Jonathan Hollander, founder and artistic director of Hollander has facilitated American tours by dance Battery Dance Company,

is one of the outstanding companies from many countries and is Co-Founder choreographers of his generation and a leader in and Board Member of the Indo-American Arts international cultural exchange Council in New York. Hollander and social activism through dance. established Battery Dance Companys His work in 40 countries has been Downtown Dance Festival in 1981 supported by the U.S. Department and continues to serve as its artistic of State Cultural Envoy, Speakdirector. Hollander received the Silver ers and Performing Arts Initiative Mask of the Silesian Dance Theatre Programs; Fulbright Senior Scholar (Poland), the USable Award (Germany) and Fulbright Specialist Programs, and Arts & Business Councils Encore Ford Foundation, Trust for Mutual Award. Under Hollanders leadership, Understanding, Governments of Battery Dance Company actively Germany, Finland, India and others. supports the commissioning of new musical scores and the inclusion He has choreographed over 75 works of live musical performance in its that have been presented in major theaters and festivals throughout the JONATHAN HOLLANDER productions. Hollander has lectured U.S., Europe, Africa, the Middle East, President & Artistic Director on Arts Management and Arts Asia and Australia. Hollander has Education in countries as diverse as established Battery Dance Company s arts Mongolia, Poland and Taiwan. He has been a guest education residencies in universities, colleges and speaker for the Aspen Institute, India Foundation conservatories and at the primary, middle and for the Arts and keynote speaker for the 2011 high school levels in New York City public schools. Asia-Pacic International Dance Conference.

Battery Dance Company

Battery Dance Company has distinguished itself for 35 years through the unique quality, scope and diversity of its programs:
Creating dances that have astonished audiences in 40 countries around the world Teaching Dancing to Connect workshops on four continents, turning thousands of young people into dance-makers Bringing arts education to New York City public schools in all ve boroughs Presenting the Downtown Dance Festival, New York Citys longest-running dance festival Sharing expertise in the field of international cultural engagement through the first-ever online Cultural Diplomacy Toolkit Providing low cost rehearsal space to hundreds of groups each year through its Studio Share Program Partnering with Lower Manhattan Arts League, 11 arts organizations that share ideas, information & resources to ensure the vitality of downtowns cultural life

Battery Dance Company

380 Broadway, 5th Floor, New York, NY 10013-3518 Tel: 212/219.3910 | Fax: 212/219-3911 | www.batterydance.org
Photos - cover: Darial Sneed; top: Richard Termine Design: Sylviane Grant

Can a dance company be as

socially relevant

as it is

artistically excellent?

With everything that it does, Battery Dance Company answers these questions in the absolute armative. As a performing arts group known for its simply gorgeous*, entrancing* productions and supple, technically perfect dancers* and an organization committed to social progress at home and abroad, Battery Dance Company fully lives up to the denition of a dynamic cultural institution with a global sensibility.

Since its founding in 1976, Battery Dance Company has brought more than 100 dance pieces to life; performed extensively in 40 countries; mentored more than 200,000 public school students through its Dancing to Connect program; hosted the Downtown Dance Festival for 30 consecutive years; provided subsidized rehearsal space for 500 non prot dance and theater groups through its Studio Share Program; commissioned two dozen original scores; and welcomed numerous international choreographers, scholars and interns to its lower Manhattan studio. Staying relevant for three and a half decades has meant listening and responding to the needs of the local and global communities it serves. The importance of fostering an engaged audience for dance has been an urgent and consistent message and is a theme at the heart of each Battery Dance Company project. By bringing free classes, lectures, and performances to cities and towns worldwide Battery Dance Company reaches across geographic and linguistic borders to relate the vocabulary of dance to the language of everyday life in a way that stimulates and sustains a global appreciation for contemporary dance.

Can

choreography
have a

conscience?

