The Chicago-based contemporary ballet company PARA.MAR Dance Theatre, returns for their third annual Spring Season Series “PIVOTAL” with three performances at the Epiphany Arts Center, 201 S. Ashland, 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 14th and 2:00 and 7:30 pm. April 15th.
With an impressive roster of past performances at the Auditorium Theatre, Navy Pier and Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park; and the coveted recognition of being named one of Dance Magazine’s 2022 “25 to Watch” – PARA.MAR Dance Theatre again breaks the mold by offering a season of new, site-specific contemporary dance in contemporary spaces with a program that explores the theme of "pivotal change."
For the upcoming “PIVOTAL performances PARA.MAR, chose the vast and spacious cathedral of the recently renovated Epiphany Hall which has been preserved and adapted into an iconic cultural hub. Here, one large stage will be installed within the venue with seating placed in the round but guests will be invited to roam around to experience the performance from alternative vantage points.
Inspired in part by the city's 2023 "Year of Chicago Healing'' initiative and struck by the poetry and vulnerability of shedding one’s own leaves in a season’s change, PARA.MAR founder and director Stephanie Martinez commissioned two of the most sought-after choreographers in contemporary dance: Hélène Simoneau (2021 Guggenheim Fellow, NYCC Choreography Fellow) and Yin Yue (YYDC, Martha Graham, 2021 Harkness Promise Award) to join the company in delving into a process that confronts the bewilderment, tenderness, and strength that comes from loss – offering a season designed around vulnerability, healing, growth, and pivotal change.
Tickets
PARA.MAR Dance Theatre presents their Spring Season Series “PIVOTAL” at the Epiphany Arts Center, 201 S. Ashland, 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 14 and 2 and 7:30 pm. April 15. The company maintains their commitment to radical access to art by continuing to offer pay-what-you-can ticketing. For tickets visit: www.paramardance.com/pivotal.
This performance series is made possible with the generous support from the Jackson Legacy Foundation.
About PARA.MAR Dance Theatre
PARA.MAR Dance Theatre, now in its third season, is a Chicago-based contemporary ballet repertory company, founded in 2020 and directed by award-winning choreographer, Stephanie Martinez.
Meaning “together, with, and for,” the Spanish word “PARA” represents the vision, purpose, and commitment to celebrating identity and creating community through contemporary ballet. Together, with the belief that inclusion leads to innovation, and that dance is an essential mode of human expression, PARA.MAR’s mission is to empower and elevate diverse voices in contemporary ballet by providing performances and programming rooted in artistic excellence, radical accessibility, and reflective of the unique identities of the communities it serves.
In addition to the “PIVOTAL,” other performances on the horizon for PARA.MAR Dance Theatre include Chicago Humanities Festival pop-up performances on April 30; the May 6 all-day public art festival (also at Epiphany); a Choreographic Residency at Ragdale through the Morrison Shearer Foundation and a collaboration with Oklahoma City Ballet in Fall 2023. For updates and more information visit paramardance.com.
Choreographer Bios
Yue Yin is an internationally recognized performer, choreographer and the founder and artistic director of YY Dance Company (YYDC). Yin studied at the prestigious Shanghai Dance Academy and NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts where she received her MFA in 2008.
Yin was the recipient of the 2021 Dance Magazine Harkness Promise Award. This prestigious award recognizes her innovation in choreography and education. She was the winner of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago 2015 International Commissioning Project, winner of the 2015 BalletX Choreographic Fellowship, and winner of Northwest Dance Project’s 5th Annual Pretty Creatives International Choreographic Competition in 2013. Through these high-profile successes, Yin has received commissions from all three widely-recognized companies as well as other companies and organizations namely Gibney Company, Martha Graham Dance Company, Boston Ballet, Philadelphia Ballet, Limon Dance Company, Alberta Ballet, Balletto Teatro di Torino, Peridance Contemporary Dance Company, USC Kaufman School of Dance, Tisch School of The Arts, George Mason University, Rutgers University, Point Park University, West Michigan University, Juilliard School for Dance and more.
Yin founded YYDC, a NYC-based, non-profit contemporary dance company dedicated to the teaching, production and performance of original choreographic works by Yin. The company incorporates Yin’s signature FoCo Technique™ which represents a dynamic fusion of Chinese dance, folk and contemporary movement language into live performances and choreographic commissions as well as educational endeavors. Under Yin’s direction, the company has presented its work to live audiences on U.S. and international stages including Schrit_tmacher Festival (Germany), and Rassegna Musike (Italy), SummerStage in New York City, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, New York International Fringe Festival, The Open Door Dance Festival in Iowa City, Iowa, DancenowNYC at Joe’s pub and many more. In addition, YYDC has performed at venues such as International Choreographic Competition Hanover, BAM Fisher, Joyce SoHo Theater, Peridance Center, Lincoln Center Rose Hall, New York Live Arts and many others. In addition to performance, the company also re-staged repertories at universities, companies and dance studios around the world.
Hélène Simoneau is a choreographer and teacher. She has been commissioned by The Juilliard School, Charlotte Ballet, Oregon Ballet Theatre, the Ailey School, BalletX, the American Dance Festival, and colleges, dance companies and festivals throughout the US and Canada. She was recently a Choreography Fellow at New York City Center and received a 2021 Guggenheim Fellowship. She has also been a resident artist at Baryshnikov Arts Center, NYU/Tisch, and a fellow of The NYU Center for Ballet and the Arts, Ailey’s New Directions Choreography Lab, and the Bogliasco Foundation. She was awarded first place for Choreography at the 13th Internationales Solo-Tanz-Theater Festival in Stuttgart, Germany, for her solo “the gentleness was in her hands.” Simoneau is originally from Luceville, a small village near Rimouski, in Eastern Québec.
With more than 11 years of award-winning works to her credit, PARA.MAR founder and director and Chicago-based choreographer Stephanie Martinez has moved her audiences along a journey guided by the physicality of her movement and honest storytelling. With original creations for Joffrey Ballet, Ballet Hispanico, Luna Negra Dance Theater, Charlotte Ballet, Sacramento Ballet, Eugene Ballet, Nashville Ballet, Ballet Memphis, Kansas City Ballet, and National Choreographers Initiative among others, Martinez’s versatility expands the boundaries of contemporary ballet movement through her passion for marrying dance and theater as a means to construct intricate visual experiences. Martinez has created over 60 ballets on companies and collegiate programs across the country. In 2010, Martinez assisted Broadway legend Ann Reinking in setting the “Fosse Trilogy,” and in 2015 was awarded Joffrey Ballet’s “Winning Works: Choreographers of Color” commission and the Chicago 3Arts Award in recognition for her work as a female artist of color. More recently, Martinez was awarded an NEA grant for her premiere “Bliss!” at Joffrey Ballet. Designated “a chameleon” of choreography by the Chicago Tribune, Martinez’s psychologically revelatory works challenge the viewer’s notion of what’s possible.