News and Events
Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre presents its 27th annual Bardavon gala performances, February 28 - March 1, 2009.
POUGHKEEPSIE, NY - The Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre (VRDT) will present its 27th annual gala performance on Saturday, February 28th, at 8:00pm, and Sunday, March 1st, at 3:00pm at the Bardavon 1869 Opera House in Poughkeepsie, NY (35 Market Street). Tickets are available on campus at the information desk in Main Building and the Dance Department office in Kenyon Hall. Tickets are also available at the Bardavon Box Office and through Ticketmaster (845) 454-3388. General admission tickets are $10; $7 for seniors, Vassar students, and the Vassar community.
"We are all very excited to be celebrating our 27th Anniversary at the Bardavon," stated Maureen Mansfield Kaddar, director of the VRDT. "The dancers have put their hearts and souls into this challenging and stimulating program."
Highlights of the VRDT's gala performance at the Bardavon this year will include Aureole, one of the signature works of master choreographer Paul Taylor and a beloved dance on many of the programs performed by his company in the past four and a half decades. Mansfield Kaddar, previously a dancer with the Paul Taylor Dance Company, has restaged Mr. Taylor's Aureole on VRDT this season, as well as his Esplanade, with Jill Echo, in 2003.
VRDT will also perform Tom Gold's (New York City Ballet) exotic and delightful ballet, Elemental, while award-winning dance and theater choreographer Peter Pucci will give rise to highly contrasted dynamics in his new ballet,shine.
Faculty choreographer, Kathy Wildberger, and guest choreographer, Takehiro Ueyama, will present two new unique modern dance works to Steve Reich scores, as they join the greater Vassar community this year in honoring this legendary composer.
Jill Echo, current Vassar faculty member and dancer/assistant director with TAKE Dance, is working closely with Mr. Ueyama in setting his new dance. Miriam Mahdaviani, a veteran of New York City Ballet, will return this year to create the company finale piece, which will be performed to a live five-piece Klezmer band. Student choreographers will include Joey Army, Robin Cherof, Max Hershenow, Marina Hitosugi-Levesque, Caitlyn Lamdin, and Cameron Lussier.
Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre (VRDT) gives dance students of Vassar College the opportunity to perform classic dance works from the ballet and modern repertoire as well as new choreography by faculty, guest artists, and the students themselves. By allowing students the freedom to create, develop, and present their own new dance works under the guidance of recognized artists in the field, VRDT provides a unique dance experience for the company as well as audience members.
For more information call the Vassar College Dance Department office at (845) 437-7470. To buy tickets by phone call Ticketmaster (845) 454-3388. Individuals with disabilities requiring accommodations should contact the Bardavon box office (845) 473-2072, as far in advance as possible to request reasonable and appropriate accommodations for the event.
Vassar College is a highly selective, coeducational, independent, residential liberal arts college founded in 1861.Posted by College Relations Thursday, January 22, 2009
About the Arts
Powerhouse Theater
The Powerhouse Theater is a collaboration between New York Stage and Film and Vassar College. It is dedicated to both emerging and established artists in the development and production of new works for theater and film. During an intense eight-week summer residency on the Vassar campus, up to twenty different projects are publicly presented, typically engaging more than 200 professional artists and theater students. Plays, musicals, and screenplays are presented in a variety of forms: readings, workshops, and fully staged productions. Since the first Powerhouse Theater season in 1985, New York Stage and Film and Vassar have served more than 2,000 artists and over 175,000 audience members through the development and production of artistically exceptional and affordably priced performances.
Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center
Located just inside Vassar's Main Gate, the Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center houses the college's permanent collection, over 18,000 works, including paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints, photographs, and glass and ceramic wares, charting the history of art from antiquity to the present. The Permanent Collection Galleries feature 350 works, ranging from the sculpted Head of Viceroy Merymose from His Outer Sarcophagus (Egyptian, c 1375 BCE) in the Antiquities Gallery to Marsden Hartley's oil on canvas Indian Composition (1914-15) in the Twentieth Century Gallery. For information on current and upcoming special exhibitions, self-guided and curriculum-based tours, and group visits, please visit the website. The art center is open to the public, and admission is free.
James W. Palmer Gallery
Located in the College Center in Main Building, the James W. Palmer III '90 Gallery presents eight shows annually, including exhibitions by renowned artists and photographers, studio art faculty and students, and local arts organizations. Recent highlights included Andrea Baldeck’s black-and-white photo exhibit, Touching the Mekong: A Southeast Asian Sojourn, organized by the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology; the Vassar Haiti Project’s annual exhibition and auction of imported arts and handcrafts; and Design Inside, showcasing the work of Vassar’s College Relations design team. All exhibitions are free and open to the public. For information on upcoming exhibitions, visit the website or call (845) 437-5370.
Music Department
Located in the Belle Skinner Hall of Music, the Martel Recital Hall is wonderfully suited, both acoustically and aesthetically, to music performance. With seating for 500, the Martel is home to the Vassar College Orchestra, Choir, Women's Chorus, Madrigal Singers, and numerous chamber groups and ensembles. The Martel concert schedule routinely includes distinguished guest artists, faculty recitals, senior recitals, and special musical events, such as last year's series of organ recitals celebrating the installation and dedication of the college's superb pipe organ, designed by masterbuilder Paul Fritts. For information on upcoming concerts and events (which are free and open to the public unless otherwise noted), please visit the website.
Dance Department
The Department of Dance sponsors several public performances each year. Among those, the Vassar Repertory Dance Theatre (VRDT) has a series of Works in Progress showings in the fall, a winter Modfest performance in conjunction with the The Department of Music, winter galas at the 1869 Bardavon Opera House, and two All Parents Weekend performances in the spring. The department's Master Class program annually invites at least one ballet and one modern expert to campus in addition to two people in other areas of dance. Public performances and lectures are often associated with these renowned visitors. Guest artists in the past have included: Irina Kolpokova, Arthur Mitchell, Helene Alexopoulos, Gregory Hines, Anna Kisselgoff, Donald Byrd, Edward Villella, Ronald K. Brown, Irene Dowd, Allegra Kent, Gelsey Kirkland, Pilobolus w/Adam Battlestein, Suzanne Farrell, Mummenschantz, Eldar Aliev, Deborah Jowitt, Bill T. Jones, Pascal Rioult, Clinton Luckett of ABT, Bill Irwin, and Donald McKayle. Many of the department's dance performances are in the Frances Daly Fergusson Dance Theater, located in Kenyon Hall.