PRESS
PARTIAL LISTING OF PRESS RELATED TO 1998-99 FULBRIGHT SENIOR SCHOLAR FELLOWSHIP IN PERU
Radio and Television
• Radio: Sol y Harmonía: Noticiero Meridiano with Carlos Fernandez, Lima, November 4, 12:00 noon: interview with Mark Degarmo and Gina Nateri (sic)
• America Radio/ 94.3 FM: "A las seis en la radio"; Friday, June 4, 1999; 6:20 PM; Live Interview with Mark DeGarmo and Ursula Lu
• Channel 7 Television; Tuesday, June 8, 1999; 12 noon; Interview with Mark DeGarmo and company dancing taped for broadcast
• Cable Mágico Television/ Channel 14: "Agenda Cultural"; Interview with Mark DeGarmo and company dancing taped on June 10, 1999 at 10:00 AM for broadcast 8 times: Friday and Monday June 11 and 14 at 8:00PM, and Saturday and Sunday, June 12 and 13 at 9:30 AM, 6:30PM, and 11:00PM
• Channel 13 Television; Tuesday, June 15; 11:40PM; Live broadcast from ICPNA/Miraflores: interview with Mark DeGarmo and three dancers (Mónica de Osma, Ursula Lu, and Lili Zeni) dancing
• Channel 7 Television; Wednesday, June 16; 7:15PM; Taped interview with Mark DeGarmo before the show at ICPNA/Miraflores
Print Media
• El Comercio; Lima, viernes, 23 de octubre de 1998: "Coreógrafo norteamericano en Lima: Mark de Garmo vino a aprender": interview.
• La Industria, Trujillo, miercoles, 9 de diciembre: "Ballet Municipal recibe a coreógrafo americano": article
• Nuevo Norte, Trujillo, miercoles 9 de diciembre: "Ballet Municipal recibe a coreógrafo americano": article
• El Comercio, Lima, viernes 11 de diciembre: "Excavaciones: Un aliento para le danza local": review by Lichi Garland
• La Industria, Trujillo, sábado 12 de diciembre: "Mark DeGarmo en Trujillo: Prestigioso coreógrafo neoyorquino intercambia experiencias con elenco de Ballet Municipal": interview
• Gestión; Lima; April 4, 1999; "Mark DeGarmo en Lima"; announcement of aesthetic education course
• El Comercio: Luces: Agenda Hoy; Lima; Monday, May 17; "Educación Estética"; annoucement
• Caretas: Ellos & Ellas; Lima; Thursday, June 3; "Danza con Huella"; Article & photo
• El Comercio: Luces; Thursday, June 3; "Danza Moderna: De las excavaciones a las huellas: El coreógrafo Norteamericano Mark DeGarmo presenta del 16 al 18 de este mes, en el ICPNA de Miraflores: 'Excavaciones' y 'Huellas en el Camino', en Noche de Estreno"; Article with photos by Patricia Castro Obando
• El Comercio: Visto y Bueno: Semana del 4 al 17 de Junio: "Huellas en el Camino: Por Lima Con DeGarmo: Nuevo montaje de un extraordinario coreógrafo"; Cover Story/ Interview of Mark DeGarmo written by Sergio Burstein with photos by Guillermo Figueroa
• Gestión; Friday, June 4; "El otro sueño americano: Mark DeGarmo regresa al Perú para estrenar coreografía, realizar proyectos de intercambio y anunciar la próxima inauguración de una escuela de danza modern en Lima"; Article/photos
• El Comercio; Sunday, June 6; "¡Ah, la esperanza!"; Article by Lichi Garland with mention of Mark DeGarmo
• Prensa Nikkei: Por los Caminos del Arte; Lima; Friday, June 11; "Iniciativa 2000"; Announcement/ photos by Felipe Tapia
• El Sol; Lima; Friday, June 11; "Camino al bailar"; Announcement/photo
• El Comercio; Monday, June 14; "Invitado de honor: Mark DeGarmo en el Festival Internacional de Danza de Trujillo que se inicia hoy"; Photo/announcement
• El Sol; Tuesday, June 15; "Huellas sobre Lima"; Article/ photo
• Expreso; Lima; Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, June 16, 17, & 18; 3 advertisements with photo
• La República; Perú; Wednesday, June 16; "Danza moderna en el
ICPNA"; Article/photo
• El Peruano; Lima; Wednesday, June 16; "Coreografía de Mark DeGarmo: 'Huellas en el Camino'. Una Obra de movimientos ágiles y bien coordinados"; Article/ photo
• Expreso; Wednesday, June 16; "Coreografía de Mark DeGarmo en Lima: Para ver el Perú: 'Huellas en el Camino'"; Article/ photos
• El Comercio; Thursday, June 17; "Danza moderna: Coreografía urbana: El Camino de Mark DeGarmo"; Interview/article written by José Gabriel Chueca; Photo by César Hartmann
• El Comercio: SOMOS (magazine): Number 654; Saturday, June 19; "Danza: Frank DeGarmo (sic): Huellas y Contrastes: con su apoya se empieza a gestar la idea de nuestra primera gran escuela de danza moderna"; Interview/article with photos by Mayu Mohana
• La Industria; Trujillo, Perú; Sunday, June 20; "11th International Ballet Festival of Trujillo"; mention in article
• El Comercio: Luces; Monday, June 21; "Danza: ¿Retrato de Lima?: 'Huellas en el Camino'"; Review by Lichi Garland with photo
• El Comercio: Luces; Thursday, June 24; "'Excavaciones'/ 'Huellas en el Camino' de Mark DeGarmo"; Announcement of performance at Museo de la Nación
• El Comercio: SOMOS: Number 655; Saturday, June 26; "Danza
Invisible"; Letter to the Editor written by Morella Petrozzi with Editor's Response/ with photos
• El Comercio: Sociales; Saturday, June 26; "Las Huellas de Mark DeGarmo"; Photo essay of the dance concert at ICPNA/Miraflores (Friday, June 18)
• Puntos Seguido: Cultural; July 1999; Interview of Mark DeGarmo (Sunday, June 13 at 10:00AM) written by Karla Villarreal.
