Creative Team
The work of
jill
sigman/thinkdance involves the creative input of
artists in many media. Current and previous members of the
creative team include:
Composer/Musicians
Kristin Norderval, soprano, is
a performer, composer, and improviser who performs a
repertoire that spans the Renaissance to the avant-garde.
Profiled by
The New York Times in "Downtown Divas
Expand their Horizons" and hailed as one of “new music’s
best” by
The Village Voice, she has
performed at festivals throughout the world, and her
collaborations have included work with choreographers,
sculptors, filmmakers, and installation artists as well as
other musicians. Her credits as a soloist include
performances with the Netherlands Dance Theater, the San
Francisco Symphony, the Oslo Sinfonietta, and the Philip
Glass Ensemble. She has recorded for CRI, Nonesuch, Koch,
Deep Listening, Eurydice, Aurora, and Point. Both as a
composer and as a performer Ms. Norderval has specialized
in developing new works for voice, with special emphasis
on small scale opera, cross-disciplinary work, and works
with interactive technology. Commissions have included
works for Den Anden Opera in Copenhagen, the Bucharest
International Dance Festival in Romania, the EAR WE ARE
festival in Biel, Switzerland and jill sigman/thinkdance
in New York City. In 2006 the American Composers Forum
selected Ms. Norderval to be a recipient of the Jerome
Composers Commissioning Program for a song cycle for the
viol quartet Parthenia, with soprano soloist and live
electronics. In 2004 and 2005 Ms. Norderval was the
recipient of a Norwegian Artist’s Stipend (Statens
kunstnerstipend) for the development of new
multi-disciplinary work, and in 2005 she was also the
winner of the Henry Cowell Award from the American Music
Center. In 2002 she received artist-in-residencies from
Harvestworks Digital Arts studio and from Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute to develop a wireless midi-glove
interface for her real-time sampling and audio processing
system. Ms. Norderval holds a Bachelor of Music in both
voice and composition from the University of Washington, a
Master of Music in voice from the San Francisco
Conservatory of Music and a Doctor of Musical Arts in
voice from the Manhattan School of Music. In 2003/04 she
was a Visiting Scholar at New York University’s Tisch
School of the Arts in the department of Performance
Studies. Kristin Norderval is currently a Research Fellow
at the University College of Østfold in Halden, Norway,
focusing on the process of creation and development of
collaborative work within the cross-disciplinary
performing arts.
Sharon
Zhu was born and raised in Shanghai, China, and read
music at University of Newcastle where she graduated with
first-class honours. She was awarded a Naumberg Fellowship to
study for her PhD in composition at Princeton University,
USA, where she has worked with Paul Lansky, Steve Mackey,
Barbara White, and Judith Weir. Recognition for her
compositions has come from Avantgarde Schwatz, Austria (Young
Composer’s Award, 1999), National Association of Composers,
USA (First Prize, Annual Composers Competition, 2000), and
Mostly Modern, Ireland (Winner, Bank of Ireland International
Composition Competition, 2001). She was composer-in-residence
in the inaugural Newburyport Chamber Music Festival in
Massachusetts in summer 2002. Sharon has also performed new
music internationally, appearing in solo, duo and orchestral
concerts. Since December 2002 she has worked for Boosey &
Hawkes Music Publishers in London, responsible for promoting
their vast contemporary music catalogue all over the world.
DJ
Joro-Boro was born in Bulgaria. He
plays and promotes Culture F*ck Music (or EthnoMesh),
the dirty and uninhibited side of globalization
force-feeded back into a party without borders, a
post-national state in which the latent content of
noise, sex, and extasy detonates the market
mono-culture. He established himself as the resident DJ
in the Bulgarian Bar in New York City, where he "oversaw
the birth of a scene that, on any given night, might see
young European jet-setters dancing next to hip-hoppers
dancing next to drag queens and people in traditional
Bulgarian dress." (Summerstage) "The fast-forward
multifarious collective from the 'Eastern Bloc' and
beyond, spearheaded by Joro-Boro and Eugene Hutz of
Gogol Bordello, pluralistically exhale out of a
trans-cultural osmosis of East meets West, romantically
fusing the abundant expressions of a relevant past into
a shifting matrix of the now-sound of today's wayward
cultural bents..." (Other Music) Joro-Boro has hosted
the premiere parties for Divan (Palinka Pictures) and
Holy Land (Cavu Pictures), co-produced the 'New York
GypsyMania' compilation CD and collaborated with video
artist Daniela Kostova on a project called "Body Without
Organs". He has shared the stage with Philip Glass,
Balkan Beat Box, Tinariwen, Golem!, Fermin Muguruza,
Slavic Soul Party!, Hungry March Band, Ozomatli, Babylon
Circus, Filastine, and Luminescent Orchestrii among
others. He also hosts Radio Nomadi Mundial (RNM) on
Thursdays, a weekly online radio broadcast from New York
via London at WirelessFM, and is currently working on an
album.
