Mexican Choreographers on the Move

Join us for a rare intergenerational gathering of four Mexican choreographers hailing from New York City, Mérida, and Mexico City. Lourdes Luna, Geraldine Cardiel, Argelia Arreola, and Erick Montes have spent recent years creating work for their dance companies. This time, they take the stage on their own.

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Use codes “STUDENT” $8 / “STAFF” $15

Acusticorporal by Argelia Arreola

A one-woman show that focuses on the body as a resonator for everything it senses and the way it’s shaped by sounds, rhythms, vibrations, and words. The work shows the body itself as a generator of harmony and polyrhythms, transforming it into a musical instrument. Acusticorporal takes inspiration from different traditional styles of African dance from Guinea and Senegal, as well as Son Jarocho from Mexico. This project is made possible by the support from Mexico’s National Endowment for Arts and Culture (FONCA), 2020 Scenic Creators Program.

Sonido sordo by Geraldine Cardiel

This piece is the reflection of two entities trying to survive the weight of existence. Using the space as a witness of a story, the choreography shows the relationship between body and sound in their intent to share their presence. Through intricate rhythmic partners, they move together towards the acceptance of a deaf sound.

Re-sonando/Echoing by Lourdes Luna

This solo creates an interactive dialogue through a sound reaction technological system to explore composition in sound and poetics with movement as the main engine. The dancer becomes the composer, who offers an ephemeral piece as the interface she interacts with generates a different combination of poetics, aesthetics, and sound for every performance. This project is supported by the Art and Technology Training Program through the 2023 Mentorship Plan for Arts, and Arts and Technology Research Mentorship Plan granted by Mexico City’s Multimedia Center at the National Arts Center.

Small:2Big by Erick Montes

This excerpt from a larger project is a movement exploration meditation that departs from a self-inquiry. How can we give meaning to what others cannot see? During this work, Montes investigates the poetics between vibration and sport physicality going off an analogy about the body joints in relation to romantic memory. This is to acknowledge the possibilities of gestures for emerging anew as a form of resistance to the social chaos we are living in.

Event information

Date: Friday, November 17th, 2023

Time: 7:00 pm

Venue: LaGuardia Performing Arts Center

Address: 31-10 Thomson Ave, Long Island City, NY 11101

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Tickets: $30

Use codes “STUDENT” $8 / “STAFF” $15

Website

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[Argelia Arreola]Photo Credit_ Courtesy of the Artist

Argelia Arreola, the Bronx based Mexican dancer, choreographer, and musician, graduated from Universidad Veracruzana in Mexico with a Bachelor´s degree in Contemporary Dance and formally trained in the traditional African Dance of Guinea for 20 years. She brings to the fore the dynamic relationship between music and the language of African (Guinea & Senegal), Afro-Cuban, and Mexican folk dance. She is currently on faculty at Gibney Dance and has developed her own AfroKorp style. Argelia is also a dancer and choreographer for Ballet Nepantla, dancer and musician for La Mezcla (a polyrhythmic San Francisco-based dance and music ensemble), and member of the Afromexican band Jarana Beat. She has performed at Lincoln Center, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, Movement Research at the Judson Church, Battery Dance Festival, BAM Dance Africa, Joe’s Pub Theater, and Summer Stage Harlem Festival, among others. She has also been awarded the National Program for Scenic Creators FONCA fellowship as choreographer and dancer multiple times.

[Geraldine Cardiel HEIC]2 Photo Credit_ Courtesy of the Artist

Geraldine Cardiel is a Mexican dancer and choreographer. She is a certified teacher at the Feldenkrais Institute in New York, and a graduate of the Professional Studies Program of the Limón Institute of New York. Her work has been produced in Mexico, Spain, and New York by the Limón Institute, DanceNow, Joyce Soho Presents, FONCA, and Celebrate México Now, among others. She has been teaching regularly at the Limón Institute of New York for many years and has been a guest teacher and choreographer in countries like Finland, Spain, Colombia, England, and Mexico. In Mexico City, she worked as a teacher at the National School of Theater Arts and at the Contemporary Dance School of Ollin Yolliztli Cultural Center as a headteacher in the dance department. Since 2015, she has collaborated with Tumàka’t danza contemporánea as a dancer, assistant director, and teacher. She works at UNAY (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Yucatán) where she has been teaching dance to groups of people with disabilities. She lives in Mérida, Yucatán.

[Lourdes Luna] Photo Credit_ Courtesy of the Artist

Lourdes Luna is a creator and performer with over 30 years of experience. She has been the Director of Créssida Danza Contemporánea A.C. since 2007. Luna was awarded the INBA-UAM National Dance Award in 1993 and 1997, and has been part of the National Arts Creators System (2005-2007, 2011-2013, and 2019-2022 cohorts). She has choreographed over 60 works and is considered one of Mexico’s most relevant creators. Her broad experience, the quality of her work, and her producing skills have made her receive the support and backing of multiple cultural institutions in Mexico. Luna’s creative work has been presented in all the most important Mexican dance festivals and, in 2010, she started her international career touring to Korea, Chile, Spain, Belgium, the UK, Italy, Colombia, Peru, Costa Rica, and the U.S. in partnership with festivals, arts precincts, and other creators and arts managers. She is currently a member of the State Council for Arts and Culture for the State of Yucatan, Mexico, and directs the Yucatán Escénica Festival.

[Erick Montes] Photo Credit_ Courtesy of the Artist

Erick Montes is a dancer and choreographer who believes in the technology of movement as the threshold for the manifestation of ancestral wisdom. He holds an MFA in Dance from The University of the Arts with a BFA from The National School of Contemporary Dance in México City. He is a former Bill.T Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company member, and holds a fellowship from The New York Foundation for the Arts. His work has received support from the Fund for New Work at Harlem Stage, The National Endowment for the Arts in México, and he received a Dance Fellowship & Life Experience Award at the University of the Arts to continue his postgraduate studies. Montes’s work is internationally acclaimed, celebrating 25 years of professional experience, feeling fortunate to collaborate with all the marvelous artists he has had the privilege to dance with over this period. Occasionally, Erick teaches as an Associate Adjunct Professor at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. He is a certified Vinyasa and Meditation practitioner with his own practice in upstate New York.

This event is presented in partnership with LaGuardia Performing Arts Center