New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA) and the National Dance Project (NDP) are offering a unique New England professional development opportunity around the presentation by Cambodia’s foremost contemporary choreographer, Sophiline Cheam Shapiro, as she shares information about her new project, The Lives of Giants, and provides an update on Cambodian performing arts today. The event will take place on October 6, 2009 from 2 PM to 5 PM at the Warner Bently Theater, Hopkins Center at Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH. RSVP: jforde@nefa.org or 617.951.0010 x512
An informal discussion follows on New England’s links with Cambodia, Cambodian-American communities in the region, and NEFA’s support strategies that link global and local creation and presentation programs.
Participants include Sophiline Cheam Shapiro, Choroeographer; Artistic Director, Khmer Arts Ensemble; Sreyleak Rin, dancer/member, Khmer Arts Ensemble; John Shapiro, Executive Director, Khmer Arts; Deirdre Valente, Lisa Booth Management, Inc.; Rebecca Blunk, Executive Director, New England Foundation for the Arts.
NEFA will provide a number of travel subsidies to assist New England artists, presenters, and educators to attend this professional development opportunity. To apply for travel subsidy (of up to $100) and to RSVP please email jforde@nefa.org by Monday, September 21, 2009.
For more on Sophiline Cheam Shapiro, here’s a interview with her on FRONTLINE/World talking about how classical dance helped her understand and communicate her experience under the Khmer Rouge.
And if you’re interested in traditional Cambodian dance locally, be sure to check out Angkor Dance Troupe. They were formed in 1986, in Lowell, by Mr. Tim Chan Thou, Angkor’s Program Director, along with a small group of dancers who learned traditional Cambodian dance in refugee camps along the Thai-Cambodian border.
Image credit: Pamina Devi: A Cambodian Magic Flute by Sophiline Cheam Shapiro. Photo by John Shapiro
Monkey Dance, Cambodian dance, 2007, Angkor Dance Troupe, Inc., Lowell, Massachusetts, Photography by James P. Higgins
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