News of Note: What You Might Have Missed in May and June 2020
Here are the latest promotions and appointments, plus notable awards and accomplishments from the last two months.
Comings & Goings
Ma Cong
has been named associate artistic director at Richmond Ballet. He will serve in an adjunct capacity before joining full-time in 2022.
New Zealand Dance Company has appointed Victoria Colombus and James O’Hara co-artistic directors, and Janine Dijkmeijer executive director, beginning part-time in June and full-time in 2021.
Annette Shun Wai
has been appointed artistic director of the OzAsia Festival.
Bobby Asher
has been appointed director of Duke Performances, effective Sept. 1.
Jared Redick
has been appointed interim dean of dance at University of North Carolina School of the Arts.
At National Ballet of Canada, Spencer Hack and Siphesihle November have been promoted to first soloist, Hannah Galway to second soloist.
Karolina Kuras, Courtesy National Ballet of Canada
Elena Lobsanova
will join Miami City Ballet as a principal, Hannah Fischer as a principal soloist, beginning with the 2020–21 season.
Julian McKay
will join San Francisco Ballet as a principal, beginning with the 2021 season.
Longtime Atlanta Ballet dancer Nadia Mara has left the company to join National Ballet of Uruguay as a principal.
Caili Quan
has left BalletX to pursue choreography. Savannah Green and Ashley Simpson have joined the company.
Sarah Ricard Orza
has retired from Pacific Northwest Ballet.
Jane Moss
will step down from her position as artistic director of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in August.
Louis Robitaille
will step down from his post as artistic director of Les Ballets Jazz de Montreal in June 2021.
Awards & Honors
Aaron Rosenblum, Courtesy C4 Global Communications
Karen Sherman
was among the recipients of a Herb Alpert Award for the Arts, which comes in the form of a $75,000 grant.
Ronald K. Brown
was awarded the 2020 Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award, which includes a $25,000 unrestricted cash prize.
Sonya Tayeh
received the 2020 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Choreography for Moulin Rouge! The Musical.
Australian Ballet physiotherapist Dr. Susan Mayes has been named a member of the Order of Australia.
Colleen Smith
has received the 2020 Randolph A. Frank Prize for the Performing Arts, which includes a $10,000 prize.
Performance Garage has named Joe González its 2020–21 DanceVisions’ Resident Artist.
The International Association of Blacks in Dance received a $50,000 Recordings at Risk grant from the Council on Library and Information Resources, to fund its Preserving the History and Legacy of Black Dance in America archive digitization project.
Recipients of Hewlett 50 Arts Commissions, each of which comes in the form of a $150,000 grant, include Joanna Haigood (with Dancers’ Group), Ishmael Houston Jones (Circo Zero), Margaret Jenkins (Margaret Jenkins Dance Company), Yayoi Kambara (Japanese American Citizens League), Liz Lerman (Green Music Center), Patrick Makuakāne (Nā Lei Hulu | Ka Wēkiu), Prumsodun Ok (Center for Empowering Refugees and Immigrants and ARTogether), Alleluia Panis (Filipino-American Development Foundation), Vanessa Sanchez (Brava! for Women in the Arts) and Amara Tabor-Smith (EastSide Arts Alliance).
At the 2020 Association of Teaching Artists Awards, Nai-Ni Chen received the Distinguished Service to the Field Award.
Recipients of the Dora Mavor Moore Awards for the 2019–20 season included Rock Bottom Movement (Outstanding Production and Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble, hollow mountain), Crystal Pite (Outstanding Original Choreography, Angels’ Atlas for National Ballet of Canada), Jay Gower Taylor (Outstanding Achievement in Design, Angels’ Atlas), Josh Martin (Outstanding Performance by an Individual, Leftovers), and Eliot Britton and Rick Sacks (Outstanding Original Sound Composition, Red Sky Performance’s AF).
