c / l / a / s / s / e / s
(Starting September 20th - December 21st)

Int/Adv Contemporary Technique
Wed 9:30 - 11:15am (no class Wed Oct 5th)
$12 Drop-In | $50 Five Class Card

GYROKINESIS®
Tues 5:00 - 6:15pm
$10 Drop-In

The mOuth Studio
810 SE Belmont, Studio 2
PDX.

i / n / f / o

Int/Adv Contemporary Technique
My technique classes are focused on maintaining and strengthening technical fundamentals of contemporary dance while providing space and opportunity to unleash each person’s informed and uninhibited potential.

Warm-ups focus first and foremost on generating heat, turning on the core and expanding the spine with principles and exercises sourced from GYROKINESIS®, Countertechnique, release techniqe and Qi Gong. Class shifts to focus on the building blocks of dance technique from plies to swings to floorwork before moving across the floor and into phrasework. While focusing on the fundamentals, this class calls on your imagination and willingness to take risk in order to deepen your experience of full-bodied movement and push yourself into a new physical realm. Weaving together codified technique with risk taking and imaginative improvisation, this class will give you the strength and tools to follow your desire and understand your body's own movement system.

GYROKINESIS®
Developed by a professional dancer for dancers seeking long and healthy careers, Gyrokinesis deepens our understanding of core strength to include qualities of suppleness, length and expansion. We will move through the fundamental exercises of Gyrokinesis--including the seven natural elements of spinal movement while also addressing all other joint articulations and ongoing deep abdominal engagement. It is helpful to bring a mat or something soft to use as padding for work on the floor.

b / i / o

With degrees in Urban Planning and Dance, Shannon Stewart has a rich history as a contemporary dancer, music organizer, and activist on the West Coast. Since 2001, Shannon has been performing professionally as a dancer locally, nationally and internationally for stage and film and began making her own work in 2008.

Having cross-trained in ballet, contemporary, release, breakdancing, yoga, capoiera, qigong, improvisation, GYROTONIC® system and somatic awareness, Shannon currently dances with tEEth and Salt Horse (2010-2011), and has danced for Dayna Hanson (2010), zoe | juniper (2005, 2008-2010), Ricki Mason (2003-2006), Kathleen Hermesdorf (2006-2008) and many others. She is certified in Gyrokinesis®, teaches contemporary technique, improvisation,, and Dance for Parkinson’s with the Mark Morris Dance For Parkinson’s program.

Shannon co-founded the Vera Project, the All-ages Movement Project, and wrote and released a history and how-two guide for all-ages music organizations in 2010, and acted as Velocity Dance Center's Development and Interim Executive Director from 2008-2011 . Her deep connection to the PNW music and dance scene and activist background impacts her approach to making contemporary performance work, finding unique ways to open up the creative process, choosing collaborators, and feeding the desire to deepen the exchange between performer and audience.

AUDTION NOTICE

FOR NEW DANCE AND FILM WORKS BY

SHANNON STEWART & ADAM SEKULER

SATURDAY AUGUST 27^TH 12-2PM

VELOCITY DANCE CENTER – FOUNDERS STUDIO

1621 12^TH AVE

SEATTLE, WA 98122

Shannon Stewart is seeking up to five dancer/performers for an evening length work building off of the past year of developing works related to memory and memory loss. This new work will be performed this fall as part of a three-month residency in a downtown Seattle Storefront.

DATES | October 1 – Dec 18

REHEARSALS | Friday – Tuesday (with Sat or Sun off). 7-10 hrs/wk

All-ages, genders, body types, and abilities are welcome. Professional performing experience preferred.

An Inner Place that Has No Place (working title), is a multi-media dance piece that Shannon Stewart will be choreographing and directing with filmmaker Adam Sekuler. The cast will be in residence in a Seattle Storefront called the Memory (Loss) Bank this fall and will perform both set and improvisational work.

The work will culminate in two weekends of performances in Seattle, one weekend in Portland, and possibly more in the future.

The budget is small, but all performers will be paid for performances and for special associated events.

Please RSVP by emailing shannonkstewart@gmail.com

PDX Class Update

There are two more Thursday intensives! 9-11:30 on 8/18 and 8/25.

I'm adding a Gyrokinesis® class on Tuesday Nights at the mOuth from 5:30 -6:30. Only $8!

