Podcast
STUDIO STORIES: REMINISCING ON TWIN CITIES DANCE HISTORY
Hosted by ARENA DANCES · EN
Stories are among our most potent tools. We need to unearth old stories that live in a place and begin to create new ones. We are story makers, not just storytellers. All stories are connected, new ones woven from threads of the old. (Paraphrased- Robin Wall Kimmerer) Join ARENA DANCES every Thursday at noon for Studio Stories, a podcast reminiscing on Twin Cities Dance history. Hosted by Mathew Janczewski, each week will feature a new renowned dance artist who has made an impact on the dance landscape in this big dance town. Know of someone whose connections should be shared? Let us know! Email us at arenadances@gmail.com
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Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Ruby Josephine Smith - Season 15, Episode 166
Nov 6, 202400:36:09Tap to summarizeRuby Josephine Smith is a contemporary dance artist, choreographer, and founder of new company Ruby Josephine Dance Theater (RJDT). She is passionate about movement as a form of emotional expression, story-telling, and language. This passion was molded from having two artist parents, getting involved in both theater and contemporary dance in her early years, and by her unconventional dance training, traveling around the world from the age of 20 to learn from a variety of artists at intensives and residencies. In 2014 she landed in Tangier, Morocco which became her home for the next 7 years, working with contemporary dance as an emerging art form in the city. In Tangier, Ruby’s choreography was commissioned and sponsored by the US Embassy of Morocco, l’Institut Français, the American Language Center Network, and the American Legation. She also had opportunities to perform and work with international artists at festivals around Europe. Ruby returned to her hometown of Minneapolis, MN in 2020 and has since choreographed works for Collab Arts, Zenon Zone, Threads Dance Project, and more recently two full-length productions under her company’s umbrella. She performs with Analog Dance Works and has appeared in work by Jennifer Mack and Jagged Moves. Ruby has been a teaching artist for over 10 years and currently teaches regular contemporary classes at Hothouse and WestMet Classical Training. She also offers artist residencies and dance program consultation to the American International School Network where she has taught in France, India and Vietnam. Throughout all of this work, Ruby believes strongly in the power of dance to tell stories, explore personal processes, and form strong human connections.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Brenna Mosser - Season 15, Episode 165
Oct 31, 202400:44:26Tap to summarizeBrenna Mosser (she/her) is a dance artist based in Minneapolis, MN. She seeks to illuminate the awe in her surroundings by sculpting falls, stumbles, and asymmetries gracefully. She spent two years in the Conservation Corps of Minnesota and Iowa, where she faced the reality of climate change and has since dedicated her work to dissect and digest this crisis with her community.She earned her bachelor’s in dance performance at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London, UK. She supplemented her degree at le Centre national de la danse Contemporaine in Angers, France where she spent two years learning intensively from world-renowned dance companies and their artists. There, she earned an L3 licence in dance performance and in arts management. Brenna founded founded Analog Dance Works in 2019, a dance company whose mission is to explore the intersection between dance and science through choreographic works and roundtable discussions. Alongside Analog, she currently dances for Threads Dance Project, Ruby Josephine Dance Theater, 43x94 Movement Research, and Zoë Koenig.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Elayna Waxse - Season 15, Episode 164
Oct 24, 202400:39:14Tap to summarizeElayna Waxse (she/they) is a St. Paul-based choreographer, dance educator, and performer who prioritizes emotional attunement, identity and risk taking in their work. They facilitate an environment of empathy, compassion and witnessing in which artists feel empowered to bring their full social and cultural identity to the work. Elayna has been commissioned by Minnesota Dance Theatre, University of Minnesota Dance Department (2022 Cowles Visiting Artist), Carleton College Dance Department, Threads Dance Project, St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists, and the University of Minnesota Opera Theater among others. She was a 2023 alternate selection for the Ann and Weston Hicks Choreography Fellowship at Jacob’s Pillow, and a 2024 finalist for the Carmel Dance Festival Choreography Fellowship. In 2023, her work was selected for the National Gala Performance at the American College Dance Association’s National Conference in Long Beach, CA. In 