Dance

Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami ready to return to live performance

Written By Sean Erwin
February 12, 2021 at 6:52 PM

Josue Justiz, Gabriela Mesa and Fabian Morales in a previous performance of “Esferas,” one of the works returning in Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami’s “Program I.” (Photo courtesy of Simon Soong)

When the pandemic hit, live dance halted, and companies shifted online. Now South Florida companies are increasingly capitalizing on outdoor performances to reunite performers and audiences for a safe and meaningful experience.

Among them is Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami, which is presenting its first program of  2021 at 4 p.m. Feb. 20 at the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center in Cutler Bay, on an outdoor stage built especially for the event.

Carlos Guerra and Jennifer Kronenberg – artistic directors of Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami and former Miami City Ballet principals – are betting audiences are ready to return for live performances.

“It’s beyond time,” Kronenberg said. “It’s lovely that we’ve all been doing virtual [performances], but at the end of the day, the art form is not about that. There is a big loss in the translation from live to digital. This is not where this art form lives.”

Added Guerra: “We have to perform, and it can’t be all virtual … It is exciting that it is live, and it is important for the dancers.”

Alexey Minkin, Mayrel Martinez and Fabian Morales rehearse “Esferas” in the studio. (Photo courtesy of Yanis Eric Pikieris)

Dimensions Dance Theatre was a prominent content provider of virtual dance in 2020, with regular offerings that derived first from its archive and then from the creation of new online works. The Feb. 20 Spring program will be the first live, in-person performance for both the company and the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center since the start of the pandemic.

Eric Fliss, the center’s managing director, expressed confidence that the facility’s rigorous adherence to Miami-Dade County’s “New Normal Guide” will provide a safe, socially distant experience for all involved.

The company established protocols to keep dancers safe and rehearsing throughout the fall, when numbers involved only two or three dancers. “Program I” increases the complexity because some works require the whole company to be onstage together.

“To handle that, we upped the strictness,” Kronenberg said. “The county requires testing of the dancers daily for seven days before the performance, and the dancers will wear masks during the performance.”

“Program I” will feature four works, with no intermission:

**The return of company favorite, “Esferas,” by choreographer and Miami City Ballet dancer Ariel Rose.

Miranda Montes de Oca in “Castles in the Air,” choreographed by Dimension Dance Theatre’s Yanis Eric Pikieris. (Photo courtesy of Yanis Eric Pikieris)

**The world premiere of “Castles in the Air,” choreographed by Dimension Dance Theatre’s Yanis Eric Pikieris. Set to composer Benjamin Britten’s “Bridge Variations,” it explores the sensation of being locked in a daydream.

“During the lockdown, we were dreaming of what the future might be, while acknowledging the present was what we had,” Pikieris said. “We were pretending we were together when we were actually taking class or choreographing through Zoom.

“In the piece, there is a duet where the two dancers – Maikel Hernandez and Mayrel Martinez – come very close to one another, but they don’t actually ever touch. And I took a lot of inspiration from the music itself, which is heavy and could make people think of isolation and loss.”

**The company premiere of “Adiemus,” a work co-choreographed by Yanis Pikieris Sr. and David Palmer, which the Maximum Dance Co. premiered in 1998.

For Pikieris Sr., “Adiemus” celebrates the joy of reconnecting – and it will be the first full-length work that includes the entire company onstage at the same time in more than a year.

“This was choreographed by me and David Palmer when we were both directors of Maximum Dance Company as a dance of celebration and exuberance …,” he said. “At that time, [my son] Yanis Eric was 3 years old. Now, for this performance, he will be dancing the role that I danced in it then.”

 

Fabian Morales and Claudia Lezcano in “RUTH: Ricordi per Due,” the final work choreographed by Joffrey Ballet artistic director Gerald Arpino. (Photo courtesy of Yanis Eric Pikieris)

**Another company premiere: “RUTH: Ricordi per Due,” the final work choreographed by Joffrey Ballet artistic director Gerald Arpino, before his death in 2008, and set on the company by Cameron Basden, former Joffrey Ballet dancer and now repetiteur and board member for The Gerald Arpino Foundation (and an occasional Artburst Miami writer).

Commissioned by Barbara Levy Kipper in the memory of her mother, Ruth Doctoroff Levy, the nine-minute pas de deux is set to the music of Italian Baroque composer Tomaso Albinoni and reflects on the experience of remembered loss.

Basden emphasized the relevance of the piece to the present: “The idea of losing someone is so prevalent in our life right now. It could not be more appropriate for this time that we are in,” she said. “It expresses both the love that one feels for the people who are here and those no longer here.”

 

WHAT: Dimensions Dance Theatre of Miami’s Spring 2021 “Program I”

WHEN: 4 p.m. Feb. 20

WHERE: South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center, 10950 SW 211th St., Cutler Bay

COST: $45 for a pod (two seats)

INFORMATION: smdcac.org

 

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