The Field/Philadelphia Celebrates 10 Years of Growing the Arts
Philadelphia, PA -- The Field/Philadelphia celebrates 10 years of “Growing the Arts,” providing service to the Philadelphia arts community with an alumni performance event to benefit the Community Education Center/CEC. The Field is a NYC based artists service organization which offers a number of programs that serve the NYC artists community and sponsors the national Field Forward Network, a consortium of artists, administrators, and organizations in 15 U.S. cities. The Field/Philadelphia is part of the national network of performing artists and offers the Field’s core program Fieldwork workshop. In the workshop, artists of any discipline meet to show works-in–progress, give and get feedback guided by a trained facilitator with specific guidelines developed by Field artists.
The CEC which is celebrating 35 years of service to the community has been a frequent partner with the Field/Philadelphia, serving as a venue for many workshops and culminating performances, a relationship which prompted longtime Fieldwork coordinator and local dancer/performance artist Renee Banson to organize the fundraiser on behave of the CEC. Banson along with assistant Fieldwork coordinator Karl Schappell, who is a performance artist, will serve as host for the performance event and fundraiser. Featured artists will include: Kali Colton, Della Cowall, Erin Foreman-Murray, Nora Gibson, Annie Hart, Martina Plag, Makoto Hirano and Jamil Gaines, Charles Tyson, Mary LaBianca, Jennifer McGinn, and Kristen Shahverdian. Along with the wide variety of dance and performance works, both evenings will feature a display a Fieldwork memorabilia, i.e., program, flyers, etc., as well as a reception following the performances. Performances are Saturday, April 12th at 8pm and Sunday, April 13th at 3pm at the CEC Meeting House Theatre. Ticket at the door will be $10, with all proceeds going to the CEC.
For further information and reservations contact the CEC at 215 387-1911, and see our website at www.cecarts.org. Photos available on request.
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ABOUT the ARTISTS:
Kali Lela Colton is a clown and filmmaker who has worked extensively as creator and collaborator on original works for theatres, art galleries, city streets, school auditoriums and community centers. Kali won an Emerging Artist Award from Franklin Furnace for their inaugural season on the Pseudo Online Network which premiered her creation myth “Mama is blue. Pop is red. Girl is green?” also featured on the Parsons CD-ROM “The History of the Future. Other highlights include keynote performer and panelist for The Furniture Society Conference 2003, presenter at Kutztown Diversity Fest 2005, Performance In An Intimate Space Award from Community Education Center, curator and host of the Virgin Bride Cabaret, and “My Job Is Hard or Lots of People Call Me (on the phone, to make dates)” featured in Tapestry Theatre's Female Funny Fest and the New York Downtown Clown Revue. Kali has studied with Master Teachers David Shiner, Antonio Fava and Ronlin Foreman. Kali is a PTP certified graduate of Dell’ Arte International School of Physical Theatre and a Lotta M. Crabtree Trusts scholarship winner. Current projects include a remounting of the Barrymore award- winning “Pay Up” with Pig Iron Theatre Company in Montclair, NJ and “The Misandrist,” a short featuring and written by Kali to be filmed this summer in New Mexico. Colton with perform “FIASCOSCURO,” described as a one-person love story.
Erin Foreman-Murray is a dancer and independent choreographer based in Philadelphia since receiving her BFA in modern dance from Temple University. Recently Erin has had the pleasure of showing her choreography as part of Fresh Juice in the Philadelphia Fringe Festival as well as at the Movement Research Open Performance Series (NYC), the FAR Space with Limina Projects (NYC), the Glue Performance Series, In Flux, and Current. Erin currently dances for Michelle Stortz/Ring Dance Theater, Meg Foley/Moving Research, and Roko Kawai. She is the coordinator of Philly Dance COSMOS, a new community-supported dance class series that provides professional development opportunities to contemporary dancers and helps to make teaching dance a more viable employment option for dance artists. She is also a member artist of the Mascher Space Cooperative, a collectively run studio and performance space for independent dance artists and a home for new dance in Philadelphia. In the spirit of Fieldwork, Murray will present new experimental solo work.
Nora Gibson is a Philadelphia based dancer/choreographer whose training spans classical ballet to post-modern improvisation. Nora has had the privilege of dancing for PATH Dance Company in Baltimore, MD under the direction of Kathy Wildberger, for Andrew Marcus Dance in New York, NY, and most recently with Jeffrey Gunshol in Philadelphia's 2008 nEW Festival. She has performed her own work in Philadelphia and throughout NYC at various downtown venues such as P.S. 122, St. Marks Church, and DIA Center for the Arts. She will be premiering the full-length version of "Net Worth" in the 2008 Philadelphia Fringe Festival. Nora holds a BFA from Tisch School of Dance at NYU where she performed in the works of Elisa Monte, Mark Morris, and others. Gibson will perform a solo, an excerpt from "Net Worth," a white-collar fable for dance and art installation that speaks of personal worth in relation to ambition.
