American Dance Guild Festival Week 6 to Feature Liz Lerman, Alice Teirstein and Doug Varone

Reaching into its archival treasure trove of rarely seen recordings of past events, The American Dance Guild continues their virtual offering 10 Years Over 10 Weeks, a rich collection of video performances of honorees and guest artists over the last ten years of ADG Performance Festivals. The video stream, which runs for ten weeks, features works by 25 dance luminaries from ADG Festivals 2009-2019. Each of the Festival artists appear sequentially by year, running for one week. The live festival has been postponed this year in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The American Dance Guild's 10 Years Over 10 Weeks is available to stream on Vimeo and through the ADG website. The showings are free, with donations welcome. The full 10 Years Over 10 Weeks lineup is below.

NEXT WEEK, Nov. 16 through Nov. 22, the 2020 ADG Virtual Festival will stream WEEK SIX, a special tribute to choreographers Liz Lerman, Alice Teirstein, and Doug Varone, honorees at American Dance Guild Festival 2015. Video footage each week will be live from 10am Monday to 11:59pm Sunday ET. To be shown on WEEK SIX:

Liz Lerman

WHAT IT'S BEEN LIKE: CHOREOGRAPHY AS A WAY OF LIFE

Liz Lerman is a choreographer, performer, writer, educator and speaker, and the recipient of numerous honors, including a 2002 MacArthur "Genius Grant" Fellowship and a 2011 United States Artists Ford Fellowship in Dance. A key aspect of her artistry is opening her process to various publics from shipbuilders to physicists, construction workers to ballerinas, resulting in both research and outcomes that are participatory, relevant, urgent, and usable by others. She founded Liz Lerman Dance Exchange in 1976 and cultivated the company's unique multi-generational ensemble into a leading force in contemporary dance until 2011. She was recently an artist-in-residence and visiting lecturer at Harvard University, and her current work Healing Wars is touring across the US. Liz conducts residencies on the Critical Response Process, creative research, the intersection of art and science, and the building of narrative within dance performance at such institutions as Yale School of Drama, Wesleyan University, University of Maryland - College Park, Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and The National Theatre Studio, among many others. Her collection of essays, Hiking the Horizontal: Field Notes from a Choreographer, was published in 2011 by Wesleyan University Press and released in paperback in 2014.

ALICE TEIRSTEIN

JOURNEY

Choreography/Performers: Young Dancemakers Company 2015
Artistic Director: Alice Teirstein
Music: Steve Reich
Costumes: By the Performers

Voice: Alice Teirstein

Performers: Tyshawn Blount, Nia Bradley, Solomon Cort, Anakeiry Cruz, Reyna Guerra, Jael Harriott, Fahrod Jacelon, Madeleine Lee, Jaidah Mcintosh, Leah Moses, Genesis Perdomo, Jada Pope, Idania Quezada, Venus Scantlebury, Dana Tillyard, Thea Zalabak.

ALICE TEIRSTEIN is a New York dancer, choreographer and award-winning dance educator, including a "Bessie," for distinguished service to the field of dance. This fall she was honored with the Lifetime Achievement Award from the New York State Dance Education Association. As a choreographer/dancer, Alice has created and performed in numerous concerts produced at major dance venues in and out of New York City, including Jacobs Pillow, New York's Dance Theater Workshop, Symphony Space, Joyce Soho, NYU Lowe Theater, Danspace at St. Marks, 92Y, Marymount Manhattan Theater, La Mama ETC, among others. She was a choreographer-in-residence for three seasons at The Yard, in Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Her choreography was presented annually in NYC parks as part of Midsummer Dances, a free summer concert series, which she co-founded in 1984 with grant awards from NYSCA and DCA. She was a Co-Artistic Director of the former Nimbus Dance Theater Company, with Erin Martin and the late Jack Moore. Alice is Founding Director of Young Dancemakers Company, a unique, totally free summer dance ensemble of NYC teens. Read more: http://community.ecfs.org/youngdancemakers/about/the-directors

Doug Varone

LUX

Choreography: Doug Varone
Music: Philip Glass, The Light
Costumes: Liz Prince
Original Lighting Design: Robert Wierzel
Performers (In order of appearance): Alex Springer, Hollis Bartlett, Xan Burley, Casey Loomis, Ryan Yamauchi, Hsiao Jou Tang, Jake Bone, Aya Wilson

LUX premiered on October 19, 2006 in San Luis Obispo, CA and was solely commissioned by the Daniel and Dianne Vapnek Family Fund. It was created, in part, while in residence at Summerdance, Santa Barbara, CA.

