Company News
NEWS!
1 Summary 2011/12
2 Working with Vivien Wood - Creative and Co-Mentoring
Partnership
3 Oppenheim to support research and development
4 European cultural relations (UK/SPAIN)
5 Youth Dance Highlight 2011 - "Once Bitten" by Vizavis
6 "Transitions" a winner for DANCE:FILM 11
7 Images
8 Other news (Congrats and Gentle goodbyes)
9 And now... for something completely different.
10 Facebook and Twitter
Latest News - January 2012
1 Summary 2011/12
During 2011 SD's Jenni Wren undertook a year of personal professional development that led to solo performances in London and Spain. She also won choreographic commissions and had opportunities to work with high profile international artists in a variety of roles which included performer, rehearsal director and assistant director.
"Taking the time to just be, feed my creativity, practice, expand, have fun in projects outside of my own and then reflect, has actually superseded my expectations, allowed cycles to finish and new ones to begin. I've met and worked with some incredible and talented people and am grateful for all my experiences. I'm now really looking forward to 2012 where I can begin to inject new skills and a fresh approach to my artistry and work." - Wren
During 2012 Jenni is preparing new work for stage and film in a new creative and co-mentoring partnership with Vivien Wood and in collaboration with multi-disciplinary artists from Poland, Spain, Greece, Israel, South America as well as the United Kingdom.
Photography Pete Huggins "Aperture Dance" © "Once Bitten" (Alice and Alex)
2 Working with Vivien Wood - Creative and Co-Mentoring Partnership
We are excited to let you know that SD's Jenni Wren and Vivien Wood are teaming up to work together in a new creative and co-mentoring partnership. Jenni was invited to work with Viv in 2011 as both performer and her assistant on a North East region-based project where the high octane partnership quickly evolved.
"Working together is fun and humorous; yet we work seriously, efficiently and with an attitude of integrity towards our art forms. This is what we found attractive about a partnership such as this; we think alike and want the same thing for our work. This is about learning from and working with each other longer term, mixed with the opportunity to push each other's artistic boundaries and abilities. We are excited about the ways in which we can challenge, compliment and support each other as artists and within our artistry. There is a lot we want to achieve in the next couple of years and can't wait to get started." - Jen and Viv
Enthusiastic about the future, their first joint ventures include meeting regular and new collaborators during research trips to both Spain and Poland in February 2012, prior to embarking on cross regional projects and new productions for 2012/13.
Photography Pete Huggins "Aperture Dance" © "Once Bitten" (James and Patrick)
3 Oppenheim-John Downes to support research and development
Oppenheim-John Downes Trust has again generously donated financial support for Jenni Wren, to assist in new studio research in 2012. We firmly acknowledge the value of the Trust's on-going support and extend our sincere gratitude to the Trust members.
4 European cultural relations (UK/SPAIN)
Jenni and SD continue to build upon their European cultural partnership with Susana Aguilar, Maiko Danza and the Conservatorio de Danza in Andalucia, Spain, through teaching, research and development projects, performance/tour and professional development exchanges.
Recent developments include Jenni's choreography "Crazy Joanna" (section 1) which is to be delivered to students at the Conservatorio de Danza in Sevilla, as part of their contemporary dance curriculum and assessments in learning and performing company rep material.
We are looking forward to returning to the school in February for the first 2012 trip to Cordoba, where Jenni Wren and Vivien Wood will be teaming up with Susana Aguilar and Luisa Galan for project preparations and collaborations.
5 Youth Dance Highlight 2011- "Once Bitten" by Vizavis
In August 2011, Jenni Wren was commissioned to choreograph "Once Bitten" with Vizavis youth dance company, from Dame Allan's School in Newcastle. The 6th form premiered the work at Dance City in November to a 2 night sell out audience, demonstrating the talents, team work and diversity the group have established this year.
"Once Bitten" has been submitted to be performed as part of National Youth Dance England and there are future hopes for the work to travel out of the region.
"I thoroughly enjoyed "Once Bitten". The material brought the best out of the dancers, facilitating every aspect of high level performance. The subject matter was taken very seriously creating real tension and sinister intent. It is refreshing to see a professional choreographer creating work of real integrity and not making a "Youth Group" piece! Many congratulations." Pete Huggins (Associate Director: Education - Dance City)
Jenni will continue to work (in glee) with Lynda Clough, (Head of Dance), Vizavis and other dance students in 2012, and is delighted to be in future long term association with the Dance Department of the school.