REPRESENTATIVE REVIEW AND ARTICLE
ECUADOR NEWS: National Edition published every 15 days: New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Chicago, Washington, Los Angeles, Houston, Toronto, Miami
ECUADOR NEWS: January 16-31, 2001.
DANCE: SPEAKING OF DANCE, by Patricia Aulestia
"Relative Tranquility," an Ecuadorian Choreodrama, Premieres in New York
"In Ecuadorian dance I find many voices and breaths. I feel encouraged by these propositions. And since I'm an educator, I don't only direct a rehearsal, but I delight in the talent of the group and I collect from it new sequences to teach them in different ways," says U.S. choreographer Mark DeGarmo on his last visit to Ecuador, when he did assessments of dance in Quito and Guayaquil for a period of six weeks, thanks to an important grant offered him by the U.S. Department of State.
The professor also managed to express what he had felt during that enriching experience of teaching-learning: "If I breathe in so many Ecuadorian sensations, I ought to exhale choreography." Fulfilling what he expressed at that time, he presented at Tribeca Performing Arts Center the New York premiere of "Relative Tranquility, a work created for the National Dance Company of Ecuador (the CND) in the summer of 2000.
The new performance, now interpreted by ten dancers from his company, confirmed the reports which appeared in the Quito newspaper El Comercio during the choreographic process: DeGarmo sought to divest the dancers of every extraneous element of their identity, stripping them of whatever characteristic was not completely authentic. From that perspective he created "Relative Tranquillity," a work that has as its core the simplicity and the personal search of each dancer, translated into movement. But "Relative Tranquility" is not lacking in thematic elements. The work revolves around two ideas – the image of "relative tranquility" in which the city of Quito existed during the orange alert caused by the Guagua Pichincha volcano in 1999, and the general crisis of the country in the preceding months. For the work, the instructor reviewed the recent history of the country, its friendship with Peru, its corruption, the banking debacle, emigration. All those themes he converted into ex-centric spiral movements, in vertiginous displacements that brake abruptly, in arms that agitate furiously, and then slow down. Maria Luisa Gonzalez, director of the National Dance Company, spoke likewise about the meaning of the work: "The risk is more evident, the energy of a collective of dancers that constantly maintains an edge of emotional and muscular tension, and why not say it, of the social tension which is what allows the viewer to have open readings of the work, what allows us to admit the necessity of finding new collective, or social, or group strengths, to serve us in life."
Steeped in these preceding experiences, Mark DeGarmo & Dancers accomplished an effective recreation of the work for its New York premiere. On the stage, excellently lit, they contrasted the two choreographic parts, which favored the creation of a dramatic atmosphere. In the first part: four dancers in silence lift one arm upwards along the body towards the neck, provoking, without altering any other element, a symbolic discourse. They look towards the sky, seeming to want to touch heaven with their hands, as if they were trying to bring down the stars. The movements arise from deep inside each dancer, and the performers formally give themselves over to the execution of rigorous technical skills. After a blackout, in the second part, the crescendo of a mute violence empowers the ten sensitive bodies: solo and in pairs, they run, turn, jump, fall, circle, and group together, falling over and over again into circles, centrifugal spirals and in spatial ruptures which express their desperation to free themselves. DeGarmo molded the Ecuadorian choreographic production into a homogeneous and committed group of performers that transformed what was, in effect, a local event, into a universal one.
The audience, impressed, applauded vigorously the originality of the choreographic proposition and the rending, tearing life force of the artists.
In "Relative Tranquility,' choreography by DeGarmo, music by Inkalesh, and lighting by Suzanne Lavander [sic, Lavender], the dancers were Yonati Joni Amar, Marie Baker-Lee, Olga Barrios, Tina Chang, Jill Emerson, Jill Spiewak Eng, Corinna Hiller, Jill Locke, Tresa Randall, and Dana Scarano.
