ADA Retrospective Performance: Family Friendly
2015-10-17 14:00 - 16:00 (America/Chicago) | Northfield Arts Guild Theater, 411 West Third Street, Northfield, MN, 55057
Join us for a multi-genre, family friendly performance featuring artists of all abilities as they share their work!
BUY TICKETS
In order to be as financially accessible as possible, this performance features Radical Hospitality, a concept pioneered by Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis. A small portion of event tickets may be purchased ahead of time for guaranteed admission, but the majority of the tickets will be available at the door. Patrons will be asked when they arrive “What do you want to pay today?” Answers can be as little as zero or as much as a million dollars (we wish!). We strive to be inclusive of all members of our community, welcome those who may never have attended a performance with us before, and encourage those who are financially able to help us support this vital concept of arts for all. The box office will open 1 hour prior to the performance.
Access accommodations, such as ASL interpretation, assistive listening devices, large print programs, and audio description, will be available for both ADA Retrospective performances. No reservations are necessary.
Artists include

Dance pieces from…

Cary Bittinger has had the opportunity to share her love of dance and the power of movement with diverse populations that range in destinations from her home state of Minnesota to Chicago, Brooklyn, Harbour Island, Bahamas, Durham, North Carolina, Wisconsin, and even Sydney Australia. Each population she encountered, she saw the essences of what movement provides: joy, freedom, peace, and an understanding of the human connection that is felt through the mind/body/spirit connection. She received her masters degree in Dance/Movement Therapy & Counseling from Columbia College Chicago in 2009, which taught her how to approach movement from a different lens. In Chicago, she was able to work with a group of high school students from the westside through a particular style of movement called footworking. Footworking originated in Chicago and allows the people who are dancing to express what they have been through in their lives. Currently, she is working as a Dance Therapist at Head Start in St.Paul, MN and for Young Dance in Minneapolis, MN. Movement has no boundary, it is limitless, even in stillness a dance is being created & with each breath a story is being told through movement.
Angelique Lele has been doing theater for most of her life. Performing in the requisite school plays as a child and then, when she was older and felt she really wanted to make a statement, co-founding an all women’s theater company called Toxic Shock Stage. In TSS, a Los Angeles based theater company, the women wrote, produced and directed all their own work. In LA, Angelique was introduced to the aerial arts and began to do trapeze and silks. It was only a matter of time before she became interested in performing. She began performing around LA and then Minneapolis when she moved to town in 2008. In 2012, an accident while she was training on the trapeze paralyzed her. Introduced to the beautiful world of integrative dance in 2014, Angelique is excited to have the chance to begin performing again and open to the challenge of exploring a new physicality on stage. She feels excited to be performing with Cary and Kathleen.
Kathleen Pender grew up in Northfield and received her B.A. in Dance from St. Olaf College. Kathleen teaches creative ballet, ballet, tap, and modern classes at the Northfield Arts Guild and assists classes with Young Dance in Minneapolis. She is also Company Manager with performance company Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater and performs for Minneapolis-based choreographer Taja Will. With deep passion for dance education and performance, Kathleen is grateful to be teaching for the Northfield Arts Guild’s dance program, which served as her dance foundation and fostered her development as an artist. Kathleen is looking forward to performing with Angie and Cary and returning to the Arts Guild stage.

BUZZ! The Musical. Script and concept by Sara Pillatzki-Warzeha and Michelle Pillatzki Ahmed, with music and lyrics by Lauren Mikeal Weber. Directed by Sara Pillatzki-Warzeha, and performed by the Northfield Arts Guild’s A+ Art Club and special guests Sara Pillatzki-Warzeha, Brian Warzeha, Ryan Puffer
“Las Chiapanecas” dance piece (music: Traditional music from Chiapas) danced by The Baile Folklórico Mexicano dance group. The Baile Folklórico Mexicano dance group of the Northfield Arts Guild was founded in 2005 by Ana Baez Toquillas. Four dancers, two students and two teachers, will be performing today. Atia Cole has danced with the group for nine years and is a high school student. Liana Cole is also a student and has been with the group for eight years. Ana Baez came to Minnesota from Culiacán, Mexico, after 15 years of dancing professionally throughout Mexico while earning degrees in dance education, choreography, and traditional Mexican folk arts. Kate Stuart has been teaching dance and music for many years, and joined Ana seven years ago as the associate teacher for the group.
Theatre piece featuring the ArtMakers College Apprentice Program, featuring Skye Curtis, Jaynee Purchase, Andrew Rossow, Jim Rossow, Nora Serres