Annie Hart has been featured on TV, Radio and at Conferences. The magic of Hart's true-life stories come from the pain and challenges of real life. She mixes tenderness with fun, humor with whimsy to create dramatic. Hart will perform "Weapons of Female Destruction" - High heels, hose and lipstick! a whacky adventure with a pitiful protagonist and a kick-ass Love Goddess.
Makoto Hirano and Jamil Gaines will perform a work-in-progress spoken word/theatre collaboration.
Makoto Hirano is a Philadelphia-based dance and theatre artist, writer, consultant, and aspiring wood-carver/master carpenter. His works have been presented by numerous venues and festivals including Yale University and Off-Broadway through the National Asian Arts Theater Festival. Performer/collaborator credits include two works with Obie Award-winning Pig Iron Theatre Company, and three collaborations with Subcircle.
Jamil Gaines is a visual, literary, and performance artist native to the South Jersey/Southeast Pennsylvania corridor. A 2004 Graduate of Temple University’s Communications program, he finds a continued creative outlet producing independent films with colleagues at Dellavision Productions, having produced award-winning short films, such as Off White (2005 Best Action Film, Filmerica Challenge) and Make-Up of a Man (2006 Best Comedy Film and Top 15 film, National Film Challenge).
Mary LaBianca recently moved to the Philadelphia area after working as a teacher and choreographer in the San Francisco Bay area. She completed an interdisciplinary undergraduate degree from the UNC-Asheville and received her MFA in Choreography and Performance from Mills College in Oakland, California. She is currently teaching, choreographing and pursuing her CMA certification. LaBianca will perform a multi media dance piece entitled “pursuant of happiness,” that was inspired by readings on evolution and human transformation.
Jen McGinn is a choreographer and teacher who recently moved to Philadelphia to co-found map dance collective (http://www.myspace.com/mapdancecollective). She received her B.A. and an M.F.A. from Hollins University in dance and arts management. She currently serves as the arts administrator at the Rock School for Dance Education.
McGinn will present her chorographic work entitled “Both Members of a Grecian Couple,” performance by dancers Ashley Anderson, James McGinn, and Danielle Paloumpis.
Martina Plag / studium - praxis is originally from Germany and trained as an architect. She creates puppetry for adult audiences to address contemporary issues and advocate social change and awareness. In 2006 she was awarded a prestigious two-year Theatre Communication Group’s New Generations: Mentorship Program grant. Her masks, puppets and automata have been in juried exhibitions and she has been awarded three residencies for her work. Martina has designed puppets, sets and prototypes for Mum Puppettheatre, Philadelphia, PA, Gas & Electric Arts, Philadelphia, PA, Slingback Productions, New York, NY, The Children’s Theatre Company, Minneapolis, MN and the International Opera Theater in Città della Pieve, Italy. Her experimental short film, mantra, was chosen to participate at the 2006 Philadelphia International GLBT Film Festival. The Eugene O’Neill Theatre Puppetry Conference showed her live and film puppet performances this past June. May 2008 will have her performing a toy theatre piece on Emma Goldman at Philadelphia's DaVinci Art Alliance. studium - praxis will perform “out of the shadows” with performers – Corbin Abernathy, Kim Carson, Susan DiPronio, Elizabeth Filios, James Mullahy and Martina Plag.
Kristen Shahverdian an independent performer and choreographer has worked with several Philadelphia choreographers. She received a MFA in dance from Temple University and BA in history and dance from Hamilton College. Her work has been presented in the New Edge Mix, Philadelphia Live Arts Festival, Walt Whitman Center, Glue Performance Series, Joyce SoHo, and the Philadelphia/Poland project. Shahverdian with Jacelyn Biondo are react/dance. They will perform “nude as the news.”
Charles Tyson is artistic director and founder of Underground DanceWorks (UDW), an Eclectifunk-based dance company in Philadelphia. He is also the artistic director of the ETC. Performance Series at the University City Arts League (UCAL) in West Philadelphia. Charles received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in dance from Temple University in the summer of 2000. His work has been performed, viewed and loved all over Philadelphia as well as Atlantic City, San Diego, Los Angeles, New York City and Wuhan, China. In 2003, Charles and UDW were awarded the "Incubator for Talented Youth Award" by the Atlantic City Dance Theatre. His performance credits include: Persona Zenobia Dance Ensemble, Kariamu & Company: Traditions, Paule Turner, Tania Isaac, Sean Curran, Michael Roberts, A.D.D. Dance Company, New LEJA Dances, the Company, Dancefusion, International Ballet Theatre, The Philadelphia Civic Ballet Company, The Brooks-Lytle Jazz Ensemble, Anne-Marie Mulgrew & Dancers Company and Stephen Welsh and Dancers. Charles is also an actor, poet, comedian, playwright, filmmaker and aspiring novelist. He is currently on faculty at the Gwendolyn Bye Dance Center, UCAL, First Position Movement Arts Center and Dance Arts where he teaches jazz, hip hop and EclectiFunk. For more about Charles, UDW or the ETC. Performance Series visit: www.myspace.com/eclectifunk & www.myspace.com/etcseries. The company will perform Sated which is based on an original short story written by Charles Tyson Jr. The work depicts a day in the life of the nymphs at play.
Release Date: Tuesday, March 25th 2008