810 SE Belmont
Studio 2

GETTING PHYSICAL (8.4 – 8.25)
A mini-dance intensive
With tEEth company member SHANNON STEWART

Four Thursdays in August @ mOuth
9-9:50am GYROKINESIS®
10-11:30 Int/Adv Contemporary Technique

For four weeks (Aug4-25th), Shannon Stewart will teach a special class series focused on conditioning the body and mind to create an expansive physical practice.

REGISTRATION
Class Series - $65
Gyrokinesis® or Technique Only - $40
Drop In - $12

Register by emailing shannonkstewart@gmail.com by Jul 29, 2011.

Getting Physical is aimed at strengthening our #1 resource – our bodies. The goal is to unleash each person’s informed and uninhibited potential through a series of morning-long immersions.

A Gyrokinesis warm up will help to shape our understanding of core strength to include qualities of suppleness, length and expansion. We will begin by moving through the fundamental exercises of Gyrokinesis--including the seven natural elements of spinal movement while also addressing all other joint articulations and deep abdominal engagement.

From this integrated place we will move into contemporary technique. While focusing on the fundamentals, this class calls on your imagination and willingness to take risk in order to deepen your experience of full-bodied movement and push yourself into a new physical realm. Weaving together codified technique and imaginative improvisation, this class will give you the strength and tools to follow your desire and understand your own signature and system.

B I o

With degrees in Urban Planning and Dance, Shannon Stewart has a rich history as a contemporary dancer, music organizer, and activist on the West Coast. Since 2001, Shannon has been performing professionally as a dancer locally, nationally and internationally for stage and film and began making her own work in 2008.

Having cross-trained in ballet, contemporary, release, breakdancing, yoga, capoiera, qigong, improvisation, GYROTONIC® system and somatic awareness, Shannon currently dances with tEEth and Salt Horse (2010-2011), and has danced for Dayna Hanson (2010), zoe | juniper (2005, 2008-2010), Ricki Mason (2003-2006), Kathleen Hermesdorf (2006-2008) and many others. She is certified in Gyrokinesis®, teaches contemporary technique, improvisation,, and Dance for Parkinson’s with the Mark Morris Dance For Parkinson’s program.

Shannon co-founded the Vera Project, the All-ages Movement Project, and wrote and released a history and how-two guide for all-ages music organizations in 2010. Her deep connection to the PNW music scene and activist background impacts her approach to making work, finding unique ways to open up the creative process, choosing collaborators, and feeding the desire to deepen the exchange between performer and audience.

Images from A Better Container excerpt at the Northwest New Works Festival at On the Boards.

A Better Container from Adam Sekuler on Vimeo.

Northwest New Works Festival at On the Boards | Mainstage June 18th & 19th, 8pm

TITLE: A BETTER CONTAINER
Direction: Shannon Stewart & Adam Sekuler
Movement Creation and Performance: Mary Margaret Moore, Marissa Niederhauser, Shannon Stewart
Guest Performer: Lenore Waldron
Composer/Performer: Sam Mickens
Video: Adam Sekuler
Lighting: Jessica Trundy
Costumes: Jenine Fisher



I'm honored to share a showcase on the mainstage June 18th & 19th with aluminum siding & mattisonthemove (Dance), Haruko Nishimura (Dance), The Blank Department (Music), and to participate in this festival with many amazing artists.

NW New Works Festival 2011 Jun 10-Jun 19

http://ontheboards.org/performances/nw-new-works-festival-2011

$14 • On the Boards 8:00PM • Mainstage & Studio Theater

Call the to get discounts on multiple tickets:
$14 for 1 showcase | $20 for 2 showcases
$24 for 3 showcases | $30 for all 4 showcase

Photos by Adam Sekuler

Teacups, sisters, ellen stewart, banana cream pie, 5 beautiful dances. Photos here.

Adopt a memory, replace a memory, replay a memory.

1/1/11 we stumbled upon the movie set of dreams for A Better Container. 1/2/11 we returned, set up, put on costumes and were stopped during the first take by SPD.

Some pop inspiration unearthed from Sam in response to being asked to cover Elvis.



The song and stage of Elvis that feels closest to my experience of growing up in an exported southern debutante pageant culture.

The idea: A writing, movement, music memory salon.

It has been a fortunate fall for A Better Container. The project has been chosen for a residency at Studio Current as well as for the Northwest New Works Festival in 2011.

And this weekend, I get to spend three days learning about tuning scores from Karen Nelson.

Armed with these fortunes, A Better Container moves forward.

To kick off it's next phase, I'm hosting a series of memory salons for anyone interested in exploring and grappling with memory/forgetting/identity. Please get in touch for more information. shannon k stewart at gmail dot com.

