The UGA Department of Dance is presenting the UGA Dance Company spring concert this April.
UGA faculty members from several areas are contributing pieces in a variety of different styles. Aerial, ballet, contemporary, ballroom, West African dance and dance film are all represented, with a multimedia presentation included. Resident artist Amelia Reiser will choreograph a piece, as well.
The concert will be April 20, 21 and 22 at 8 p.m. and April 22 at 2 p.m. in the New Dance Theatre, located in the Dance Building, which is between Soule and Green streets (off Sanford Drive) on UGA’s South Campus in Athens. Tickets are $12 for students and $16 for general admission and can be purchased at dance.uga.edu, by phone at 706-542-4400, or in-person at either the UGA Performing Arts Center or the Tate Center box offices during business hours (10 a.m. to 5 p.m.).
Assistant professor Elizabeth Stich is curating this year’s spring concert as well as choreographing an aerial duet and a dance film.
“The best part of a concert like this is that it allows our audiences to see the true variety of what our faculty have to offer our students,” said Stich. “We also get to highlight the talent and versatility of our students.”
“One of the more unique additions to this year’s concert is my collaboration with [lecturer] Jason Aryeh,” said Skip Taylor, head of the department of dance.
Aryeh and Taylor collaborated on a dance film project. Four dancers were choreographed and filmed in Ghana, and then separately, four dancers at UGA did the same. Both groups were choreographed by Aryeh. These two separate groups have been edited together in this original dance film experience.
Reiser, contributing a contemporary modern dance piece, is an alumna of the UGA department of dance. Currently in Atlanta, Reiser performs with Atlanta based dance company Staibdance and teaches yoga at Decatur Yoga. She is also teaching and working with Holle Black as a director at Centering Youth, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit yoga service initiative that brings yoga and mindfulness to young people in the juvenile justice system and to those who have been sexually exploited, abused or are experiencing homelessness.
Lisa Fusillo, UGA Foundation Professor in the Arts; Jason Aryeh, lecturer of dance; Michael Fulford and Natalie Cox, artistic directors of the UGA Ballroom Performance Group; and part-time instructor Nena Gilreath, co-founder and co-artistic director of Ballethnic Dance Company, round out this concert.