Photography Pete Huggins "Aperture Dance" © "Once Bitten" (Martha's revenge)
Wishing the cast lots of luck for their next performance on February 4th 2012! GO SHINE!
6 "Transitions" a winner for DANCE:FILM 11
We were delighted that the continuing collaborative efforts of Jenni Wren and Aurora Fearnley in the form of short film "Transitions" was screened at the DANCE:FILM 11 Festival as a winner for IdeasTap new dance film talent category.
This was our 3rd successful year of entry and showings of our collaborative work at DANCE:FILM, based in Edinburgh as part of Dancebase, Scotland's National Dance Agency. We would like to extend our thanks to the festival organisers for their on-going support and the judging panel for selecting our film as a winner for this year.
7 Images
All images for this Spring News are taken from Jenni's work, "Once Bitten" and are kindly supplied by Pete Huggins "Aperture Dance", from Newcastle.
8 Other news
Choroegraphic Assortment: Jenni has included a new assortment of her most recent choreographic work on vimeo. This is still in development and a first cut edit only. Another medley of her dance for camera work will be available later in spring 2012.
Congratualtions go to:
Young Dancer - Ellis Saul (Dame Allan's). Ellis who dance the opening solo for Jenni Wren's "Once Bitten", was selected for the YDE Young Creatives programme 2012. This YDE programme, runs in partnership with The Royal Ballet School and The Royal Opera House and is designed to help budding choreographers create a new work that will be performed on stage at the Royal Opera House. We hope Ellis has a great time and can't wait to see the results of her work. Jenni has asked Ellis to be part of a future work for late 2012.
Photography Pete Huggins "Aperture Dance" © "Once Bitten" (Ellis Saul)
We are very excited and extend our congratualations to Janet Smith (SDT) who will be taking up her new post as Director at NSCD in February 2012. Janet was a huge inspiration to Jenni and was the one who encouraged her to become a dancer and later supporting her in her journey to become a choreographer. It will be great to have Janet so close to the company and we wish her the best of luck for her work with the school.
Gentle goodbyes: We were sad to be informed that "Gill Clarke died on November 15 2011 as she lived, calmly and with great poise." (Independent Dance) A further article, written by the guardian said,
"Gill Clarke, who has died of cancer aged 56, was one of the foremost contemporary dancers of her generation. She was also a renowned teacher and a tireless advocate for the independent dance sector - the world of freelance dancers and choreographers working outside established institutions." The sensational impact that Gill and her work had on the dance world will live on and be celebrated, although she will be sadly missed.
9 And now... for something completely different.
Who'da thunk it?
During her CPD year, Jenni found herself coaxed into utilizing her other talents in Spain performing as a solo artist, singing in a variety of music venues and restaurants in Cordoba! See article. Wren said:
"The year of CPD turned out to be very varied and interesting indeed. Having time to try and learn new things was great though I never thought I'd get the opportunity to really tune into and evolve other areas of my artistic interests such as singing and playing guitar. This experience was incredible and something that I will continue to treasure and perhaps even develop. It brought a lot to me personally, whilst meeting new people and surprisingly bringing many different groups of artists together. Thanks to my "Manager" (Luisa Galan), all the venues and all those who came to the performances (some even more than once!"
"My favourite venue to play at was El Cazador de Iconos, an ART Shop/BAR in Cordoba, run by the owners who are artists themselves. Not only did they provide a great venue and amazing support for my concert but without my knowing, they had also researched me and discovered my choreographic and dance work. Before I knew it, they were projecting dance films from our Vimeo page and promoting my work, encouraging future audience for our new 2012 dance partnership ventures in Spain. Thanks to Luis for the image he produced above. I'm really looking forward to visiting again in the Spring." (Wren)
10 "Social" Networking
VIMEO
Vimeo - www.vimeo.com/slanjayvahdanza
Vimeo is proving to be a very useful tool to share work, make contacts, see what others are doing and to statistically know where Slanjayvah Danza's work is being watched. We are currently experiencing consistent and overwhelming viewing statistic, so thank you to all the viewers and supporters, those who let us know that they like it and those who pass on the links!
TWITTER
Apologies to our twitter followers due to our lack of tweeting! We are back on the tweet deck and getting back in touch.
http://twitter.com/#!/slanjayvah
We are still on facebook and gaining more friends all the time. This is where we regularly post intermittent updates so if you would like to join, find us here
Until the next time.... don't walk... DANCE!
