Michelle Mola wins the 2008 Susan Braun Award

Michelle Mola, a 2007 graduate of The Juilliard School, will create a dance for the camera with a grant from DFA and guidance from mentors. Unanimously chosen by DFA's 2008 team of mentors, Michelle demonstrates a distinct clarity of vision, confidence and artistry. Michelle also received the distinguished Leonore Annenberg Fellowship in 2008 and is scheduled to choreograph for the 2008 Juilliard Summer Dance Intensive. Mola is teaching artist and co-founder of enterCircle international outreach programs. In 2007, she received the Hector Zaraspe Prize for Outstanding Choreography.

Michelle's statement about proposed film
"Chambermaids and Tuxedo Dances"

The film journeys as first time movie director Michelle Mola curiously examines quintessential Busby Berkeley style musical sequences inside of the confines of a tight space. By rigging low tech contraptions normally used to get large scale shots created on giant Hollywood sound stages, we are shooting for and with the camera. We are executing complex camera movements, including camera operators as dancers and reversing their roles, we shoot the process and performance, the working class and the opulent, the cast and crew, the Chambermaids and Tuxedo dances. The short film proposes the notion our attention will not be misled by the institutions that oppress us; a series of contact improvisations whose characters each cope by devoting energies to simple pleasures, letting imaginations roam free. Our performers, characteristically androgenistic, surf between basic and embellished fashions. Through meticulous fieldwork examination of assembly lines, the reversal of fortune, mundane task and small strategy for survival, Michelle Mola and her creative companions construct and shoot improvisations in their Brooklyn arts studio The Manor.

"We are building for and with the camera simultaneously. There's something inappropriate about opening up the film to capture process and performance and explore turning everything on its head. If there wasn't that element of self identification, it wouldn't be something I was compelled to do. I think the miniature scale will create some interesting results and I enjoy being invested this way in the current workspace." www.MichelleMola.com

MENTORS for the 2008 Young Choreographers Initiative:
Gwendolen Cates, Ben Dolphin, Hila Shani, Julie Talen, Louis Venosta

Dancer: Logan Kruger; Photo by Michael Hart

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Austin McCormick, winner of 2007 Susan Braun Award

Statement of Intent written by Austin McCormick
Born in Santa Barbara and dancing since he was five, choreographer/dancer Austin McCormick writes, "I plan to develop and build upon a piece I began researching and creating while I was a student at the Juilliard School and the Conservatory of Baroque Dance. The piece is an exploration of Baroque patterns and vocabulary in conjunction with contemporary movement, contrasting formality and emotionally passionate abandon."

"I am fascinated by the Baroque period and its decadent ornamentation but more so in the underbelly of the period. My piece creates a world that is based on the social structure of a Court. The characters are each driven by different motivations and desires, however, must subscribe to a particular way of behaving in public. Choreographically, we see the group execute traditionally Baroque patterns and dances, however, throughout this ritual, we see glimpses of who each character really is as shown through aa contemporary perspective. The work explores who we allow ourselves to be seen in public and asks whether that persona is in conflict with who we really are at our core."

"Adapating this piece to film will open so many exciting possibilities. This medium will allow me to show the period floor patterns from different visual perspectives and illustrate the emotional implications of these patterns, their meaning. The Baroque form has so much inherent subtlety due to its time in history; film allows the viewer to be closer to the action, seeing every layered glance and relationship. I want the viewer to at times be at the vantage point of the King seeing an elaborate ceremony unfold for his pleasure and at times be in the center of the movement as if they are a dancer fulfilling their spatial duty, a cog in the wheel. Film allows an audience to see the whole picture while at the same time revealing a character's most private moments."

"I plan to work with filmmaker Phillip Buiser who brings his experience as a professional actor and graduate of the Neighborhood Playhouse to the collaboration."

Second prize was split between Ashley Browne and Belinda McGuire.

Third prize awarded to Berkeley Carroll School in Brooklyn
(free class offered in the fall, 2007)

MENTORS for the 2007 Young Choreographers Initiative:

Pre-Production: Visual Structure and Storyboarding: Betty Jenkins
Idea development/Writer: Elizabeth Zimmer, Louis Venosta
Composer: Teresa Wimmer
Lighting: Dikayl
Production Manager: Doug LeClaire
Cinematographer: Jerry Pantzer, Penny Ward, Ronald Grey
Choreographer: Judy Lieff, Jody Oberfelder
Director: Daniel Conrad, Amy Greenfield
Editor: Kathleen Fitzgerald, Monica Gillette
Photographer: Nan Melville
Programmer: Bill Woods