April 9, 2009

MEDIA CONTACTS: Nick Massella
202-994-3087; massella@gwu.edu
Kirk Kristlibas
202-994-0995; kirkak@gwu.edu

GW'S DEPARTMENT OF THEATRE AND DANCE PRESENTS DANCEWORKS SPRING 2009
APRIL 16 - 18, 2009

EVENT: 

The George Washington University's Department of Theatre and Dance presents DanceWorks Spring 2009, part of the 2008 - 2009 MainStage Season, with performances choreographed by visiting professor Anthony Gongora and guest artists luciana achugar and Cynthia Word and GW students.

WHEN: 

April 16 - 18, 2009; 7:30pm

WHERE: 

The George Washington University
Dorothy Betts Marvin Theatre, Marvin Center first floor
800 21st St., NW, Washington, D.C.
Foggy Bottom-GWU Metro Station (Orange and Blue lines)
 
TICKETS:  

General admission is $15. Admission for GW students and senior citizens is $10.  Tickets are available online at www.theatredance.gwu.edu, by calling 202-994-0995 or at the Dorothy Betts Marvin Theatre Box Office. 

ABOUT THE PERFORMANCES:

Duncan Suite is choreographed by Cynthia Word, Washington, D.C., choreographer, educator, and founder and artistic director of Word/Dance/Theater. Word says of her piece, "Isadora Duncan created these mazurkas (similar to a Polish folk dance) around 1905. Inspired by the gypsies, mazurkas connect us to passion, to the land and the laws of nature - frequent themes in the Duncan oeuvre. With emotions ranging from young girlish flirtation through womanly seduction, these dances require a passionate inner presence wed to the purity and simplicity of the movement."

We're Here For You is choreographed by Brooklyn-based, award-winning Uruguayan choreographer luciana achugar. 

apart is choreographed by visiting professor and concert director of DanceWorks Spring 2009 Anthony Gongora.

Coulrophobia: The Ballad of the Clune is choreographed by Richard Westerkamp, GW junior.   Coulrophobia delves into the dreams of two young girls who are in an abstract world where nothing is as it seems. Through their misadventures, we are presented with the idea of fear, and more specifically, whether we overcome or succumb to our fears.

MetroPULSE is choreographed by Courtney Coughlin, junior. Coughlin says of her piece, "The city he sighs/screams/cries, but in the silence takes hold of your hand. Do the insides of your wrists touch and beat in time, and do you course through veins of concrete, and do you know that you are never alone?"

Mack Hines V. Hugh Mennz (2009) is choreographed by Kadie DelSordo, GW junior, who described the piece as "It was suddenly so clear; the machine would never stop..."

Seventeen Seventy-Five Plus One, E.D. is choreographed by Whitney Fetterhoff, GW junior.

ABOUT THE CHOREOGRAPHERS:

achugar created six independent works, including The Sublime is Us, which premiered at Dance Theatre Workshop in October 2008. Her work has been presented in New York, Cambridge, Mass., and Uruguay at festivals, theatres, dance studios and galleries, including the Ensemble Studio Theatre, Not Festival Project, Klaus von Nichtssagend Gallery, Green Studios and the Festival Iberoamericano de Danza. achugar received a BESSIE Award as creator/choreographer for Exhausting Love at Danspace Project, and in November 2008, she accepted Tere O'Connor's BAX10 "Passing it on Award" as an artist and artists in progress. achugar is a 2008 New York Foundation for the Arts fellow in choreography. She was a 2007 choreography fellow of the Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography at Florida State University and a sugar salon artist, a program developed by WAX in partnership with the Barnard College Department of Dance.

Word received a full scholarship to study choreography at The George Washington University in 1987. After receiving a Master of Fine Arts, she joined GW's Department of Theater and Dance faculty. Word has performed solo works in Washington, D.C., venues and worked with the late modern dance pioneer Eleanor King. Word is a dance education consultant with the Kennedy Center Department of Education and travels nationally and internationally conducting professional development residencies in dance education for teachers in various settings. Word/Dance/Theater was a finalist in the Dance Metro D.C. Awards for Outstanding Emerging Company, and she was a finalist for Outstanding Emerging Choreographer. Word also was selected for WJLA's "Tribute to Working Women" in November 2004.

Gongora has danced in the companies of Loretta Livingston and Dancers, Chicago Repertory Dance Ensemble, Bob Eisen Dance, Mordine & Company and Jan Ekert & Dancers. Gongora has presented his own work nationally and internationally and taught at the Dance Center of Columbia College from 1990-1997. He also was a visiting lecturer at University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana, an associate professor at Illinois Wesleyan and on the faculty of the Chicago Academy of the Arts. He is a recipient of two Illinois Arts Council Fellowships and has received funding from the Chicago Council of Fine Arts, the Unicorn Foundation and the Asheville Arts Alliance.

For more information about the Department of Theatre and Dance, visit www.theatredance.gwu.edu.

For more news about The George Washington University, visit www.gwnewscenter.org.

- GW -