Arts & Humanities Campus News

CORE premieres ‘WITHOUT (within) BORDERS’

CORE Contemporary and Aerial Dance Company’s season performance explores themes about internal and external boundaries.

The UGA dance department’s CORE Contemporary and Aerial Dance Company will present its annual season performance Feb. 22-24 at 8 p.m. at the New Dance Theatre in the dance building. The company will premiere “WITHOUT (within) BORDERS,” an aerial, contemporary dance and multimedia performance.

The evening’s nonstop 65-minute show explores themes about internal and external boundaries—personal, cultural, political and spatial—and perceptions about both concrete and invisible walls that are created and destroyed. The performance is enhanced through a visual landscape incorporating projection mapping, animation and film. The company will perform on aerial silks, slings, lyra and bungee.

An experimental company by nature, this creative research lab often engages in collaboration with scientists, technicians and artists to transcend science, technology and the arts to create the annual program.

“We will bring together UGA student artists with professional dancers who will demonstrate a variety of aerial and contemporary dance skills,” said Bala Sarasvati, UGA’s Jane Willson Professor in the Arts and CORE artistic director. “Our guest artists, performers and collaborators greatly enhance the overall show.”

CORE Contemporary and Aerial Dance Company performing members are Gracie Bailey, Kennedy Butterfield, Madison Calderwood, Kristin Jaspers, Rachel Kelley, Alex Ozbilen, Samantha Miller, Olivia Byers and Aviva Kasowski.

In addition, guest artists Shawn Evangelista, a professional dancer and CORE alumnus based in Atlanta; Mario Vircha, a veteran dancer for the Nacional Dance Company of Costa Rica; and Mirna Minkov, a CORE alumna, will be choreographing and performing for the show.

CORE alumni will present “Blessed,” choreographed by Bebe Miller and originally performed by the CORE Concert Dance Company in 1998. Former CORE members performing in Miller’s dance are Blake Dalton, Heather Hogan, Stephanie Napierala Little, Anne Shaffer, Jennifer Tweed Morlock, Maryn Whitmore and Genie Wiggins.

Tickets are $16 for general admission or $12 for students and seniors. To purchase tickets, visit the Tate Student Center ticket office, order online at pac.uga.edu or call 706-542-4400. Tickets are also available for purchase at the door beginning at 7 p.m. each evening of the concert. Student groups who can make a one-time purchase of eight or more student tickets will receive a group rate of $5 per ticket. Advanced ticket purchases to all shows is highly recommended.