STUDIO STORIES: REMINISCING ON TWIN CITIES DANCE HISTORY

Taja Will (pronouns Taja/they) is a queer, Latinx (Chilean) adoptee, performer, choreographer, somatic therapist and Healing Justice practitioner based in the Twin Cities (MN), on the stolen and  occupied Dakota lands of Wahpekute and Anishinabewaki. Taja’s approach integrates improvisation, somatic modalities, text and vocals in contemporary performance. Their aesthetic is one of spontaneity, bol...

Derek Phillips is a native of Kansas City, Missouri and a 1977 graduate of Carleton College. He began his dance career with the Nancy Hauser Dance Company and later toured nationally with the Children’s Theatre Company. Derek has been a roster artist for the Minnesota State Arts Board’s Artists-in-Education Program and conducted annual residencies for the Montevideo, Minnesota public schools for o...

Christine Maginnis, a native of Minneapolis, has been an active dance artist in her home town for almost four decades, a good chunk of that time spent as a performer and teacher with Zenon Dance Company under the artistic direction of Linda Z. Andrews. With Zenon she toured to Switzerland, Aruba, Saipan, Russia, New York and throughout the Midwest. She had the honor of performing in over 100 works...

A St. Paul native and tap and jazz dancer through high school, Colleen went to Utah and majored in dance. She came back to the Twin Cities on fire with the idea of performing and choreographing and teaching dance in the schools. While in Utah, she was exposed to and embraced for the first time “modern dance”.  She came back to Minnesota in 1979 with a renewed idea of how deep and wide dance could...

Morris Johnson, Jr is a choreographer, teacher and dancer who started his formal dance education in Broadway District in New York. He is a two(2) time recipient of the Judith De Jean Memorial Scholarship Award from the New Dance Group  Studio and also received scholarships from The Bernice Johnson Dance Studio and the American Dance Machine under Lee Theodore and Ann Rankin.  Morris has performed...

Leigh W. Dillard retired as Professor Emerita, College of Saint Benedict/Saint John’s University, in 2015. She taught dance at CSB/SJU for fifteen years and was Chair of the CSB/SJU Theater Department for eight years. She was honored with the Linda Mealey Faculty/Student Collaborative Research and Creativity Award in 2015. Currently, Ms. Dillard is teaching dance to seniors as part of a research p...

Ranee and Aparna Ramaswamy's Ragamala Dance Company is the embodiment of an immigrant story. Founded in 1992 by Ranee, and currently under the leadership of Artistic Directors Ranee and Aparna and Choreographic Associate Ashwini Ramaswamy (mother and daughters), their aesthetic is deeply influenced by their cultural hybridity as Indian-American artists. Practitioners of the South Indian class...

In addition to the just-released From the Flutes of Our Bones (Nodin Press) Mary Moore Easter is the author of three other poetry books, The Body of the World (Minnesota Book Award in Poetry Finalist, 2019), Walking from Origins , and the forthcoming Free Papers: poems inspired by the testimony of Eliza Winston, a Mississippi slave escaped to freedom in Minnesota in 1860 (2021). She edited Can’t S...

Christopher Watson was a member of the New Dance Ensemble of Minneapolis and has performed with the Chicago Moving Company, Harbinger Dance Company of Detroit, and Joanna Haigood's Zaccho company in San Francisco, dancing in works by Pearl Lang, David Gordon, Dan Wagoner, Linda Shapiro, Kathryn Posin, Doris Humphrey, and Margaret Jenkins, among others. Christopher received a Bachelor of Arts...

Robin Stiehm's professional dance career spans 4 decades, beginning as a ballet dancer at the Minnesota Dance Theatre. She was a soloist at MDT, performing in ballets such as Concerto Barocco, Les Sylphides and La Bayadere and became a prime interpreter of choreographer Loyce Houlton's contemporary ballet. In 1989 Robin transitioned to modern dance and worked with New Dance Ensemble, als...

Pramila Vasudevan is a cultural worker, choreographer and trans disciplinary artist. She is the founding Artistic Director of Aniccha Arts (since 2004), an experimental arts collaborative producing site-specific performances that examine agency, voice, and group dynamics within community histories, institutions, and systems. This is her fifth year as director of Naked Stages at Pillsbury House The...

Dance training with, Louise Revere Morris, 1926-1936; dance training with, Doris Humphrey, 1926-1936; dance training with, Charles Weidman, 1926-1936; dance training with, Hanya Holm, 1926-1936.