* El Watan, Algeria; Outlook, India; Badische Zeitung, Germany

Photos - left to right: Chin Lai & Jacob Pritchard

when we

connect

when we

leap

Battery Dance Companys steadfast commitment to the accessibility of the arts often requires it to challenge the assumptions that accompany traditional dance performances. Some of the companys most treasured productions have occurred without tickets and without walls. While Battery Dance Company invites audiences to experience world-class dance at its home in lower Manhattan, the troupe also brings the music and movement of its work into the natural gathering places of communitiesschools, parks, office buildings, museums, and studiosfor acionados and first-time dance audiences alike to enjoy. This spirit is embodied in the Dancing to Connect program, an award-winning initiative that engages international youth in creativity and team building through the American art form of modern dance. Born from Battery Dance Companys Arts-inEducation initiatives in New York City public schools, which have served over 200,000 students of all ethnic backgrounds since its start over thirty years ago, Dancing to Connect lets students experience the full arc of the creative process, from the rst spark of an idea to the nal curtain call. Students work with Battery Dance Company teaching artists in intensive choreographic workshops that culminate in student performances of works they themselves have created. For many, interacting with Battery Dance Company provides the first exposure to professional artists. The grins that spread across the faces of children experiencing the thrill of a live dance performance for the very rst time compel Battery Dance Company to return year after year.

Battery Dance Company has toured five continents, bringing its works to Algeria, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bermuda, Bulgaria, Burma, Cambodia, China, Democratic Republic of Congo, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Ghana, Hungary, India, Israel, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Laos, Malaysia, Mongolia, Morocco, Namibia, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Slovenia, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Swaziland, Sweden, Taiwan, Tanzania, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda and Vietnam. Before each trip begins, Battery Dance Company partners with host countries to design a schedule that reinforces the companys dedication to making its art widely accessible and using dance to foster intercultural understanding. Between performancesoften staged in small cities and towns for which a visit from an international arts group is a rarityBattery Dance Company engages community members of all ages in a dialogue about dance. From hip-hop workshops with girls in headscarves in Amman to choreographic workshops with Klezmer musicians in Krakow, the company works to encourage an atmosphere in which ideas can be freely shared and collectively explored. Discovering similarities and respecting dierences are cornerstones of the Battery Dance Company international mission. From one trip to the next, a fundamental lesson is reconrmed: inspiration travels both ways. Just as the company emboldens young dancers in Kuala Lumpur to experiment with unfamiliar styles, the company returns home enriched and inuenced by many new friendships and fresh ways of seeing.

Print & design: courtesy of Photos - top to bottom: Christian Jungeblodt, Richard Termine, Nicholas Papp, Ina Debald

Photo: Jacob Pritchard

when we

assemble
languages into a single, vibrant dialect. Works that reference the historical and cross-disciplinary nature of dance are another of the traits that distinguish Battery Dance Company choreography. Poetry, painting, even Arabic calligraphy are equally likely to inform the companys choreography. The company is also well known for bringing its dancers together with newly commissioned scores, breathing visual and physical life into the notes for the rst time. The ultimate fusion occurs the moment the dancers and musicians face their audience. The rich inuences that have led to the creation of each work are as numerous as the varied backgrounds of the thousands of individuals who experience a Battery Dance Company performance each year.

when we

share

Collaboration is the hallmark of Battery Dance Companys creative process. When developing a new work, the company draws on the virtuosity and vision of its dancers, resident composers, musicians and designers to generate the final production. Under the direction of Jonathan Hollander, the companys President and Artistic Director, the expertise of the entire Battery Dance Company family is fused into a single, powerful expression. This practice gives voice to a chorus of cultures. Dancers in the company bring with them inuences from the countries of their formal dance training, including Barbados, France, India, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Serbia, Slovenia, South Africa, Sweden and Taiwan. The narratives of each composition are realized through the unication of these diverse

The cultural landscape in New York City changes continuously, perhaps nowhere more acutely than in Lower Manhattan. Staying relevant for thirty-ve years has required Battery Dance Company to be as dynamic as its surroundings. In 1982, Battery Dance Company created the Downtown Dance Festival, which has since become New York Citys longest-running public dance festival. The Festival revels in the panoply of dance that New York City oers and features a diversity of dance styles with a local and international roster of performers. After moving to its current home on Broadway in 1984, Battery Dance Company created the Studio Share Program , providing subsidized rehearsal space for nonprot dance and theater companies. The Studio Share program serves hundreds of dance companies each year, playing an urgent role in preserving the creative nexus that characterizes New York City. Through major funding from the Robert Sterling Clark Foundation, Battery Dance Company has launched the rst-ever Cultural Diplomacy Toolkit, a free online resource that shares with the arts and diplomatic communities the lessons learned from the Companys international projects in 40 countries. An active member of Lower Manhattan Arts League, Battery Dance Company partners with acclaimed downtown-based arts organizations to share ideas, information and resources and to devise new ways of ensuring the vitality and accessibility of the arts in lower Manhattan.

Photo: Jacob Pritchard

Photos - top to bottom: Richard Termine, Jacob Pritchard, Richard Termine