Sanspointe receives grant from ASCA

Sanspointe received a grant from The Alabama State Council on the Arts (ASCA) to present Primary Subject in May 13-16, 2010. Primary Subject will feature modern dance works choreographed by Lynn Bowman, Shellie Chambers, Taryn Lavery, Rhea Speights and guest artist Killian Manning. This is Sanspointe's first request and grant from ASCA.

Bowman, Chambers and Speights have choreographed for the company previously. This will be Lavery's first time to present her work with the company. Lavery is a 2008 graduate from The University of Alabama, where several other Sanspointe company artists also received their degrees, including Chambers, Speights and Founder Michelle Hamff.

Also featured in Primary Subject is Manning's new work, There was Morning and Evening, Another Day to music by Kit Weinart. Manning, who lives in North Carolina, spent two weeks in Birmingham during the Holidays setting the work on seven dancers. She will continue to work with the dancers until the performance remotely through video and email communications. She'll be back in May for the performance and to teach a master class open to the community.

Killian Manning is on the faculty at UNC-Greensboro in Communication Studies and teaches dance at the Ballet School of Chapel Hill. As Artistic Director of No Forwarding Address, she has received funding from numerous N.C. state and local arts agencies and was named "Best in The Triangle" in dance for four years. Killian has presented her award-winning choreography in Salt Lake City, Boston, Chicago, Birmingham, and North Carolina. She served on the dance faculty at UNC-Chapel Hill from 1989 to 1995, and has also taught at Radcliffe, the Boston Conservatory, Repertory Dance Theater School, and Samford University. Prior to that, she studied, performed, and choreographed in Boston from 1980-1987, where she was a member of Susan Rose and DanceWorks. Most recently she has enjoyed creating new dances at Durham Academy and the Carolina Friends School.

Sanspointe performs at Vestavia High School and The University of Alabama

On October 22, following performances of Dances Fall in Birmingham, we performed excerpts of Dances Fall at Vestavia High School (VHS). We were excited to perform for the second time to perform at VHS. We performed one a solo from Michelle Hamff's Neruda No. 5, Rhea Speights Trick or Treat Me Like a Fool, and Lynn Bowman's A Very Dry Spell for more than 600 fine arts students.

On October 27th, we spent a day in Tuscaloosa at The University of Alabama. Lynn Bowman taught class to dance majors in the morning. We spent the afternoon setting the lights in Morgan Auditorium for the full-length presentation of Dances Fall, observed by a class or two.

We presented Dances Fall at 7pm, including pre-show live music by Abram and Sarah. Following the performance, we had an informal Q&A with more than 20 dance majors about everything from the content of the dances to the business of running a dance company. More than half of our company artists are graduates from The University of Alabama, and we are always thrilled to go back and visit. This day-long residency was made possible by UA's Creative Campus.