre in Bucharest, in addition to for that he is invited to Polish Dance Theatre in Poznan to create a new piece which premiered in April 2014.

At Breaking Ground, his work 'Red Belt," commissioned specially for the festival, will be performed by Carley Conder, Artistic Director of Conder/dance.

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