ArtMakers is a new arts organization born in Northfield to create an inclusive, community-centered, career arts day program for individuals of varying abilities. ArtMakers combines a Career Arts Group and a College Arts Apprentice Program to bring artists with disabilities together with students from the colleges and other artists from the community to create and share their work.
“Over the Rainbow” is a story montage that blends works by Robert Munsch, Maurice Sendak, and L. Frank Baum with the music of Paul Williams, Harold Arlen and Edgar Harburg, and Steven Schwartz. ArtMakers is grateful to stand on the shoulders of such wonderful artists.

Dance piece, “Three Little Birds” from Emma Hilson
Emma Hilson is a 10 year old who is new to the MN Dance world has always enjoyed dancing, whether by herself or in front of a group of others. She has recently performed in the Arts Access Chautauaua “Here I am” concert.
Dance piece, “Uptown Funk,” performed by Michael Cohn (music by Bruno Mars)
Michael Cohn was born in Iowa and raised in the Twin cities. Originally he started dancing as a form of therapy and socialization in 2010 and found over time that he has learned techniques and skills that have broadened his scope of dance. He brings a slight twist with his dancing as he utilizes a walker and sometimes a dance wheelchair to help him move across the dance floor. Watch as Mike moves and shows how life can be free as we move with music!

This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Southeastern Minnesota Arts Council thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

The Artists Disabling Assumptions exhibition is sponsored by:

ADA Retrospective Performance for Mature Audiences
2015-10-17 19:30 - 21:30 | Arts Guild Theater, 411 West Third Street, Northfield, MN, 55057, United States
Join us for a multi-genre, “for mature audiences only” performance featuring artists of all abilities as they share their work and dive into often hidden narratives of the disability experience, including relationships, romance, and sex.
BUY TICKETS
In order to be as financially accessible as possible, this performance features Radical Hospitality, a concept pioneered by Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis. A small portion of event tickets may be purchased ahead of time for guaranteed admission, but the majority of the tickets will be available at the door. Patrons will be asked when they arrive “What do you want to pay today?” Answers can be as little as zero or as much as a million dollars (we wish!). We strive to be inclusive of all members of our community, welcome those who may never have attended a performance with us before, and encourage those who are financially able to help us support this vital concept of arts for all. The box office will open 1 hour prior to the performance.
Access accommodations, such as ASL interpretation, assistive listening devices, large print programs, and audio description, will be available for both ADA Retrospective performances. No reservations are necessary.
Artists include
Narrative storytelling, “An Open Letter to the Men of Craigslist,” by Alison Bergblom Johnson
Alison Bergblom Johnson writes true stories that focus on women’s lives, telling stories that buoy insiders and educate outsiders. She gives words and weight particularly to experiences of sexual violence and mental illness, aiming to replace myths with knowledge from lived experiences. Fiction Fix, Burly Bird, and Diverse Voices Quarterly, among others, have published her work. She’s read her writing at the Walker Art Center and 7th Street Entry. Bergblom Johnson writes creative nonfiction and narrative performance art. Fiction Fix, Burly Bird, and Diverse Voices Quarterly, among others, have published her nonfiction. She was a resident of the Arts Retreat at the New York Mills Regional Cultural Center and at the Vermont Studio Center. She has performed her work at the Walker Art Center and 7th Street Entry. Her one-woman show, Other Than Tragedy, and a group show in resistance to sexual violence premiered in the Minnesota Fringe Festival. Her work focuses on neglected personal stories about the past that intersect with the present.
Dance pieces by Michael Cohn, Brian J. Evans, and J-Sun