Doug Varone is a choreographer of contemporary dance for the concert stage, as well as opera, Broadway, regional theater, and film. He is the Artistic Director of Doug Varone and Dancers which he established in 1986 as an opportunity to explore and process his particular choreographic vision. Doug Varone has become known for his emotionally charged, animated, and distinctive movement style. His incredible ability to tell a non-literal story can be seen in his solo The Fabulist (2014), in which he illustrates the confidence experienced in youth and the vulnerability that comes with aging. Captivated by detail, he is also known for site-specific works, like The Bottomland (2008), which was set in the Mammoth Caves of Kentucky, and featured in PBS's Dance in America series. Commissions include the Limón Company, Hubbard Street, and Batsheva Dance Company. He received an OBIE Award (2006), multiple NEFA National Dance Project grants, a Guggenheim Fellowship (1996), and two individual Bessie Awards (1998, 2007). He is currently on faculty at Purchase College, and the company is in residency at the 92nd Street Y. He received a new commission from the American Dance Festival. Read more: https://www.dovadance.org/

The yearly American Dance Guild Festival is a themed live event which presents over 30 artists of diverse backgrounds, ages and aesthetics ranging from modern to post-modern, to performance art to cultural hybrids. Each year luminaries in dance are recognized with awards of Distinguished Artistry and Lifetime Achievement, and it is these artists who are featured in this special presentation.

The 10 Years Over 10 Weeks full lineup:

October 12-18: Donald McKayle, Erick Hawkins (2009)
October 19-25: Paul Sanasardo, Jane Dudley, Linda Tarnay (2011)
October 26-November 1: Elaine Summers, Dianne McIntyre (2012)
November 2-8: Lar Lubovitch, Marilyn Wood, Remy Charlip (2013)
November 9-15: Joan Myers Brown, Douglas Dunn, Bill Evans (2014)
November 16-22: Doug Varone, Liz Lerman, Alice Teirstein (2015)
November 23-29: Jean Erdman (2016)
November 30-December 6: Garth Fagan, Martha Myers, Thunderbird American Indian/Louis Mofsie (2017)
December 7-13: Jane Comfort, Eleo Pomare (2018)
December 14-20: Jody Gottfried Arnhold, Gus Solomons jr, Abdel R. Salaam (2019)

To view the virtual collection on the above dates, please visit americandanceguild.org or vimeo.com/americandanceguild

"The American Dance Guild holds a unique position as both a promoter of the new and preserver of the living history of modern dance as an art form," said Gloria McLean president of the American Dance Guild. "We are digging into our extensive historical archives for this year's virtual presentation, and the superb artists represented offer an opportunity for students, teachers and researchers as well as the general public to engage in the rich heritage and diverse subject matter of modern dance."

The 2020 American Dance Guild Virtual Performance Festival 10 Years Over 10 Weeks gratefully acknowledges support from Jody and John Arnhold | Arnhold Foundation, The Harkness Foundation for Dance, and The Janis and Alan Menken Charity Fund.

ABOUT THE AMERICAN DANCE GUILD:

The American Dance Guild has served the dance field in many capacities for more than 60 years, including conferences, festivals & publications. The yearly Performance Festival brings together artists from across the nation and internationally for performances and master classes and presents awards for Distinguished Artistry and Lifetime Achievement. ADG's performance opportunities range from gala productions to bare-bones choreography showcases. In June 2014, ADG participated in Jacob's Pillow's Inside/Out program. In addition, ADG provides scholarly resources through its New Dance Group Gala Video and its publications such as Branching Out: Oral Histories of Six National Dance Organizations and Dance Scope.

The American Dance Guild offers an annual summer scholarship to Jacob's Pillow in Becket, MA. ADG supports one-half of the tuition for a gifted young dancer to attend this renowned summer festival.

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