Lizz Roman & Dancers Bring SUNSET DANCES III to San Francisco This Month

Lizz Roman & Dancers perform a new site specific journey entitled “Sunset Dances III”, engaging the architecture of a two story home in San Francisco's Outer Sunset with performance, music and film. On three weekends from September 15 to October 1. The award winning Lizz Roman & Dancers offer performances for a very limited audience. Performed in multiple locations simultaneously with viewers at each location, offering audiences an immersive site experience from different perspectives.

In this Site Specific Journey the context of Roman’s dancers goes beyond a simply charismatic interpretation of performing to break the wall between the audience and the dancer.The perceived “meaning” of dance is in the structure and the way movements are placed next to each other and form relationships, Roman’s dancers bring forth an essence of form and movement in a particular place at a particular moment beginning to define its structure including film and music.

This site performance features composer Jerome Lindner’s original musical score performed live with films by award winning filmmaker Pete Litwinowicz.

“Sunset Dances III” features Dancers Liz Duran Boubion, Erin Coyne, Colin Epstein, Clairey Evangelho, Clarissa K. Ko, Jamie Nakama,Diego Ramil, Daniel Rojas, Hentyle Yapp and Hannah Westbrook.

Lizz Roman’s unique choreographic style has established her as one of California's leading site choreographers.This third part to her award winning SUNSET DANCES: Architectural Meditations II (2017) is performed in multiple locations With “Sunset Dances II”  Lizz Roman & Dancers engaged space and time in a deeply immersive site experience, simultaneously from 3 different perspectives.

Roman and her company have been making dances in San Francisco's dance spaces, local theaters, and outdoor festivals since 1995.  LR&D are best known for their trademark expansive dances that spring, roll, and fly through buildings, resulting in an Isadora Duncan Dance Award (IZZIE) for outstanding choreography in  2017 SUNSET DANCES: Architectural Meditations and  2013 for "DEEPER: Architectural Meditation at CounterPulse" (2012), and a IZZIE nomination for Best Company Performance for CELLGROUND (2005). The company has developed innovative site-specific techniques to work in unique and commonplace locations with a variety of multi-media collaborators and scenic elements. WaterSaw, Roman's most recent music collaborators received an IZZIE Award for Original Music score for 2012's "DEEPER." The SF Butoh Festival and Yerba Buena Gardens Festival commissioned Roman to create a site-specific dance, which premiered at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in 2005, and was remounted again for the 2006 festival season. In 1998, Roman and filmmaker Kevin Cunningham received the SF WEEKLY Black Box Award for Cross-Genre Performance for "IN HER DREAMS."

Lizz Roman & Dancers:

Liz Duran Boubion, MFA, RSMT is a dance-theater artist,  presenter and instructor who has been exploring the impermanent nature of the body and the sustainability of temporal art forms since 2011 under her company name, Piñata Dance Collective. As a Chicana and queer choreographer, Boubion is making a bridge between several communities by placing value on identity, ecology and radical aesthetics through personal narratives, ritual performance and political art intervention. She is the founding Artistic Director of the Festival of Latin American Contemporary Choreographers(FLACC) since 2014.

Erin Coyne is a San Francisco-based dancer, choreographer, and educator. Originally from the Chicago area, Erin graduated from the University of Minnesota with her Masters in Education and dual degree in Dance and Education. Since then, Erin has had the pleasure of performing for Kinetech Arts, FACT/SF and Roseann Baker, while also presenting her own work at various venues throughout Minneapolis, Chicago, and the Bay Area. Her dance film, shift, was an award-winning Dance Film in the 2021 San Francisco Indie Short Film Festival. Most recently, Erin co-produced and directed the dance premiere, A Flight of Movement & Drinks, at Uzay Gallery in February 2023 with a local music producer.

Colin Epstein is a dancer, acrobat, clown, and wears many other hats at various times. He is frequently seen on stage with 13th Floor and Tara Pilbrow Dance; and is absolutely delighted every time he gets to dance with Lizz Roman & Dancers. And hey, check out his podcast - The Roll Report! 

Clairey Evangelho (she/her)  is an emerging dance artist and special educator. Clairey studied various movement forms with Amara Tabor Smith, Katie Faulkner, and James Graham at UC Berkeley where she earned a B.S. in Environmental Justice, Embodiment, and the Sociology of White Science. Clairey’s dance is informed primarily by training in Gaga, Silvestre Technique, Contact Improv, Release techniques, and her own sensory, imaginative, and relational experiences as an autistic person. Clairey also works in Special Education for Oakland Unified School District.