Gary Peterson has been a part of Minnesota’s dance community for nearly 40 years. In addition to his work as managing director of Ananya Dance Theatre and research collaborator with Dr. Ananya Chatterjea, he has served as dance student, consultant, and as executive director of James Sewell Ballet, Zorongo Flamenco Dance Theatre, Zenon Dance Company, and the Southern Theater. He has produced profes...

Prolific is perhaps the best word to describe Myron Johnson's career as Artistic Director and Choreographer of the Ballet of the Dolls and the Ritz Theatre. He's produced well over 150 ballets and shows no signs of slowing down or softening an edge that has defined his 50 years on the stage. But as he transitions into a new phase of his career, Johnson's 2011 solo show Songs for a S...

A dedicated performer, teacher and creator, Karen Long Charles received a BFA Ballet/BS Computer Science from Texas Christian University and M.Ed. in Administration from Georgia State University.  Charles has performed with numerous dance companies including Room to Move Dance Company (Atlanta, GA), Susan Warden Dance Company (Kansas City, MO) and was awarded a fellowship to study at the Alvin Ail...

A native of Mendota Heights, MN, Neil Greenberg studied from the age of 11 with Minnesota Dance Theatre and School, taking class and performing alongside Toni Pierce(-Sands), Robin Stiehm, and Lea Thompson (see photo).  He moved to New York City in 1976, and was a member of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company from 1979-1986.  As a choreographer he is known especially for his Not-About-AIDS-Dance ,...

Laurie Van Wieren has been a creative force in the Twin Cities for 30+ years. Her choreography has been shown in the Twin Cities, nationally, and in Europe. 9x22 Dance/Lab, her monthly showcase, is the pre-eminent performance platform for local and visiting choreographers. She’s developed work for the Walker Art Center’s Open Field performance, which highlighted 100 local choreographers. Van Wiere...

Amy Behm-Thomson studied dance at the University of Minnesota. She was a very active member of the Minneapolis dance community for over 15 years.  Amy joined ARENA Dances in 1999 and Zenon Dance Company in 2000. She has also performed with Dancing People Company, Ragamala Music and Dance, Catalyst - Dances by Emily Johnson, and Cathy Young Dance.  She is the proud mother of two young children livi...

 Greg Waletski is a graduate of Chaska High school and St. Old College. He has been a member of the Twin Cities dance scene for over 30 years. For 22 of those years he was a member of Zenon Dance Company. His most recent projects have been dances by Megan Meyer, including (FW) Redux which has been interrupted by Covid. In 2013 Greg began a career transition to American Sign Language/English Interp...

Since starting Zenon in 1983, Linda has earned accolades for developing the company’s unique modern and jazz aesthetic by commissioning repertory works from such choreographers as Bebe Miller, Dwight Rhoden, Bill T. Jones, Bill Young, Llory Wilson, Joe Goode, Stephanie Skura, David Dorfman, Doug Varone, Danny Buraczeski, Daniel Rousseve, Cathy Young, Keely Garfield, Johannes Wieland, Seán Curran,...

Zoe Sealy a major influence in the development of jazz dance in the Upper Midwest moved to the Twin Cities 40+ years ago. In 1972 she founded the Zoe Sealy Dance Center, which for many years was a primary training ground for jazz and tap artists. In addition Zoe founded and was Artistic Director of the Minnesota Jazz Dance Company and toured with the company in the 70’s and 80’s throughout the U.S...

Louise Robinson began dancing in her parents sunroom in Winona, MN at the age of three and has maintained a connection with dance in Minnesota ever since.  She attended St. Olaf College where she studied with Ann Wagner, Susan Bauer and Toni Sostek.  It was during college that she started learning the administrative side of dance and first got involved in an organization being formed  in the Twin...

April Sellers is an independent choreographer, dancer and performance curator who has created over 60 works over the past 18 years. She is the Founder and Artistic Director of April Sellers Dance Collective which is renowned for its complex expressions of identity in highly crafted performances. She uses movement, humor, and a mix of scripted and improvised content to explore gender, politics and...

Judith combines a rare articulate sensibility in dance and in writing, specializing in Jewish dance. Her career has been documented in the Performing Arts Archives of the Special Collections of the University of Minnesota and in the Dance Library of Israel.  The papers she donated to the Dance Library of Israel cover her work for the Batsheva-Bat Dor Dance Society from 1972-1977, letters with Sara...

Linda Shapiro works as a freelance writer and has published articles, reviews and essays on dance and other subjects in The Twin Cities Reader, The Minnesota Monthly, Midwest Home & Design, Minneapolis St. Paul Magazine, Architecture Minnesota, Music Live, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, St. Paul Pioneer Press, CLA Today, City Pages, Twin Cities Metro, The Rake and Dance Magazine and The Gay City Ne...