A work in progress excerpt of A Better Container will be part of MOVE! in Tacoma this weekend!
Joining Mimi and I will be Neil Coffey and Yuki Enomoto. We'll miss Allie and Sam.

October 1st 7pm October 2nd 2&7pm

Performers of MOVE! #17 include: The MOVE!NG Company, Tacoma City Ballet, Coriolis Dance Collective, Mia Monteabaro, Shannon K Stewart

MOVE! is coming faster and fiercer every time, don't miss out. Performers joining us from Seattle and Tacoma and if you're not a dance fan MOVE! will make you one.

Proceeds from the show benefit the tuition-free ballet program at MLKBallet

Click here to:
Get your MOVE! tickets today

www.brownpapertickets.com

A Better Container. On location in Brooklyn. On a roof. With graffiti.

I know it's never been done before.

Artist Bios for A Better Container:

Allie Hankins has yet to give me a bio. Things I know. . . She moved to Seattle from New Mexico. She spent the month of July choreographing a dance every day. She is almost unnervingly clear and exacting in her movement.

Sam Mickens has, since his teen years, recorded and toured the world
extensively in groups The Dead Science, Degenerate Art Ensemble, Xiu
Xiu, and Parenthetical Girls. At present, among other projects, Sam is
leading his NYC-based Ecstatic Showband & Revue, a large hardcore soul
ensemble. He is also presently making preparations for "Kayfabe: Game
of Death," a large-scale performance work to be staged in Brooklyn
November 2010.

Mary Margaret Moore came to Seattle nearly five months ago from Albuquerque, New Mexico. She holds a BA from Cornell University in Art History and Visual Culture, completed in 2003. Those college years were also marked by competitive sports and intense physical training—MM was captain of the women’s volleyball program. Following university, she moved to Paris, France and placed herself amongst the throngs of Parisian dancers, awkwardly barefoot and muscle-bound…the study of dancing ensued… Most recently, her movement investigation led her into improvisation, which eventually led her to the heavy door of the Grande Salle at physical theatre school, Jacques Lecoq (2007). MM is now working on a solo adaptation of Deborah Hay’s 2009 Solo Project choreopgraphy, At Once.

OPEN FLIGHT STUDIO
PRESS RELEASE

PRESS CONTACT: Paige Barnes – Co-founder/Resident Artist, Open Flight Studio
E-MAIL: barnes.paige@gmail.com
TELEPHONE: (206) 419-5481
KILL DATE: August 23, 2010

Event: FLIGHT DECK
When: Saturday August 21 at 7:00pm / Sunday, August 22 at 4:00pm
Who: Flight Deck recipient SHANNON STEWART with invited guests KRISTIN HAPKE (tin dance) and MARISA HAGA.
Where: Open Flight Studio /4205 University Way NE/University District
Tickets: $8 suggested donation
Info: info@openflightstudio.org / www.openflightstudio.org

Open Flight Studio is thrilled to announce the eighth annual installation of Flight Deck, a residency program that awards studio time to Seattle dance artists from May to August and culminates in a performance. This year’s performance will show the work created by Flight Deck recipient SHANNON STEWART with invited guests artists KRISTIN HAPKE (tindance) and MARISA HAGA at Open Flight Studio on August 21 at 7pm & August 22 at 4pm.

Where do we begin?

We are about to begin.

Memory - where our stories lie. Where smell is a vehicle that shuttles us to a familiar feeling and trauma seeds itself in a shoulder blade or sacrum or large intestine.

Memory - a cage of identifiers: girl, pretty, poor, educated, lacking a deep plie, introverted, good at multi-tasking, gets dates easily but doesn't keep them.

This book on dementia that I bought talks about the liberation from painful memories as one thing to celebrate when looking for reasons to appreciate memory loss. I wonder about what this means for my grandmother who doesn't seem to know how old she is or even that she is confined to a wheelchair in a nursing home. Does she feel freedom from not being cognizant of these limitations? what memories do I want to lose?

Anne Michaels offered another sentence where I have to pause and breathe at every word to ponder the weight of its choice.

In particular, these eleven:

". . . the distress evoked by the futility of objects that outlast us."

Yesterday (the fourth of july) I went to the alter/installation that Monica Mata Gilliam and Vanessa DeWolf have created. Monica is reconstructing memories carefully, piece by piece, photo by photo and trying to ease the heartbreak of losing her mother with the copper in pennies minted before 1982. Vanessa, on the other hand is focused on "trying to remember" periods of her life that she has very little recollection of, memories that are documented but don't feel like hers.