Dance Fest to include workshops, special project

June 2, 2011

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The 2011 Swamp Dance Fest, directed by Neta Pulvermacher, is a transformative four-week dance intensive intended for pre-professional and professional dancers 16 and older.

It combines a rigorous schedule of classes, rehearsals and performances, artist talks, seminars and special projects.

This summer, Yaniv Abraham of Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company will teach Gaga workshops as part of the intensive and create a new work with the dance fest’s participants. The New York-based Neta Dance Company will also be in residence teaching, creating and performing.

Gaga is the movement language and practice developed by Ohad Naharin throughout his work as a choreographer and artistic director of the world renowned Batsheva Dance Company. It is an experience in embodiment and the power of imagination, an experience of freedom and pleasure through guided, integrated movement exploration.

Abraham graduated from the Mate Asher School of Performing Arts under the direction of Yehodit Arnon, the founder of the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company. Soon after, Yaniv joined the Batsheva Ensemble in August 2001. Abraham has been awarded the America Israel Cultural Foundation grant in 2003, 2004 and 2005. Two years after dancing in the Batsheva Ensemble, Abraham joined the main company under the direction of world renowned choreographer Ohad Naharin and was a member of Batsheva until July 2010. In 2002, Abraham became a Gaga-certified teacher both for dancers and for nondancers. Since July 2010, he has been teaching master classes, workshops and setting repertoire of Ohad Naharin all over the world. Yaniv is now teaching Gaga on a regular basis in Tel Aviv at the Suzanne Dellal Centre.

The Neta Dance Company was founded in New York City in 1986 by Juilliard graduate and Israel native Pulvermacher, with her Juilliard classmates Ani Udovicki, Stephanie Tooman, Kraig Patterson and Andrea Feier. Pulvermacher and her company continue to push the boundaries of dance by merging movement, philosophy, science, music, intuition, narrative and imagery to suggest new meanings and possibilities, while creating a living, breathing theatrical space.

Swamp Dance Fest will be held July 4-31 at the UF School of Theatre and Dance.

Tuition and registration fees: four-week tuition is $1,250
two-week tuition is $750
(A nonrefundable application of $40 is required)

UF students can register for DAA4920 with Kevin Austin at kaustin@arts.ufl.edu. Non-UF students should contact Neta Pulvermacher to register at neta@ufl.edu