Israel Gone Gaga: Batsheva to the Max

Float. Pull your bones. Smear your flesh on the ground. Connect to your pleasure. Quake. Stretch your face. Find the snake in your spine. Put a good taste in your mouth. Melt. Connect to your form. Take an ice cold shower. Boil like spaghetti. Find your groove. Above all, don’t stop moving. These are some […]

Please Respond: RSVP Cycles in the Work of Anna and Lawrence Halprin

Ann and Lawrence Halprin have been married for over 68 years, and this pair of artists have spent just as long working together. An event this month at the Stern Grove Rhoda Goldman Concert Meadow marks their deepest collaboration yet, informed by decades of experience and experimentation. Ann, who changed her name to Anna in […]

Dancers’ Group: Celebrating 30 Years

To help celebrate Dancers’ Group’s 30th anniversary this year, we have reached out to people to share a special remembrance. Throughout 2012 this publication will carry a few pieces per month, each telling a unique story of the impact our work has had on a variety of artists, educators, writers, and funders. These remembrances paint […]

ORGANIZED CHAOS: Lenora Lee’s Fire of Freedom Tackles PTSD

GROWING FROM A RESIDENCY on the tiny black box stage at The Garage in San Francisco to large-scale site-specific works that incorporate film, martial arts, text, and installation elements, Lenora Lee has created more ambitious works every year. In addition to dance and original music, Lee’s company, founded in 2007, strives to address themes such […]

From Dress-up to Drag

Monique Jenkinson, aka Fauxnique, exudes the demeanor of both a fabulous diva and a humble girl-next-door–at once imagining performance as spectacle and sparkle beyond the norm, while methodically crafting personal, intimate artistic studies, displaying the pretty things she holds dear. As one of the 2012 Irvine Fellows at the de Young museum in San Francisco, […]

Welcome

PLEASE TOUCH ME, IN IMAGINABLE AND UNIMAGINABLE WAYS. This is my wish when entering a new situation, publicly and privately, and it’s also a good mantra. Provocative? Of course, but that’s what makes life interesting, and what artists are charged to do: reframe the situation with risk, spicing it up with surprises, then, potentially, adding […]

the NETWORK project

the NETWORK project addresses human survival and what we truly need– from sustainable living practices to communal engagement and empathy, as we recognize and build our resilience. Considering climate change, and the many other crises we face, the project is inspired by systems of communication, resource-sharing, and survival employed by tree communities, as a lens […]

Reflections: What a Difference a Dance Conference Can Make

Flying from Oakland to Chicago to attend the 16th annual conference of the National Dance Education Organization (NDEO), November 5, 2014, I recalled my maiden voyage to NDEO in 2001. Back then I was the only person from northern California in attendance—and one of only three from the entire state. I felt excited about what was […]

Passing

In 2021 I was hired as an artist in residence at Ruth Asawa School of the Arts (SOTA), a San Francisco high school I graduated from in 2020.

It’s Hard To Say

This is the story of a dancing banana. Try saying it out loud: “Dancing banana.” On the first syllable of “dancing” and the second syllable of “banana” your mouth turns up into a smile.