The program, titled, "Mark DeGarmo Eyes the World," also included the world premier of "Dear Children:" Awake and Rise," and ":Bitter Grounds: A Portrait of El Salvador." The season of Mark DeGarmo & Dancers, a part of the Tribeca Dance Series, also counted on the collaboration of PAMAR – Pan American Musical Art Research Inc.
Viva la Danza!
Mark DeGarmo, dancer, choreographer, founder and artistic director of Dynamic Forms, Inc., a non-profit organization, is also a teacher, panelist, writer, lecturer, ex co-president of the negotiating team of the Union of Teaching Artists, and a national and international defender of dance in the cultural life of the state of New York and of the United States.
He began his dance studies in 1977, impressed by a performance of dance/theater in Massachusetts. He studied art at the University of Ohio. In New York, he studied at the Juilliard School, where he obtained his BFA. In 1982 he founded his own company, Mark DeGarmo & Dancers, with which he has made more than 15 world tours in recent years, presenting 75 works by himself in Ecuador, El Salvador, England, France, Mexico, Peru, and Slovenia. He has taught at the Jose Limon Institute in New York and at the Institute of Aesthetic Education at Lincoln Center in New York. He has received many awards: An American Cultural Specialist Award 2000 from the Department of State of the United States; the Cultural Challenge Award of the Department of Cultural Affairs of the City of New York; the Annenberg Challenge Award from the New York Center for Arts Education; the Fulbright Senior Scholar Fellowship to Peru; and recognition form the National Endowment for the Arts, among many others."
SELECTED QUOTES
"Last year I was able to see the children in a new light. Some of the student vocabulary enrichment included: elements of dance, levels in space, patterns, locomotion, overlapping, counterpoint and intensity. There was a lot of thinking and problem solving involved for the students to do in order to accomplish the activities, not just random movement."
—Jessica Carrion, First Grade Teacher, New York City Department of Education, Queens
"Mark DeGarmo & Dancers connects dance with the world."
—Middle School Student, MS 135, Bronx
"Mark DeGarmo & Dancers have offered a highly professional, extremely creative, performing arts residency and workshops. The response from students, parents and teachers to this dance experience has been uniformly positive and has increased understanding of how the arts are essential to education and learning. The teaching artists are familiar with the new learning standards and work along with classroom teachers to develop critical thinking or evidential reasoning skills."
—Marlene S. Filewich, Acting Superintendent, Community School District 11, Bronx
"You make dancing a wonderful, fun experience and at the same time a tremendous learning activity."
—Wendy Pass, Second Grade Teacher, PS 81, Bronx
"The culmination of the class experience was a performance at Davis School by Mark DeGarmo & Dancers. Before each piece, a dancer spoke with the children giving them elements to look for and focus on in each dance. The audience was quite engaged and attentive. It was fabulous! Each teacher then followed up the performance with art, rhythms, discussions and stories. Geography was out of the post-dance process as well, since the program was entitled, Dance Around the World."
—Judith Pinals, Arts Coordinator, Davis School, New Rochelle, NY
"One could not ask more from a dance performance."
—Lichi Garland, Dance Critic, El Comercio, Lima, Peru
"He's doing 'nothing' and he's doing 'everything.'"
—Gerardo Delgado, Director, En Dos Partes, Mexico City
"This is an outstanding New York City cultural organization that has received past recognition for the excellence of its Schools Partnership Program: A Comprehensive Arts Education ... Its excellent interdisciplinary and intercultural programs use the art of dance and creative movement to illustrate and enrich the study of the arts and other curriculum areas."
—Dr. Angelo Gimondo, Former Superintendent, District 30 Queens
"Mark DeGarmo was a truly outstanding cultural specialist."
—Susan R. Crystal, Cultural Affairs Officer, US Embassy, Quito Ecuador
"This is as good as it gets."
—Srimati Lal, Painter and Art Critic, Calcutta Times of India
"You were gorgeous! You were gorgeous! You were almost edible!"
—Helen Caldicott, Physician and Environmental Activist, Ghost Ranch, Abiquiu, New Mexico
"Mark danced right off the charts!"
—Rev. Dr. Paul Smith, Pastor, First Presbyterian Church, Brooklyn
"Mark's performance. . .was charming and hilarious and a hit with the opening night audience at Audart."
—Audrey Regan, Audart Gallery, New York
"Mark DeGarmo & Dancers move with a supple measure of freewheeling energy."
—Dulcie Leimbach, The New York Times
"MARK DeGARMO made oddly interesting things happen in the works that he and his dancers presented. . . He was particularly inventive in 'Drive with 8's,' a solo for himself in which he ran and leaped, punching the air and acting like a tough guy. Suddenly, he grew ill at ease. And this was not the nervousness of a fleeing thug, for he looked vulnerable. However, once he let down his guard, he was carefree. As both performer and choreographer, Mr. DeGarmo made these changes fascinating."
—Jack Anderson, The New York Times
