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MOVEMEDIA

Students in KCAD’s Pamella Roland DeVos School of Fashion KCFS 320 Construction IV course worked directly with Grand Rapids Ballet and choreographer Penny Saunders to create the costumes for the Ballet’s MOVEMEDIA Program II. Get an inside view of the process!

Sponsors

  • Tickets

    Tickets $12-$25
    Ballet Box Office
    (616) 454-4771

  • Dates

    Program I: March 13-15, 2015
    Program II: April 16-17 & 19, 2015

  • Location

    Peter Martin Wege Theatre
    341 Ellsworth SW

Choreographers

Program I

Andrew Bartee

Choreographer

Andrew Bartee is from Everett, Washington. He studied on scholarship at Pacific Northwest Ballet School and attended summer courses at Pacific Northwest Ballet School and the School of American Ballet. He was the first recipient of the Flemming Halby Exchange with the Royal Danish Ballet School and a 2007 Princess Grace Award recipient. Bartee joined Pacific Northwest Ballet as an apprentice in 2008 and was promoted to corps de ballet in 2009. He has performed leading roles in such ballets as George Balanchine’s The Four Temperaments, Peter Boal’s Giselle, Val Caniparoli’s The Seasons, Ulysses Dove’s Red Angels, Mark Morris’ A Garden, and Kent Stowell’s Cinderella and Nutcracker. Bartee performs regularly with the contemporary dance ensemble Whim W’Him. Read more…

Sagi Gross

Choreographer

Educated at The Dutch National Ballet Academy in Amsterdam, Bat-Dor Dance Academy and Tellma Yellin High School for the Arts in Tel-Aviv. During his studies, he won five scholarships for both choreography and dancing from the American-Israel Sharet Foundation. As a dancer, he has worked with Bat-Dor Dance Company, The Israeli Opera House, Dede Dance Company, The Netherlands Opera House in Amsterdam, De Dutch Don’t Dance Division The Hague and Resextansa Company in Bari, Italy. As a choreographer, Gross received a large international exposure and his choreographies have been performed in South Korea, England, Belgium, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, France, Austria and Israel. Read more…

Gina Patterson

Choreographer

Since 1998, Ms. Patterson has created over 80 original works, 10 of them full-evening productions, for companies including VOICE, Atlanta Ballet, Cincinnati Ballet, Nashville Ballet, Richmond Ballet, MADCO, Hubbard Street 2, CoDa21, Ballet Austin, Ballet Concierto, Ballet Florida, Dayton Ballet, BalletMet, DanceWorks Chicago, Imagery, Ballet Pacifica, Ballet East, Interlochen Arts Academy, Point Park University, Goucher College and the University of Iowa. Her ballets have been presented internationally in Italy, Germany, Slovenia, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, and Spain. She is in demand as a master teacher and coach and since 2009 has been the artistic director of VOICE Dance Company, a project-based laboratory for her work. Read more…

Musician

Peter Bradley Adams

Original music composed for Gina Patterson’s To the River

Originally from Birmingham, Alabama, Peter Bradley Adams was one half of the duo, Eastmountainsouth, signed by Robbie Robertson (The Band) to Dreamworks records in 2003. Adams has since released five solo records, as well as an EP for his duo project, Down Like Silver. His latest release, The Mighty Storm, was named by iTunes as one of the top 10 best singer/songwriter albums of 2014. Adams received a Master’s in Composition from the University of Alabama School of Music, as well as an advanced degree in Film Scoring from the University of Southern California School of Music. His songs have appeared in numerous films and television shows, including “Something Borrowed”, Cameron Crowe’s “Elizabethtown”, “Everybody’s Fine” (starring Robert Deniro), Alias, The Mentalist, One Tree Hill, The Fosters, Revenge, New York Med, So You Think You Can Dance, and many more.

Choreographers

Program II

210rsd,Susan Jaffe,headshots

Susan Jaffe

Choreographer

Declared by the New York Times as “America’s Quintessential American Ballerina” Susan Jaffe danced as a principal dancer with American Ballet Theatre for 20 years, a career which began in 1980. Prominent in the international dance scene as well, her European engagements included performances with The Royal Ballet, The Kirov Ballet, The Stuttgart Ballet, The Munich State Opera Ballet, La Scala Ballet in Milan, The Vienna State Opera Ballet, The Royal Danish Ballet, The Royal Swedish Ballet, and The English National Ballet. Ms. Jaffe’s versatility as a dancer allowed her to tackle a large range of choreographic works which included her acclaimed interpretations of the classics like Swan Lake, as well as the dramatic works of John Cranko, Antony Tudor, Agnes de Mille and Kenneth MacMillian. She also worked with and danced the works of many prominent choreographers such as Jiri Kylian, Twyla Tharp, George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, Lar Lubovitch, Nacho Duato, Roland Petit, David Parsons, Mark Morris, Merce Cunningham, Ronald Hynd, Frederick Ashton, Ulysses Dove and Lynn Taylor Corbett. Read more…

Andrea Schermoly

Choreographer

Andrea Schermoly (Andi) was born in South Africa where she first started training at the National School of the Arts in Johannesburg under the direction of Vyvyan Llorayne. She received a full scholarship to Rambert Ballet and Contemporary School in London and shortly thereafter a full scholarship to The Royal Ballet School in London, where she completed her dance education. After graduation, she joined Boston Ballet Company. While dancing in Boston, she danced leads in ballets ‘Ginastera’ by Rudi van Dantzig and ‘Sharp Side of Dark’ by Jorma Elo. She was invited to join Netherlands Dance Theater in Holland. She had the extraordinary experience of performing existing repertoire as well as new creations by choreographers such as Jiri Kylian, Mats Ek, Paul Lightfoot/Sol Leon, Ohad Naharin, Hans van Manen, Alexander Ekman and many other great contemporary choreographers. Read more…

resident choreographer penny saunders grand rapids ballet

Penny Saunders

Choreographer

Penny Saunders, originally from Florida, graduated from the Harid Conservatory in 1995. Later that same year Saunders began her professional career with The American Repertory Ballet while also continuing to train with Elisabeth Carroll. Saunders made her way out west in 1999 to join Ballet Arizona where she continued to dance the traditional ballets as well as many neoclassical and contemporary works. Saunders was introduced to Moses Pendleton in 2001, which led her to tour extensively with MOMIX Dance Theater for the following two years before moving on to New York City in 2003 where she became a founding member of Cedar Lake Ensemble. In 2004 Saunders joined Hubbard Street Dance Chicago where she had the good fortune to dance works by Jirí Kylián, Nacho Duato, Ohad Naharin, Mats Ek, Twyla Tharp, Christopher Bruce, Doug Varone, Aszure Barton, Victor Quijada, and Alejandro Cerrudo, among many others. Read more…

Yuka Oba

Choreographer

Yuka was born in Japan where she received her training from Hitomi Takeuchi Ballet School. She attended English National Ballet School in UK from 2006-2008 where she danced many soloist roles. In 2009, Mario Radacovsky invited Yuka to join the Slovak National Ballet where she danced a variety of roles. Yuka has won many competitions in Japan including NBA All Japan Ballet Competition, Saitama All Japan Dance Competition, UB All Japan Ballet Union Competition, International Ballet Competition in Yokohama and others. Yuka performed The Sofa in Seattle last January and at the Joyce Theatre in New York in August 2013. Also she performed Le Corsaire Pas de Deux in the gala at The National Theatre in Tokyo and the Pas de Deux from Le Carnaval de Venise in Fukushima. Read more…

Andrea Schermoly

Andrea creating her new ballet for MOVEMEDIA