Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company Announces Final Month of The Bridge Programming (FREE)
Company:
Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company
Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company announces Final Month of Programming for
The Bridge Virtual Dance Institute of boundary-breaking dance experiences
Free One-Hour Company Classes on Zoom and In Person
Open to All Dancers at an Intermediate to Advanced Level
Every Monday & Wednesday in February 2023
Dancers interested in attending the virtual session can join the class by registering HERE.
For February's hybrid classes, aimed at professional dancers, interested participants can register HERE.
The Bridge Class schedule:
Monday, February 13, 2023 | Tino Zoccoli-Mayers (Yoga) at 10am ET
Tino teaches Yoga class focusing on restorative practices to prevent and heal injuries in dancers and athletes. They pair Vinyasa and Yin yoga–"Vin and Yin"–to stretch, condition and heal the aerobic anatomical system. S/he will help students prepare, simply, wherever they practice, a psycho-somatic space and body consciousness for the gentle, extended cool-down with Yin yoga, invented by multi-cultural American yogis along the Pacific Ocean coast to incorporate Zen and Chinese Medicine. Please prepare when possible: a yoga mat; blankets/towels; 2 yoga blocks (or: books, soup cans); a yoga strap (or: fabric belt, towel) and any other soothing or healing object.
Wednesday, February 15, 2023 | Kerry Lee (Chinese Dance) at 10am ET
Kerry Lee will be teaching basic movements in Chinese Dance. She will draw ideas from the classical and ghe folk styles, as well as movement ideas from the time she spent with Nai-Ni Chen.
Monday, February 20, 2023 | Layla Ogasawara (Belly Dance) at 10am ET
This class will combine yoga and strengthening exercises, followed by isolation and belly dance combinations.
Monday, February 27, 2023 | Rio Kikuchi (Gyrokinesis) at 10am ET
Gyrokinesis® is a slow, fluid, exercise practice based on the natural elements of spinal movement. By gently working the joints and muscles through rhythmic and undulating movements, coupled with calming breathing patterns, the exercises stimulate the body's internal organs while corresponding breathing patterns stimulate the nervous system, open up energy pathways, and oxygenate the blood.
In this trying time of change and uncertainty, the arts are a source of healing and unity, we would like to encourage everyone to support dance as dance is an essential medicine for the society to recover from the pandemic that has caused injury to our bodies and our hearts. Support for The Bridge can be sent through nainichen.org/donate.
In the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company established a new dance institute through Zoom, The Bridge. As the world has continued re-opening, The Bridge has evolved, with the introduction of hybrid classes. Now that dancers can once more safely practice in person, The Bridge will close at the end of February. Interested dancers can still participate in Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company's in-person community classes this summer and fall, which will continue to include hybrid options to allow dancers around the world to stay involved.
As a dance institute, The Bridge invites world renowned as well as up and coming dancers and choreographers to come to guest teach the class. Advanced/Intermediate level professional or pre-professional dancers who are looking to explore beyond their own boundaries and looking for new dance experiences are encouraged to participate. The core program is based on Nai-Ni Chen's Kinetic Spiral, which is a cross-cultural dance vocabulary that integrates the Chinese martial arts philosophy in TaiChi with contemporary dance practices she studied in America. Guest artists will cover a wide range of folk and classical dance styles.
The Institute's aim is to bring together dancers, choreographers and directors around the world to experience the master teachers of color whose practices are embedded in the community and are focused on advancing the art of dance that transforms the personal, environmental and metaphysical spaces.
About the Artists:
Katy Alaniz Barnhill is a San Francisco native who, over the last quarter century, has studied over 30 forms of cultural dance in addition to ballet, contemporary, jazz, and hip-hop. She received a scholarship to San Francisco Ballet for 10 years then attended high schools of the arts in San Francisco and Los Angeles. She expanded her study of cultural dance with Pdt. Chitresh Das (Kathak of India), Vladimir Riasantsev (Russian Character), El Farruquito (Flamenco), and received her BA in World Arts and Cultures from UCLA. Katy has danced with Deli Ritmo (Flamenco), Mora Reyna (Belly Dance), Ballet Afsaneh (Central Asian), Nai-Ni Chen (Chinese), Simorgh (Farima Berenji/ Persian), FAL Danse (Laure Fleurentin/ Haitian) As a Pasista in Rio Carnaval (Samba), Ballet Casquelourd (Congolese), Siete Potencias (Cuban), and a pre- covid DanceHall intensive in Kingston Jamaica (Belleh23ja).
Greta Campo is the Artistic Director of the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company. She began her dance training in her native Milan at the Carcano Theater, where she was first introduced to Martha Graham's work. She performed with the Martha Graham Dance Company in their 2012 New York Season and later on their international tour. Greta is a recipient of the 2016 Rising Star Award from the Fini Dance Festival.
Andy Chiang has been a lifelong practiioner of martial arts, he had a black belt in Karate when he was 18, then joined the Wu Tang organization based in Taiwan to study Shaolin and Tai Chi. He is Nai-Ni Chen's partner and the Executive Director of the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company.
Born in Tokyo, Japan. At age of 3, Rio Kikuchi began ballet training at Studio Benus in Japan and later she was introduced to Tap and Jazz. She studied in the Summer Intensive at Kirov Academy of Ballet of Washington, DC in 2015. She also studied Ballet technique and Point work privately with Luis Villanueva. In 2017, Rio moved to New York and was granted a Scholarship to study at The School of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. In addition, she received a Scholarship to Alonzo King Lines Ballet's Summer Program in 2019. She performed with Alvin Ailey Dance Theater at New York City Center in 2018. A member of the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company, Rio is also a certified Gyrokinesis® instructor.