Costume Designers
Naoko
Nagata’s evolution into costume making is a long
story. With literally no formal training, Nagata’s first
costume was created for Jeanine Durning in 1998. From that
moment, she has been creating for a diverse group of
choreographers and dancers non-stop. She has collaborated
with David Dorfman Dance, Bebe Miller, Liz Lerman, David
Neumann, Gina Gibney, Reggie Wilson, Ellis Wood, Zvi
Gotheiner, Karl Anderson and many, many others. Working
closely with collaborators, Naoko helps bring to life what
she herself calls, “The creation of a shared dream.”
Olga Naiman is the artistic
director of APARAT, where she designs space and costume
for performance, installation, events, film, magazine
editorial and commercials. Recent design for performance
projects include The Double (performance, London), Broken
Cycles (performance installation, Prague), Greek Passion
(opera, Prague), Hot Trees (rock concert, London). She was
born in Ukraine and has returned to NYC after several
years of wandering.
Dancers
Toby
Billowitz has lived in New York since 1996 and
performed there and elsewhere with Jordan Fuchs, Jill Sigman,
Lynn Neuman/Artichoke Dance Company, Philippa Kaye Company,
Red Shift Dance, Jonette Ford, Ben Munisteri Dance Projects,
WORKS/Laura Glenn Dance, Mary Seidman & Dancers, Ali
Kenner, Noel MacDuffie, Mary Suk, Despina Stamos and
Wen-Shuan Yang, Jill Meadows, Amalgamated Performance Group,
Lostwax, Delicious Biscuit, Deborah Birrane/Unexpected
Company (Seattle), Chamber Dance Company (Seattle), Alexandra
Beller, Jon Zimmerman, Tony Silva Dance and Music, Christine
Suarez, Earl Mosley, Dance First, Joanna Mendl Shaw, Holly
Twining/Les Gilles Twining and Sean Curran, in no particular
order. He spent eight years at White Mountain Summer Dance
Festival as a resident company or faculty member. His own
choreography has been seen in Virginia, Connecticut,
Massachusetts, Washington, and in NYC at locations such as
the LaMAMa Cafe, BRIC and the Cunningham Studio, among
others.
Donna
Costello is a dancer and teaching artist living in
Brooklyn, NY. She has thoroughly enjoyed having a deeper
experience of Sigman’s process with
RUPTURE after
having a small part as one of the nurses in the nucleus of
Pulling the Wool. Ms. Costello is a founding member
of Shannon Hummel’s Cora Dance and dances for Mollie
O’Brien’s Mob productions. Her projects also include a new
work by Pele Bauch, filming
The Missing Room with
GK1 productions, and recreating Fred Astaire numbers with
Paul Grecki. She has had the pleasure of working with Stephen
Koplowitz, Melissa Briggs, Naomi Goldberg, Christine Suarez,
and in collaboration with Laura Hymers on collaborative
choreography. Ms. Costello teaches for Brooklyn Arts Exchange
and Lincoln Center Institute.
Hilary
Maia Grubb is originally from the San Francisco Bay
Area, where she began her formal dance training at the ripe
old age of twenty-four, after fifteen years of competitive
springboard and platform diving. While still on the Left
Coast, she was a member of the Bay Area Repertory Dance
Company and the stolenmovement collective. In New York she
has worked with Abby Bender Schmantze Theater, Marianela
Boan, Eleanor Dubinsky, koosil-ja, Neta Pulvermacher, Ani
Weinstein, and Martha Williams. Hilary is a founding member
of good rid/dance performances, a collaborative,
cross-disciplinary performance collective; her work has been
presented by Dixon Place, Spoke the Hub, and Triskelion Arts
in New York City. Hilary has recently returned to school to
pursue medicine.