2024, she was invited to join the inaugural cohort of ChoreoTech: Immersive Dancemaking with AI and VR at The School at Jacob’s Pillow.Professionally, Elayna has danced with Minnesota Dance Theatre, Colorado Ballet/Colorado Ballet Studio Company, Black Label Movement, BodyCartography Project, and with Cie. Ismael Ivo at ImPulsTanz Vienna International Dance Festival and in São Paulo, Brazil.She was a member of TU Dance from 2012 to 2019, performing works by Alvin Ailey, Dwight Rhoden, Jawole Willa Jo Zoller, Katrin Hall, Francesca Harper, Stephanie Batten-Bland, Gioconda Barbuto, and Gregory Dolbashian among others. They were part of the original creation team of Come Through, the collaboration between TU Dance and Grammy-award winning musical group Bon Iver. Through this collaboration Elayna performed at the Hollywood Bowl (LA, CA), the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (Washington, D.C.), and at Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival (Manchester, TN). Elayna is 2019 recipient of a McKnight Fellowship in Dance, through which they worked with choreographer Bobbi Jene Smith on an original solo. As a dance educator, they have taught ballet and contemporary dance at the University of Minnesota, Minnesota Dance Theatre, TU Dance, and Macalester College. In 2024, they served as Interim Artistic Director for Minnesota Dance Theatre & School and they are currently the Dayton Hudson Visiting Artist/Teacher at Carleton College.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Javan Mngrezzo - Season 15, Episode 163
Oct 17, 202400:51:01Tap to summarizeJavan Mngrezzo(he/him) is a dance creator, instructor, and performer – in that order. He relocated to Minnesota in 2021 by way of Portland, OR. Oregon was his second home state, after CA, where he graduated from Western Oregon University in three years, magna cum laude, with a Bachelor of Science in Dance and Sociology. As a creator: past credits include AMEZ Dance, James Sewell Ballet, and Minnesota Dance Theater – to name a few. As an instructor: currently teaching at Out on a Limb, and has previously taught at studios such as Lundstrum and HotHouse – to name a few. As a performer: past credits include AMEZ Dance, Rhythmically Speaking, ARENA Dances, and James Sewell Ballet – to name a few. He is presently investigating the convergence of dance and other mediums that will slowly find a home within his new creative art hub ZzoZzo.mn.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Lily Conforti - Season 15, Episode 162
Oct 10, 202400:32:01Tap to summarizeLily Conforti is a performer, choreographer, and dance teacher from the Twin Cities. She graduated from the University of Minnesota with degrees in dance and physiology in May 2021. She is interested in articulation of movement with music, and creating multimedia dance works that are new and exciting for audience members. Lily is the founder and choreographer for Corpus Dance Works. She started the group in 2019. They have performed in the MN, Indy, and Calgary Fringe Festivals, Candy Box Dance Festival, Inbox at Artbox, DanceBarn's Vol III CollabArts, and in other local festivals. The group creates under a collective goal of combining dance and other artistic genres such as Dance and Theater in their most recent hour long show 'All the Hullabaloo'. Lily looks to push storytelling, whimsy, and artistry to the forefront of her work and also to remind audiences that art can be serious while also being a silly, fun time. Along with her own dance choreographies, Lily has performed in work by Kjara Wurst, Gallim Dance, Honey Works Dance, Black Label Movement, and Alternative Motion Project. She will be performing with Threads Dance Project this coming November 2024!
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Nieya Amezquita - Season 15, Episode 161
Oct 3, 202400:43:57Tap to summarizeNieya Amezquita is a Minnesota-based professional dancer working with Threads Dance Project and Rhythmically Speaking. She has also performed works with Concerto Dance, Alexandra Bodnarchuk Dance Projects and many others. Nieya earned a BFA in Dance from the University of Georgia. There she had the opportunity to perform nationally and internationally with founding company CADE:NCE before studying in Portugal with the Addo Platform. Most recently, Nieya choreographed for Threads Dance Project and Alternative Motion Project, was a Happy Hour Artist in the CandyBox Dance Festival hosted by Arena, and launched her own dance company, Amez Dance.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Alexandra Bodnarchuk - Season 15, Episode 160