Seyong Kim, Assistant Professor at Western Michigan University, holds an MA in Dance Education from NYU. He is a Certified Movement Analyst, a Registered Somatic Movement Educator, and an ABT® Certified Teacher. He has taught in Rutgers University, Kent State University, Randolph College, Peridance, and Charlottesville Ballet. He has professionally worked with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet, Albania National Ballet Theatre, Baltimore Ballet, Neglia Ballet, Oakland Ballet, Traverse City Dance Project, TAKE Dance, and Landestheater Coburg Germany.
Kerry Lee is the Co-Artistic Director of the Atlanta Chinese Dance Company and a former principal dancer of the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company. After graduating from Stanford University with an engineering degree and working for a top-ranked economic consulting firm, she followed her heart into the professional dance world in New York City. As a traditional Chinese and modern/contemporary dance artist, Kerry performed throughout the US and the British Virgin Islands with the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company, H.T. Chen & Dancers, Dance China NY, and gloATL before returning home to co-lead the Atlanta Chinese Dance Company with her mother Hwee-Eng Y. Lee. Among other honors, Kerry was the only Chinese dancer among the finalists who received a ticket on So You Think You Can Dance Season 11. www.kerryylee.com
Yuri Ogasawara (Layla) moved to US at the age of 18, received MA in Art Administration in State University of NY. Former training in classical piano since age of 5, music was always main source of inspiration. She has traveled around the world on her own and enchanted into the world of ancient Orient / Middle East and started to study dance with Elena Lentini and Andrea Beeman at Fazil's. Currently she has been the original member of Dancing Rubies under Andrea Beeman's Oriental / Middle Eastern dancing ensemble, which has performed various festivals throughout NYC areas. She also create her own dance works corroborating with various artists presenting in art events.
First trained in 2012 to teach aerobic, "flowing" Vinyasa yoga with the NYC-based Yoga to the People at their San Francisco and Berkeley, California studio locations, Tina "Tino" Zoccoli-Mayers finds a symbiotic relationship between dance, yoga, meditation and movements. Tino's first full-time job was dancing in the Washington Ballet's Studio Company 2004-5 in our capital. Next, as an honor's student at Stanford University, CA, they were blessed to meet the West Coast, postmodern dance pioneer, Anna Halprin, and later danced at her famed "Mountain Home Studio" outside over the redwood forests of Marin County, CA. Currently, Tino continues to transition in modern and postmodern dancing, using writing, film, and New Genre studies to heal from chronic illness with art and dance therapies. They debuted their human-rights-awareness, Japanese movement theater solo, "S/he, or S/hekinah" with Vangeline's Queer Butoh 18 on the Lower East Side, NYC.
About Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company:
"Chen's phrases, part exoskeletal rigidity, part boneless grace, embodied an epic dignity."
- Village Voice
Choreographer/Dancer, Nai-Ni Chen, was a unique artist whose work crosses cultural boundaries. Each of her dances reflect her personal vision as an immigrant and an American female artist with deep roots in the Asian culture. From this very personal perspective, she created new works that reflect current issues with global influences. Some of her works were developed in collaboration with renowned artists such as the Ahn Trio, Glen Velez, Joan La Barbara, and the members of the New Asia Chamber Music Society.
Bridging the grace of Asian elegance and American dynamism, the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company is a premier provider of innovative cultural experiences that reflect the inspiring hope and energy of the immigrant's journey. The company's ground-breaking works have focused on themes from ancient legends that reflect issues of the present time to purely abstract, contemporary dances influenced by a mix of cultures Nai-Ni Chen experienced in New York. An Asian American company that celebrates cross-cultural experience, the Company's productions naturally bring forth issues of identity, authenticity, and equality.
The Company has presented at some of the most prestigious concert halls such as the Joyce Theater, Lincoln Center in New York, and the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center in Florida. The Company appears annually at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Queens College, the College of Staten Island and on Ellis Island. Internationally, the Company has presented at international festivals including Open Look Festival in Russia, the Silesian International Contemporary Dance Festival, the Konfrontations International Festival in Poland, the Chang Mu International Dance Festival in Korea, the Meet in Beijing International Arts Festival in China, and the Tamaulipas International Arts Festival in Mexico.
The Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company has received more than 20 awards from the National Endowment for the Arts and numerous Citations of Excellence and grants from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. Advancing Dance Education, the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company is currently in residence in New Jersey City University pioneering a program with the University's A Harry Moore Laboratory School teaching dance to urban children with disabilities. For additional Company information, visit their website, www.nainichen.org; write to Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company, P.O. Box 1121, Fort Lee, NJ 07024; or call (800) 650- 0246. Programs of the Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company are made possible by the generous support of our Board members, the National Endowment for the Arts, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts/Department of State, a Partner Agency of the National Endowment for the Arts, The Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation (MAAF), the New Jersey Cultural Trust, the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature, The New Jersey Arts and Culture Recovery Fund administered by the Princeton Area Community Foundation, the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, the Hyde and Watson Foundation, E.J. Grassman Trust, The Horizon Foundation for New Jersey, New Music USA, the Blanche & Irving Laurie Foundation, Dance/NYC Dance Advancement Fund, the Rapid Response Program of American Dance Abroad, the Association of Performing Arts Presenters' Cultural Exchange Fund, supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, PSEG, Proskauer, WAC Lighting, and the Glow Foundation and the Dragon and Phoenix Foundation.