Jennifer
Sydor is a graduate of Butler University and holds a
BFA in Dance performance. She has danced with the Dayton
Ballet, Indianapolis Ballet Theater, Dance Kaleidoscope, Kim
Robards Dance, and as a featured guest performer with the
National Ballet of Georgia in Tbilisi, Republic of Georgia.
In New York, she has worked with Christine Suarez, Dixon
Mena, Stefanie Nelson, and Sunwha Chung. She is currently a
member of Blacksmith Daughter's Dance Theater under the
direction of Nia Love.
Lighting Designers
Jonathan Belcher
has worked in the theater as a designer since 1989,
concentrating mostly on modern dance and performing arts. He
has over 100 pieces to his credit mostly in New York and the
New York area. He has recently added television to his cachet
as Set and Lighting Designer for CUNY Television. He has had
the pleasure of designing scenery and lighting for Brian
Lehrer, Bernard Pivot, Regina Resnic, The American Theater
Wing, Doug Muzzio, and others. In dance, he has collaborated
with Dean Moss, Levi Gonzalez, Maria Hassabi, David Dorfman,
and Sarah Michelson. Jonathan has been Resident Lighting
Designer and Technical Director for The Kitchen Performance
Space, University of Michigan Musical Society, Jacob’s
Pillow, and Dance Theater Workshop. He is a graduate of the
National Theater Institute and Connecticut College.
Severn
Clay has designed lighting and environments for dance,
theater, opera, art installations and architecture at home in
New York City and abroad. He thrives in converted or existing
venues outside the pale of proscenium theaters. Recent
projects include a two-part production of Robert Penn
Warren's "All the King's Men" adapted and directed by Adrian
Hall, and an original play by the Deep Ellum Ensemble which
had its New York premiere at the Ohio Theatre's Ice Factory
Festival. He is the owner and principal of Severn Clay
Studio, an architectural and exhibit lighting design firm.
Video Artists
Katherine
Liberovskaya is a video and media artist based in
Montreal, Canada, and New York. Since the late 1980s she has
worked predominantly in experimental video and has produced
single-channel videos, video installation works, and video
performances that have been shown at a number of artistic
venues, festivals, and events around the world. In recent
years her work—in single-channel and installation video as
well as performance—is focused on collaborations with new
music composers and sound artists, notably Phill Niblock, Al
Margolis/If, Bwana, and David Watson. Since 2003 she has
explored live video mixing in improvisation with new
music/sound art performing in diverse contexts in North
America and Europe with music/sound artists such as Margarida
Garcia, Barry Weisblat, o.blaat, AnthonyColeman, Tiziana
Bertoncini, Thomas Lehn, Urkuma, Giuseppe Ielasi, Renato
Rinaldi, Hitoshi Kojo, murmer, John Grzinich, André
Gonçalves, Alessandro Bosetti, Audrey Chen, and Zanana. She
has received numerous grants and arts awards in Canada, and
her articles on video and media art have been published in
ESSE-Arts + Opinions, la Revue Électronique du CIAC, the
Banff Center's HorizonZero, and the Canadian Journal of
Communication.
Lisa Niedermeyer jump started
her dance video experience in 2002, as Video Production
Assistant at Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. She then
returned to Jacob's Pillow as a video artist for the
festival's first Dance on Camera Workshop with Victoria
Marks, Carmella Vassor-Johnson, and Deirdre Towers. Since
then Lisa had been going strong with many projects
including; featured video artist for the premiere
broadcast of the dance video series, "Move the Frame" on
Brooklyn Cable Access in NY, directing and editing "Circle
of Compassion Circle of Peace", a 12 minute documentary
video of Tibetan Nun creating a sand mandala, as well as
video design for the original play "S" based on Richard
Linklater's screenplay "Slacker". As a dancer in NYC Lisa
performs with Jane Comfort and Company.
Visual Design
Alicia Tam is a
visual artist and designer who studied architectural design
and contemporary sculpture while an undergraduate at Yale
University. Her work ranges from jewelry and furniture design
to large scale sculptural installations, often challenging
traditional materials and media to forge unusual creations.
