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June 9, 2010

Cincinnati Ballet dancer's visa approved
by Lauren Bishop
June 2, 2010
Cincinnati Enquirer

The Cincinnati Ballet announced Wednesday that the work visa for company member Liang Fu, a citizen of the People’s Republic of China and a rising star in the company, has been renewed by the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service after a delay that threatened his future with the ballet.

Fu twice had been granted a visa for “individual artists of extraordinary ability” that allowed him to work for the Cincinnati Ballet. But when the ballet applied to renew his visa in March, the Immigration Service asked for detailed evidence that Fu has achieved “distinction” through a high level of achievement in his field, substantially above that ordinarily encountered.

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Farewell, My Lovelies: A Ballerina Hangs Up Her Toeshoes
by Claudia La Rocco
June 7, 2010
The New York Times

There are only two dancers in Balanchine’s “Duo Concertant,” and each has some time to think onstage while listening to the pianist and violinist play the opening of its Stravinsky score.

What a torrent must have flooded Yvonne Borree’s mind on Sunday afternoon at the David H. Koch Theater. Surely it included her 1992 performance of the duet, when she was cast alongside Mikhail Baryshnikov (who appeared as a guest artist). That was her first time dancing the role. And Sunday was the last, as Ms. Borree, a principal dancer, retired after 22 years with City Ballet, the same company her mother, Susan Borree, danced in before her.

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The last of Balanchine's ballerinas retires, marking the end of a storied era
by Toni Bentley
June 4, 2010
The Wall Street Journal

The nurses told Darci Kistler that she couldn't go into George Balanchine's hospital room, it was past visiting hours. It was Friday evening, April 29, 1983. He had been in Roosevelt Hospital for many months with endless numbers of doctors and specialists parading in and out of his room, unable to diagnose the 79-year-old choreographer's condition. Ms. Kistler started to cry, sat down the hallway and refused to leave. Finally, one young nurse, who knew Balanchine would want to see her, let her slip into the room.

He didn't talk, but he held her hand and knew who she was, his newest ballerina, age: 18. "There was this incredible man, so intelligent, so wise, who made so many beautiful ballets, such a teacher, a man of such great faith," she recalls, "but I saw fear in his eyes. That is what moved me. He didn't want to go."

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Australian Ballet defies slump for box office bounce
by Michaela Boland
May 27, 2010
The Australian

The Australian Ballet had a 12 percent surge at the box office last year, thanks to increased ticket prices and an additional 15,000 tickets sold in the tough economic climate.

But despite maintaining sponsorship and philanthropic income, and opting for less expensive productions to contain costs, the nation's flagship dance troupe reported a meager surplus of $220,131.

However, AB executive director Valerie Wilder said: "It was a really good year."

According to the company's annual report, published yesterday, audiences in Melbourne increased by 10 per cent to average 81 per cent across the season, and in Sydney they increased 5 per cent to a 91 per cent average.

The problem was with the high cost of staging ballet.

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Encapsulating Cunningham's Legacy
By Robert Greskovic
June 5, 2010
The Wall Street Journal

'Squaregame," a playful, hardly square 1976 dance by Merce Cunningham, has become something of a calling card for the Cunningham Dance Foundation's Legacy Project, which was announced in June 2009 and set in motion by Cunningham's death a month later at 90 after a 65-year choreographic career.

The newly revived "Squaregame" had a private showing this January in New York before becoming part of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company's final two-year Legacy Tour. It represents the efforts of the Dance Capsule, a foundation entity devised to sustain Cunningham's legacy as a dance innovator. MCDC describes the capsule as a "digital package" meant to "preserve Cunningham's work for future generations."

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Keeping the Artists in Williamsburg and Attracting the Bankers
By Christine Haughney
June 7, 2010
The New York Times

Some New Yorkers — no matter how uncreative their jobs and lives may be — love to mention how they live in neighborhoods once romantically settled by poets, painters and musicians.

Developers often talk up these histories when selling apartments.

But while many of them think of artists as place holders for lawyers and investment bankers, Douglas Steiner, one developer struggling to sell units in the vastly overbuilt Brooklyn neighborhood of Williamsburg, is betting it pays to keep artists in the neighborhood even after wealthier buyers move in. He is hoping the deal he struck with the choreographer Elizabeth Streb will help the sales of his $1 million-plus town homes and apartments.

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Purchase College Appoints Dean Of School Of Arts
June 4, 2010

Ken Tabachnick, New York City, has been appointed Dean of the School of the Arts at Purchase College, SUNY. He will begin on July 1.

Mr. Tabachnick has extensive experience in multiple facets of the arts, having worked as an administrator, lighting designer, consultant, producer, and legal counsel. He recently served as General Manager for the New York City Ballet. In this position, he was responsible for managing the largest dance organization in the country, including developing its long-term strategy, cultivating relationships with trustees, and overseeing a $60 million annual budget. His experience as a fundraiser generated approximately $15 million annually to support the New York City Ballet’s operations.

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An Exciting New Online Resource for the Performing Arts
The new NPAC resource website is now live at www.performingartsconvention.org. A vast array of resources in Advocacy, Artists, Education, Diversity and Technology can be found on the site, with more added regularly by NPAC's expert curators. Users are encouraged to share comments, suggestions of additional resources & requests.

Virtual NPAC, our experiment with bringing the performing arts community together online, begins on Monday, June 14 and can be accessed through the NPAC site. VNPAC is a true community site -- it will offer access to sessions from many national conferences along with a platform for conversations across the performing arts. Anyone and everyone can post (through a moderator), so share your conference reports, links, pictures, videos, information sharing and productive discussions with the broad performing arts community nationwide.

Some of Dance/USA's Conference sessions may be streamed to VNPAC, so be sure to check it out!

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Artistic director of American Repertory Ballet is let go as cuts made to budget, performances
by Peggy McGlone
May 29, 2010
The Star-Ledger

Critically acclaimed choreographer Graham Lustig has been let go by the American Repertory Ballet as part of a major restructuring of the financially troubled company.

Lustig, 55, served as artistic director of the New Brunswick-based company for 11 years and had raised the profile of the ballet with new productions and innovative programs. His position — and that of executive director — were eliminated in a cost-cutting move that will also trim the number of performances next season and the number of dancers employed, said Christine Chen, interim managing director.

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Rennie Harris Receives Honorary Doctorate
June 3, 2010

Choreographer Lorenzo “Rennie” Harris received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree at the Bates College 144th commencement ceremony on May 30, 2010.

Founder and Artistic Director of Rennie Harris Puremovement, Harris was one of five honorary degree recipients this year. Honorands included: Dr. James McCarthy, Harvard professor of biological oceanography; Jane Pauley, veteran journalist and television anchor; Elizabeth Strout '77, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist; and Dr. Teresa Woodruff, an obstetrics and gynecology researcher at Northwestern University.

Credited for being one of the first to bring hip hop dance to concert stages around the world, Bates College trustee Geri FitzGerald introduced Harris by stating “he has transformed not just the art of dance, but our very notion of what art is and where it comes from."

Similar to the way he approaches his choreography, Harris delivered a commencement speech filled with his own life experiences. In his speech, Rennie urged the graduates to “remember the three laws of hip hop — individuality, creativity and innovation.” Words he lives by everyday.

Harris was also awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in April 2010.

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Kazuo Ohno, a Founder of Japanese Butoh, Dies at 103
by Jennifer Dunning
June 1, 2010
The New York Times

Kazuo Ohno, a founder of Butoh, the influential Japanese dance-theater form whose traditional look of darkness and decay evoked for many the horrors of the wartime bombings of Japan, died on Tuesday in Yokohama, Japan. He was 103 and had continued to perform beyond his 100th year.

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Stumble for an Awards Show
by Michael Cieply
May 31, 2010
The New York Times

So you think you can dance?

Not unless Robyn Astaire signs off — at least, if you are doing a toe-tap with the name or likeness of Fred Astaire.

Ms. Astaire, the performer’s widow, filed a suit on Friday in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeking to block what she says is unauthorized use of the Astaire name by the coming Fred and Adele Astaire Awards.

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Young Americans Embrace Rigors of the Bolshoi
by Clifford J. Levy
May 31, 2010
The New York Times

The curtain rose on the Bolshoi Ballet’s revival of “Esmeralda,” and soon boys and girls dressed in Renaissance costumes took to the stage, pairing off in a spirited dance that they had learned in the Bolshoi’s own hothouse of an academy.

They were the future of Russian ballet, heirs to centuries of glorious Russian tradition, an elite few who had been chosen from across Russia.

Except, that is, for the one from Montana.

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First-Ever Guidelines for Fiscal Sponsorship Released for Funders and Nonprofit Sector Leaders
April 25, 2010
Tides Center

The National Network of Fiscal Sponsors (NNFS) announced the release of the first ever Guidelines for Fiscal Sponsorship. Fiscal sponsors are nonprofits that enable the movement of resources from funders to projects, ideas, organizations, and activities. Unveiled at the 2010 Annual Conference of Council on Foundations in Denver, the guidelines are of particular value for fiscal sponsors, funders, and nonprofit leaders. The purpose of the new guidelines is to raise awareness and broaden the understanding of fiscal sponsorship and to promulgate standards of best practice in order to improve the field of fiscal sponsorship.

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