Sep 26, 202400:56:00Tap to summarizeAlexandra Bodnarchuk is a Carpatho-Rusyn American choreographer and cultural activist based in Minneapolis, MN. As the Artistic Director and choreographer for Doma Dance Theater, Bodnarchuk creates original works for the stage and screen that draw together her ethnic heritage with contemporary movement practices. Centering the body as a tangible site of culture, Bodnarchuk explores questions of self-expression, community, dispossession, and cross-cultural identity through works that range from solo pieces to ensemble works.Bodnarchuk is a 2021 Ann & Weston Hicks Choreography Fellow at Jacob’s Pillow and a 2022 & 2020 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow Finalist (Jerome Foundation). Her second evening-length work, Rock, Paper, Scissors, was presented by The Southern Theater in March 2023.In 2024 she released her second dance film Mamko Moja L’uba, which is named for a folk song popularized by Carpatho-Rusyn singer Maria Mačoskova, and featured costumes inspired by traditional clothing from the Zemplín region in Eastern Slovakia. She also completed a commission for The Museum of Russian Art, responding to Serbian sculptor Zoran Mojsilov’s surrealist exhibition, The Dry Neck of the Pig. She is currently working on two commissions to premiere in Spring/Summer 2025, including being a Featured Artists in Arena Dance’s 2025Candy Box Dance Festival.Bodnarchuk is the daughter of first- and third-generation immigrants. She was raised in Pittsburgh, PA, where she studied European folk traditions, including classical ballet and Slavic and Balkan folk dance. Southwestern PA, which hosts an active community of Eastern European folk organizations, has the largest concentration of Carpatho-Rusyns in the United States. As a member of the North Hills Junior Tamburitzans, Bodnarchuk was taught by the renowned Željko Jergan with a primary focus on Croatian dances. She also performed with the now-shuttered Slavjane Folk Ensemble, the sole Carpatho-Rusyn children’s dance ensemble in the United States. Under the direction of Jack Poloka she toured Slovakia, Poland, and Ukraine, exploring the diasporic homeland and cultural landscape of the Carpatho-Rusyns.Bodnarchuk graduated from Bodiography Contemporary Ballet’s College Preparatory Program and then earned a BFA in Dance Performance and Choreography and BA in French from Ohio University (OU). During college, she spent a semester in Avignon, France, training at the Conservatoire d’Avignon under Cyrille de la Barre. She also studied Ghanaian dance and drumming under the direction of Paschal Yao Younge and Zelma Badu-Younge and was amember of their group Azaguno African Dance Ensemble.Embracing her role as a cultural activist, Bodnarchuk has continued to deepen her study of and connection to Carpatho-Rusyn cultural traditions by visiting her ethnic homeland and learning the Rusyn language. By amplifying her ethnic heritage and probing the connections among the Carpatho-Rusyn experience and diasporic communities around the world, Bodnarchuk offers a potent invitation to rediscover the unrecognized histories embedded in each of us.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Cheng Xiong - Season 15, Episode 159
Sep 19, 202400:52:18Tap to summarizeCheng Xiong is a local Hmong dance artist, choreographer, teacher, and community leader. Xiong was born in a refugee camp in Thailand, sponsored by family in the United States, and moved to St. Paul, Minnesota. Xiong started picking up Hip Hop dance, particularly Break(dance)ing, through family and friends. With his journey as a street dancer, he continued his studies in dance at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and was able to broaden to different styles and professional skills. Xiong became the first in his family to receive a Bachelor of Arts. He is currently a company member of Black Label Movement. He recently worked with local professional companies such STRONGmovement, BRKFST Dance, and Minnesota Timberwolves’s First Avenue Breakers. He is also a Breakdance instructor and educator, teaching at Cypher Side Dance School and the University of Minnesota Dance Program. Xiong is also a Hmong dance artist/researcher who is among the first in Minnesota to fuse forms of Breaking, Contemporary, and acrobatic dance styles. His integrated movement practice consists of floorwork, high physicality transitions, and rigorous dynamic movements that thrive on integration and cross-training. Developing a new personal style that pushes athletic skills to their highest and at the same time challenges the creative process by drawing from his background, allowing movements forming together in unique ways. His overarching aim is to continue to use the body as a medium for communication.Some highlights of his work were in 2018, when Xiong participated in the “I’m From…Vol. 2” show at the Southern Theater, where he debuted his solo in collaboration with Tou Saiko Lee, called “Being Hmong, Being Free.” That same year, Xiong was one of the choreographers to present work for Saint Paul Conservatory Performing Arts’ J-Term Project: Dance Repertory Concert, where he debuted his new work “Locomote” in The O'shaughnessy theater at St. Catherine