Regina Nejman & Company

Rethinking Strategies inquires into new strategies to generate movement from within and in collaboration with the space's structure, exploring the proximity relationship of two dancers. In the piece, dancers move from a state of stillness to a more energetic and free state of mind in a shifting world that invites the audience to let go of the outside chatter and confusion and enter a world of movement, music and visual kinesthetic stimulation where the body in movement is the main subject. The dance is performed by Regina Nejman and Fumihiro Kikuchi with live cellist Luke Santy. Excerpts of the piece were performed at Dixon Place on May 15th 2018 and a longer version was performed on August 15th 2018 also at Dixon Place. Luke Santy has been collaborating with Regina Nejman since 2017, and their process consists of creating live improvised sounds and music to the choreography. The choreography has some moments of improvisation as well, and this relationship creates an exciting “in the moment” awareness of all the artists involved and “brings the audience in”.

Regina Nejman grew up in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and is based in New York City where she has been creating her own choreography since 1993 and founded Regina Nejman & Company in 1997. She has performed extensively both here in the United States and abroad. Regina is a recipient of a 2020 Creative Engagement grant from LMCC for her new project Bubble, and has received support from Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Greenwall Foundation, LMCC/MCAF, Puffin Foundation, Meet the Composer. She received commissions from Joyce Theater Residency space grant, The Yard, Princeton University, New Jersey City University and Dixon Place, and her work has also been presented by LaMama, Joyce Soho, Symphony Space, DTW, Queens Museum and others. Regina received her BA from SUNY/Empire State College. She has taught dance at Princeton University, Wesleyan University, Harvard Summer Dance, NYU Common Hour Class, LaGuardia Performing Arts High School, HAI and Center for Arts Education. Regina is a per-diem dance teacher at NYCDOE and is an MFA in Dance candidate at Hunter College.

More on her and her company at http://reginanejmancompany.blogspot.com/

and https://www.facebook.com/reginanejmancompany/

BREAKTIME

Early in the pandemic, Jonathan Matthews and Holly Sass joked about making a piece with a six-foot pole strapped between their bodies. After a whole lot of national turmoil, it ended up being the only thing they felt they could do. 6’ was originally made as a performance for Arts On Site’s Arts Alive series in October 2020, with the help of space grants from Arts On Site and Spoke the Hub. 6’ Pole is a film adaptation of the performance’s more task-oriented material, created for Spoke the Hub’s virtual People’s Choice Showcase the following month, in collaboration with internationally recognized film artist Derrick Belcham as cinematographer. It is, perhaps for the first time, impossible to not invariably end up making work about the times we are in, the limitations of which can really feel like taking a PVC pipe to the gut.

BREAKTIME is a site-fluid reservoir for bad ideas, generated and performed by Holly Sass and Jonathan Matthews. Classmates at NYU, they were often cast together until joining forces in 2017 for Tisch Dance’s Alumni Choreographic Mentorship with Gus Solomons, Jr. They have since been hosted by such kind folks as UNA Projects, Center for Performance Research, Dixon Place, Create:ART, Arts On Site, Triskelion Arts, Spoke the Hub, Circadium School of Contemporary Circus, and Tisch Dance’s Summer Residency Festival. The pair has been nourished by residencies through Jonah Boaker Arts Foundation, Create:ART, and The Croft. Interested in community-based initiatives, BREAKTIME participated in Jemila MacEwan’s inaugural Land Falls residency and helped convert Bridget Struthers’ Brattleboro barn into a shared performance space. BREAKTIME has enjoyed collaborations with director Julia Barrett-Mitchell, choreographer-costumer Maddie Schimmel, installation artist Dave Hannon, brass quartet The Westerlies, cinematographer Derrick Belcham, and is always on the prowl for creative relationships.