Mike Cohn, dancer/choreographer, “My Life:” Watch as Mike moves and shows how life can be free as we move with music by Lisa Heffter.
“The Show Must Go On” by Brian Evans, who will dance, sing and play guitar.
J-sun and Crew will perform a Hip Hop dance.
Mike, Brian, J-sun and Charley take you on action packed 5 minute drive. See how cold people can be during the action of taking a selfie. Music edited by J-sun. Story designed by Mike Cohn.
Mike will perform 2 dances, “Uptown Funk” (music by Bruno Mars, et. al) and “I Can’t Dance” (music by Genesis). One dance shows a side of the dance world that may not be viewed in the eye of the disability community every day. The final dance will challenge movement in a new way for Mike.

Michael Cohn was born in Iowa and raised in the Twin cities. Originally he started dancing as a form of therapy and socialization in 2010 and found over time that he has learned techniques and skills that have broadened his scope of dance. He brings a slight twist with his dancing as he utilizes a walker and sometimes a dance wheelchair to help him move across the dance floor.Mike Cohn recently stared a dance company. I Can Dance You Can Dance.
Brian J. Evans is a Professional Performing Human. For the past eight years, Evans has had the privilege and pleasure of engaging in a vast array of fields. Teaching in public and private institutions, working with healthcare providers in the US and abroad, performing as singer, actor, dancer in churches, theaters, basements, outdoor stages, any space provided that encourages the arts to thrive. An artist striving for social justice, Evans places high value in process and product, having had most of his training out in the ‘Arts field’ of the Twin Cities, working with over 50 artistic directors on more than 200 projects from solo endeavors to collaborating as a self-employed professional performer & teaching artist. Primarily as a principle dancer and musical director for Stuart Pimsler Dance & Theater, Evans has continued to investigate the idea that connections exist between us all and it’s the responsibility of the Arts to rediscover those connections, highlight them to allow us to feel holistically human.
J-Sun is a teacher and community leader in the Twin Cities; a competitor and an academic, recipient of the 2013 Sage Award for Outstanding Performance and consultant for The Annual Groundbreaker Battle. He instructs traditional movement with historical moments as a veteran practitioner of breaking and toprocking.
Narrative storytelling by Amy Salloway
Actor/writer/storyteller Amy Salloway has been called “kick-ass funny and achingly poignant,” “raw and fearless,” and “gifted at mining humor where others might see only darkness”. Her three autobiographical solo comedies (“Does This Monologue Make Me Look Fat?,” “So Kiss Me Already, Herschel Gertz!,” and “Circumference”) all began their lives at the Minnesota Fringe Festival and have gone on to tour to Fringes, theatres, colleges, communities and festivals across the US and Canada, winning some pretty nice awards along the way; her two-person play, “Entwined”, hopes to travel beyond Minnesota eventually as well. Amy has contributed stories to MPR’s “In the Loop” radio show, CBC’s “Definitely Not The Opera” (sort of the Canadian equivalent of “This American Life”) and the national podcast “Risk!”. She was a founding member of the popular narrative collective Rockstar Storytellers, a two-time recipient of the VSA Artist Initiative grant, and has won the St. Paul Moth and the SlamMN! story slam once each. Amy teaches classes in memoir, creative writing, storytelling and other more specific subtopics through Minneapolis Community Ed and sometimes Story Arts Minnesota, and performs regularly on just about every spoken-word-oriented stage in Minneapolis. For even more info, check out Amy’s embarrassingly stagnant website www.amysalloway.com, or the much more responsibly-managed www.facebook.com/awkwardmomentonstage.
This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Southeastern Minnesota Arts Council thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund.

The Artists Disabling Assumptions exhibition is sponsored by:
