Performance Details
The Department of Performing and Media Arts presents:
Share In / Share Out
End-of-Semester Dance Showcase
Predominately student-devised dance works, specifically featuring Cornellians in PMA Dance Studio courses this fall semester: PMA 3241: Site-Specific to Immersive Dance Theater: Choreography for Unconventional Formats and Spaces, PMA 2300: Dance Composition, PMA 2280: Dance Improvisation, and PMA 2221: Contemporary Movement Practices.
The Class of ’56 Dance Studio Theatre, Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts
430 College Avenue
Friday, December 6th, 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, December 7th, 2:00 p.m.
Content Warning: Content warning: Mature themes will be explored in some of the work, including references to sexual violence and rape culture.
Program Note
SHARE IN/SHARE OUT is an end-of-semester showcase of predominately student-devised dance works, specifically featuring Cornellians in PMA Dance Studio courses this fall semester: Choreography for Site-Specific to Immersive Dance Theater, Dance Composition, Dance Improvisation, and Contemporary Movement Practices. This compilation of projects and portfolios is a part of MOVING FORWARD: New Futurism in Installation, Intermedia, Interactive & Immersive Dance, which is a yearlong activation of brand-new, cutting-edge curriculum, curricular and extracurricular events, guest artist exchanges, symposia, and performance and live-action engagements germane to the twenty-first century field of dance and its momentous innovations.
Futurism first emerged in the early twentieth century as an effort to articulate the moxie and acceleration of modern thinking and making, emphasizing groundbreaking technologies and their lasting impact. In 1965, Fluxus co-founder Dick Higgins followed by naming the simultaneous, inter-practice of multiple art mediums, traditions, and genres as “intermedia.” Still an increasingly interdisciplinary field, intermedia is ever-relevant–colliding, propelling, and entangling dance with theater, film, text, music, sound, projection, and scenic design in the emergence of new, redefined stages, studies, materials, methods, and careers in the practice and production of dance.
Embedded in this very legacy–and committed to preparing Cornellians for the realities of their industries and the knowledge and skill sets to shape their futures–the Department of Performing & Media Arts is thrilled to announce the course launch of Choreography for Site-Specific to Immersive Dance Theater (PMA3241) in Fall 2024 and Screendance: History & Practice (PMA2301), alongside mainstay Technology and The Moving Body (PMA3350) in Spring 2025. The 2024-2025 school year also marks the beginning of new curricular and extracurricular collaborations with Michael Byrne–Research and Creative Lead for Tech, Arts, and Culture at Cornell’s technology campus, as well as co-leader for the university’s Milstein Summer Program in Technology and Humanity.
Also in Spring 2025, students enrolled in Rehearsal and Performance (PMA1611, 601) will have the privilege to learn and perform 50 Looks and other iconic repertory by Merce Cunningham for the Annual Spring Dance Presenting Series in the Kiplinger Theatre on April 25 & 26, 2025. The opportunity to be a part of Cunningham’s ‘Events’ offers participants a firsthand experience and an embodied understanding of the historic trajectory for installation and intermedia dance.
In the making of SHARE IN/SHARE OUT, students were asked: What does it mean to move forward? What is the future that you seek? Demand? Desire?
SPECIAL THANKS:
SHARE IN/SHARE OUT would not be possible without the support of our collaborators and community. Thank you to PMA Chair, Dr. Samantha N. Sheppard, and the department’s tremendous staff and production team. And, of course, thank you to our students, whose hearts and visions are at the center of what we do and why we do it.
Department Note
The vision of the Department of Performing and Media Arts is to nurture and mentor artists, performers, writers, and thinkers through the process of event programming. We recognize that all people should see their stories represented, and envision their stories as valuable. We commit ourselves to creating spaces that actively seek to break down systems of oppression based on race, gender, sexuality, class, ability, and place of origin and empower all to be involved. We seek to stimulate thoughtful discussion and enact social change within our productions and our audiences. It is our goal to make our events accessible to the wider Cornell and Ithaca community, to strengthen bonds and engage inquiry, dialogue, and impact around social and cultural expression.
In the 2024-2025 academic year we will help realize a wide range of students’ creative projects, from original plays, to solo performances, to readings, to choreographies, to acting, directorial, and curatorial projects. We are particularly happy that in addition to supporting live performances, we are now also supporting the production of student films. Enjoy the shows!
Winter & Spring 2025 Dance Courses
January 2025
PMA 3214, Dance in America examines genres such as hip hop, salsa, modern dance, and ballroom as we develop the tools necessary for viewing dance, analyzing it, and understanding its place in larger social, cultural, historical, and political structures. No previous dance experience necessary. MTWRF 12:35pm - 3:45pm Online Meeting. Jan 2 - Jan 17, 2025 (3 Credits)
Spring 2025
PMA 1611, Rehearsal & Performance is a project course for students interested in participating in the full production of the Annual Spring Dance Presenting Series in the Kiplinger Theatre on April 25 & 25, 2025. In addition to brand-new choreographies by faculty, students will have the privilege to learn and perform 50 Looks and other iconic repertory by Merce Cunningham under the direction of Patricia Lent of The Merce Cunningham Trust and esteemed company alumnus. Predominately Fridays, 1:00pm – 4:30pm (1 to 3 credits)
PMA 2220, Modern Dance Technique is a studio immersion course for training in modern concert dance techniques and methodologies. This class is open to all levels as we delve into community building through the act of dancing. Monday/Wednesday 2:30-4:25 (2 credits)
PMA 2300, Dance Composition is a design studio course to explore, experiment, and hone fundamental skills for original dance-making in solo, duet, and collaborative group projects, delving into methods for personal expression, storytelling, sequencing, abstraction, musicality, and artistic leadership. Wednesdays, 7:30pm – 10:00pm (3 credits)
PMA 2301, Screendance explores the evolving relationship between choreography and cinematography. We will examine various aesthetic approaches to the form. No previous dance experience necessary. M/W 2:55-4:10pm (3 Credits)
PMA 3210, Classical Dance Technique is a studio course for the practice and performance of classical concert dance techniques, principles, and philosophies, including but not limited to the Cecchetti and Vaganova ballet methods as germane to the 21st century. Tuesdays & Thursdays, 4:50pm – 6:30pm (2 credits)
PMA 3350, Technology and the Moving Body is a studio course that uses tools of digital technology and basic composition principles to design and create digital realities for the body to relate to or be the leading character in. The primary goal is to assist each student in locating an artistic point of view in relationship to design and the relationship between the body and technological modalities. Wednesday 7:30-10:00 pm (3 credits)
Contributing Faculty
Juan Manuel Aldape Muñoz (Ph.D.) is an Assistant Professor at Cornell University, Department of Performing and Media Arts, with research and teaching expertise in critical dance studies, (im)migration, and Latinx cultural production. In addition to writing about performance’s role in transforming society and ideas of citizenship, he’s a choreographer and dancer whose work has been presented internationally. He’s the former managing director of San Francisco’s Festival of Latin American Contemporary Choreographers. He is a 2024 writer and artist-in-residency at the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography (MANCC). He sits on the Board of Directors for the Dance Studies Association.
Olive Prince is a Visiting Lecturer in Dance at Cornell University working with students in Contemporary Movement Practices, Improvisation, Composition, and Technology and the Moving Body. Prince works with dancers to develop movement originating from deep explorations with literature and poetry, combined with imagistic physical tasks, phrase work, and improvisational parameters. The creative process is frequently a “playground” of experimentation that calls upon risk, vulnerability, and transformation. Prince has been commissioned to create dance for many Philadelphia companies and colleges including site-specific work in the Blackwell Library at William Smith College, the Philadelphia Museum of Arts, Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens (a mosaic art garden), and the Iron Factory. Prince’s work has been presented at the International Night of the Singapore Youth Festival, Triskelion Arts Center (NYC), the Philadelphia International Festival of the Arts, the Live Arts Festival (PHL), the International Contemporary Dance Conference, New Dance Alliance’s Performance Mix Joyce Soho, the CEC Resident Artist Series, the nEW Festival and the Philadelphia Fringe Festival among others. Most recently, her work was featured in an interview on WHYY’s piece “Articulate with Jim Cotter” and she was 2023 recipient of NYS Choreographer’s Initiative Grant. As a veteran Philadelphia performer, she worked as a company member with Kun-Yang Lin/Dancers, and Merian Soto for over a decade as well as Silvana Cardell Dance Theater and Group Motion. Her performance credits include touring internationally in Taiwan, Singapore, Germany and Indonesia as well as nationally at the Lincoln Center Outdoors Festival, Battery Park Dance Festival, Joe’s Pub, Interlaken Arts Festival, and throughout Philadelphia. Prince received her MFA in dance and choreography from Temple University and worked as an Assistant Teaching Professor at Drexel University uplifting student’s artistic practices.
Danielle Russo is an Assistant Professor of the Practice (Dance & Critical Dance Studies) at Cornell University. Her creative and scholarly research concentrates on dance/performance and interactive technologies for unconventional ‘stages’ and environments, frequently in the public realm and through socially engaged praxes. As a choreographer, she has been presented nationally at the American Dance Festival, Detroit Institute of Arts, Jacob’s Pillow, Lincoln Center for Performing Arts at Damrosch Park, The Oculus at the World Trade Center, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and The Yard; and internationally in Austria, Belgium, Canada, France, Italy, Mexico, Panama, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, and Trinidad and Tobago. Residency and fellowship awards have included C.N.N. - Ballet de Lorraine (FR), Danscentrum Jette (BE), Nadine Laboratory for the Contemporary Arts (BE), Independent Artists Initiative WUK (AT), Jonah Bokaer Arts Foundation (US), LEIMAY (US), Mana Contemporary (US), Performing Arts Forum (FR), and Springboard Danse Montréal (CA), among others. She is a multi-year grant recipient of NYC Department of Cultural Affairs through the Brooklyn Arts Council (BAF, LAS), Carnegie, Dance/NYC, Harkness Foundation for Dance, One Brooklyn Fund, and the Foundation for Contemporary Arts. She is a proud grant recipient of the Cornell Council for the Arts and Society for the Humanities, as well as the Arthur C. and Molly Phelps Bean Faculty Fellowship. Driven by social and civic impact, she has been creative placemaking and producing large-scale performances and experiential artwork in architectural, historical, and politically-charged settings since founding Danielle Russo Performance Project/DRPP in 2010 (www.drpp.nyc). With an emphasis on the intersection of local arts and public access, DRPP aims to bridge existing gaps between live arts curation and the larger, multi-cultural milieu that is New York—its homebase. Highlights include Armory Arts Week, Julian Schnabel’s Casa del Popolo, Governors Island, HERE Arts Center, The High Line Nine, La MaMA (fabNYC), LMCC River to River with Amy and Jennifer Khoshbin, Moynihan Station, Place des Arts, and Solange Knowles’s Saint Heron, to name a few. Outside of her own devising, Russo danced with The Metropolitan Opera for several seasons. Prior to arriving at Cornell, she was faculty at NYU Tisch School of the Arts, SUNY Purchase Conservatory of Dance, CUNY Queens College, University of Iowa, and The Joffrey Ballet School BFA and Professional Divisions.