University. In 2022, Xiong was awarded as one of the McKnight Dancer Fellows. The following year, Xiong debuted his new work “Penumbra” at the Southern Theater, for Arena Dances presents CANDY BOX as one of the Happy Hour artists. Right after that, he also debuted his new work called “Breaking Breaking” for the Mixtape Collective show, Mixtape 6: Cypher Space, that was held at the Cowles Center for Dance and the Performing Arts. Later in fall of 2023, the Minneosta Orchestra commissioned Xiong to create a duet called, “Stories of the Harvest,” with composer Jocelyn Hagen’s excerpt of “Shoua and the Northern Lights Dragon,” for their annual Young People’s Concert: Sounds of the Harvest. In 2024, Xiong presented his new work “Polarity” at the Barbara Barker Center for Dance for Black Label Movement’s Inaugural Mover’s Make series.Alongside his repertoire of performances, Xiong is a Breakdance instructor and educator. He has taught at after-school programs such as Washington Technology Magnet Middle, Hazel Park Preparatory Academy, and Ramsey Middle through the East Side Arts Council. At present, Xiong is currently teaching at the University of Minnesota Minnesota Theater and Dance Program and Cypher Side Dance School.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: NEW BREED series with Jake Nehrbass - Season 15, Episode 158
Sep 12, 202400:44:26Tap to summarizeBorn and raised in Minneapolis Minnesota, Jake is a teacher and performing artist in the Twin Cities. Having danced since the age of three, and being trained in tap dance, ballroom dance, jazz dance, modern dance, as well as having an interest in physical therapy and yoga, Jake graduated from St. Olaf College with a BFA in Dance and Exercise Science.Alongside being a company member of Black Label Movement, Ruby Josephine Dance Theatre, and Rhythmically Speaking, Jake has worked with or continues to work with Arena Dances, Contempo Physical Dance, Concerto Dance, Buckets and Taps, Mixtape, Threads Dance Project, Flying Foot Forum, Katha Dance Theatre, Eau Claire Dance, STRONGmovement, and has performed in Stephan Koplowitz’s Northfield Experience. Jake has also danced in Au, a Live at the Shed work created by Hatch Dance and Honey Works.Jake currently teaches at Prairie School of Dance as well as Ballare Teatro Performing Arts Center.
Transcribe →Studio Stories: Reminiscing on Twin Cities Dance with Mariusz Olszewski - Season 10, Episode 125
Mar 23, 202301:05:34Tap to summarizeMariusz Olszewski, ballroom artist, coach and choreographer whose work has been presented at the biggest ballroom venues, dance festivals, theaters and television around the world. He choreographed for the World, American, Polish and Ohio Star Ball Champions and other top ranking ballroom couples including Blackpool Dance Festival American Smooth finalist.Mariusz, moved to Minneapolis in 1996 to join Jazzdance! by Danny Buraczeski and danced with the company for 5 years performing at the most prominent stages and dance festivals such as Kennedy Center, The Joyce Theater, Ordway Center for Performing Arts and The Guthrie Theater as well as Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival and Bates Dance Festival as well as American Dance Festival among others.Prior to Jazzdance, Mr.Olszewski was a lead dancer and assistant to artistic director of The Silesian Dance Theater, the first professional modern dance company in his native country Poland.During his 5 seasons with The Silesian Dance Theater he had performed and worked with such renown choreographers and dance legends as Anna Sokolow, Gerri Houlihan, Teresa Freedman, Melissa Monteros, Avi Kaiser, Mark Haim, David Dorfman, Wendell Beavers, Stephanie Skura, Risa Jarolow , Sam Costa and company's artistic director Jacek Luminski among others.For his roles created in that company he received Silesia’s President’s Award for Outstanding Artist in 1995.He is a founding member of Beyond Ballroom Dance Company and served as its Artistic Co-director and Rehearsal Director.Mariusz’s work is driven from his modern, jazz ,ballroom dancing and theater experience.He choreographed and collaborated with Minneapolis prime dancers and companies such as Zenon Dance Comapny, Minnesota Dance Theater and James Sewell Ballet's Sally Rousse , Cathy Young Dances, Robin Stiehm's Dancing People Company.Mariusz graduated from The Institute of Culture Theater Department in Opole, Poland.He was a guest choreographer on popular television show "Dancing With the Stars" and featured choreographer for 8 seasons on "So You Think You Can Dance”/ Poland creating a record number of over 35 routines in contemporary, modern jazz and ballroom dance styles.In 2016 he was invited to choreograph two ballroom shows “ Rhythm Divine” and “Grace” for Hong Kong’s biggest Dream Cruise Line. Mariusz is a recipient of 2005 McKnight Artists Fellowship for Dancers.
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