Clarissa K. Ko is a spirited dance artist and educator who encourages supportive and reflective dance spaces for all ages. Clarissa received her BA in Performing Arts and Social Justice from the University of San Francisco and her MSEd in Learning Design and Technology from Purdue University. In recent years she has danced with Lizz Roman and Dancers and 13th Floor Dance Theater in dance films and site-specific work. Through her dance company, Five Feet Dance, Clarissa has presented work at CounterPulse, SAFEhouse for the Arts, Little Boxes Theater, and the Asian Art Museum.

Jamie Nakama is living a passionate life as an anthropology professor, environmental educator, dancer, capoeirista, and yoga teacher. It is through movement that she finds ultimate freedom and joy.  Her diverse movement background includes capoeira, modern, aerial dance, butoh, hula, and African dance.  Jamie performed with various dance companies in Hawaii prior to moving to the Bay Area in 2016.  She started working with Lizz Roman and Dancers in 2017 and is thrilled to be on another creative journey with this amazing group of humans! Creating site-specific dances with Lizz is a constant reminder that life is a dance! 

Diego Ramil is a dancer and musician. This is his first project with Lizz Roman.

Daniel Rojas is originally from SoCal and moved to San Francisco in 2015. He began his dance training at RCC in Riverside in 2013 and has continued to be inspired by all forms of movement. Since then he has worked as a yoga and fitness instructor and continues to dance in SF. Movement is a universal language and he hopes to continue to explore and share his love of movement with those around him.

Hentyle Yapp has danced with companies in New York City and Taipei. This is his first project with Lizz Roman.

Hannah Westbrook is a dancer and dance maker based in Oakland, CA with training rooted in contemporary forms, dance theater, and site-specific dance. She holds degrees from UC Berkeley in Theater, Dance, & Performance Studies and has performed internationally and locally with companies including animi motus, Tim Rubel Human Shakes, Epiphany Dance Theater, Tara Pilbrow and Stephan Koplowitz/AXIS Dance Company. She’s thrilled to be dancing with Lizz Roman & Dancers! www.westbrook.dance 

Musicians-Jerome Lindner, is a San Francisco Native. Jerome began playing guitar at 13 years old. Soon after, he began to accompany Lizz Roman’s dance classes throughout the city. He then went on to compose and perform for Lizz Roman & Dancers, where he won his first Izzy. In 2014 he graduated From Ex’pression College with a Bachelor's Degree of Applied Science. Jerome has since gone on to create music over the past 9 years including composition for projects with LR&D as well as his own music with Andrew Bigs, Malcolm Lee among others.

Malcolm Lee Halcrombe is a San Jose based music producer, engineer, MC, drummer and father. He has drummed with San Jose's Akoma Arts for 7 plus years, studied Afro-Brazilian rhythms and movement with Capoeira Irmandade for 10 plus years, and has operated recording studios for over 12 years. Malcolm's drumming style is rooted in the traditional West African, Afro-Cuban and African American rhythms of the 60's. Malcolm is also a respected teacher in the community hosting many youth classes for drumming, music production and recording all throughout the Bay Area. Malcolm currently runs Wav Haven Music studio in San Jose CA.

Andrew Bigs is an artist and performer from East Side San Jose. Andrew has released 3 albums and many singles over the last 5 plus years, including his most recent album Feel Good Bigs in 2022, a  collaboration album with producer Jerome Lindner. His music ranges in sound from boom-bap and pop to bass-heavy west coast sounds, all tied in with his often raw social commentary and energetic, light hearted feel. Andrew has been on 3 nation wide tours including Warped Tour in 2016. Andrew got his start in performing at open mics around the Bay Area which eventually led him into the SLAM Poetry world where he has competed in multiple national competitions in the early 2010s. Andrew also has a background in acting and film, having directed and produced his own music videos as well as music videos for other artists and sketch-comedy skits. His music and videos can be found on all major platforms. 

Filmmaker Pete Litwinowicz is a choreographer and filmmaker who concentrates on combining both art forms. Pete is a visual effects software developer and artist for the motion picture and video industries. Pete holds several awards including an Academy Award©; an Emmy®, an Ars Electronica Golden Nica (Austria); and an Imagina Award (Monaco) for Best Visual Effects and Visual Innovation. Pete has been the filmmaker for Lizz Roman and Dancers since 2017, worked as co-artistic director of Dance Continuum SF from 2007-2012, and danced for Company Chaddick from 1996-2006.

Lighting designer Clyde Sheets  began working with Lizz Roman & Dancers in 2000 on their work 81/2 X 11 at ODC Theater. This began a run of designing the next 6 shows for Lizz, also doing music for 4 shows (with Alex Kelly and later Jerome Linder). These shows earned critical acclaim, an Izzy Award for the company and a place for CS in the Prague Quadrennial in 2011 for the lighting design of the 2006 show Blue Floor Reflections. Clyde designed the company's work Sunset Dances in 2017 and Sunset Dances II in 2019. Clyde is currently the Director of Interdisciplinary Arts at Interlochen Center for the Arts in Northern Michigan.

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