Aerial Dance = A Lifelong Pursuit

Susan Murphy has had a profound influence on my work in aerial dance, and I am thrilled to introduce her to the AerialDancing.com community.  Susan began training with Terry Sendgraff, a gymnast in California who saw potential for expression in the air.  Terry is credited with inventing the single point dance trapeze and starting a movement of self expression and healing through aerial dance.  As one of her proteges, Susan has performed her work at Lincoln Center and currently tours with Girls on Trapeze, an all-female aerial troupe whose work, Herself Rising, recently won Circus Now’s International Contemporary Circus Exposure competition in 2014. If you’ll be in New York January 8th, 2015, you should check it out! Susan will be performing a solo about her grandmother and great-grandmother with plenty of other fabulous pieces from the company at the show. Also Upcoming: Susan is also hosting a retreat this September 2014 at her studio. (See the end of the article for more on that!)

Continue reading “Aerial Dance = A Lifelong Pursuit”

Interview with Ilona Jäntti: Creator of a One Woman Show

ilona jantti

 

Ilona Jäntti studied circus at Circus Piloterna in Stockholm and contemporary dance at Laban Centre in London obtaining a master’s degree in choreography. Ilona has collaborated with a diverse range of circus, dance and theatre companies and venues including Shakespeare’s Globe, Royal Opera House, The Place and Darwin Centre at National History Museum in the UK, Circo Aereo and Flow Productions in Finland and Cirkus Cirkör in Sweden. She has been a resident artist at V&A Museum of Childhood since 2010. Ilona has been awarded a three-year Artist Grant by the Finnish Government, starting in 2012. We were lucky enough to snag an interview with her between shows at the 2014 Spoleto Festival in Charleston, SC. Special thanks to Circus Building for hosting the Meet & Greet event.  Continue reading “Interview with Ilona Jäntti: Creator of a One Woman Show”