World Premiere of Convergent Waves: Boston / April 21 – 23, 2022
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Lenora Lee
Phone: (415) 913-8725
Email: LenoraLeeDance@gmail.com
www.LenoraLeeDance.com
Pao Arts Center and Lenora Lee Dance present
World Premiere of Convergent Waves: Boston
site-specific, multimedia, immersive dance performances by Lenora Lee Dance
At Pao Arts Center in celebration of its 5th Anniversary Season!
LOCATION
ADMISSION
$20-50 – https://www.eventbrite.com/e/convergent-waves-boston-tickets-244507136427
For more info: https://www.paoartscenter.org, www.LenoraLeeDance.com
For questions or high resolution images, email LenoraLeeDance@gmail.com, (415) 913-8725
Convergent Waves: Boston is a new site-responsive, multimedia experience by Lenora Lee Dance celebrating the contributions of activists and non-profit leaders, reclaiming space by eliciting stories of community agency, resilience, and transformation. Inspired by rich narrative, this work represents a powerful call for community oriented development in the face of rapid change, making a collective statement for the preservation of community as neighborhoods across the country inhabited for generations face cultural erosion, loss of businesses, and displacement through gentrification. Convergent Waves: Boston highlights successes in preserving the cultural fabric and accomplishments of these communities.
Conceived, Produced & Directed by Lenora Lee
Choreography by Lenora Lee in collaboration with the performers
Performers / Dance Collaborators: Naoko Brown, IJ Chan, Peter Cheng, Flora Hyoin Kim Han, Lynn Huang, Johnny Huy Nguyen
Media Design by Lenora Lee
Music
- Composed by Vijay Iyer, performed by Fieldwork, Vijay Iyer Trio, Miranda Cuckson, Michi Wianko, Kyle Arrmbust, Kivie Cahn-Lipman, and Wadada Leo Smith. Additional recordings composed and performed by Vijay Iyer and Wadada Leo Smith.
- Composed and performed by Tatsu Aoki, with Kioto Aoki, Jamie Kempkers, Edward Wilkerson Jr.
- Composed by Francis Wong. Performed by Francis Wong, Deszon X. Claiborne, Tatsu Aoki.
For more detailed information about the music, click here
Interviewee Voiceover by Susan Chinsen, Ken Eng, Paul Lee, Tunny Lee, Angie Liou, Lydia Lowe, Cynthia Woo, Yu-Wen Wu, Cynthia Yee
There will also be a virtual screening of Convergent Waves: Boston presented by ArtsEmerson in Fall 2022.
Lynn Huang by Robbie Sweeny
LENORA LEE DANCE
Lenora Lee Dance (LLD) integrates contemporary dance, film, music, and research and has gained increasing attention for its sustained pursuit of issues related to immigration, incarceration, global conflict, and its impacts, particularly on women and families. The company is directed by San Francisco native Lenora Lee, who has been a dancer, choreographer and artistic director for the past 23 years in San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York. She has been an Artist Fellow at the de Young Museum, a Djerassi Resident Artist, a Visiting Scholar at New York University 2012-2016, an Artist in Residence at Dance Mission Theater, a 2019 United States Artists Fellow.
LLD creates works that are both set in public and private spaces, intimate and at the same time large-scale, inspired by individual stories as well as community strength, at times crafted for the proscenium, or underwater, or in the air, and at times are site-responsive, immersive and interactive. For the last 14 years, the company has been pushing the envelope of large-scale multimedia, and immersive dance performance that connects various styles of movement and music to culture, history and human rights issues. Its work has grown to encompass the creation, presentation and screening of films, museum and gallery installations, civic engagement and educational programming. www.LenoraLeeDance.com
PAO ARTS CENTER
Pao Arts Center was established in 2017 as a visionary program collaboration between Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center (BCNC) and Bunker Hill Community College (BHCC). Located at 99 Albany Street in downtown Boston, Pao Arts Center is Chinatown’s first arts and cultural center. Pao Arts Center represents the belief that investing in arts, culture, and creativity are vital to the health and well-being of individuals, families, and vibrant communities. Through its innovative approach, Pao Arts Center empowers creativity, connection, learning, and support. paoartscenter.org
ARTIST BIOGRAPHIES
Vijay Iyer (music compositions, recordings) Described by The New York Times as a “social conscience, multimedia collaborator, system builder, rhapsodist, historical thinker and multicultural gateway,” composer-pianist VIJAY IYER is one of the leading music-makers of his generation. His honors include a MacArthur Fellowship, a Doris Duke Performing Artist Award, a United States Artist Fellowship, a Grammy nomination, and the Alpert Award in the Arts. His most recent album, a trio session with drummer Tyshawn Sorey and bassist Linda May Han Oh titled Uneasy (ECM Records, 2021), was named Best New Music in Pitchfork and was hailed by the New Yorker as “a triumph of small-group interplay and fertile invention.” https://vijay-iyer.com
Tatsu Aoki (music) is a prolific composer, musician, filmmaker, and educator. Based in Chicago, Aoki works in a wide range of musical genres, ranging from traditional Japanese music, jazz, experimental and creative music. Aoki studied experimental filmmaking at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and is currently an adjunct Full Professor at the Film, Video and New Media Department, teaching film production and history courses. To this date, Aoki has produced and appears in more than 90 recording projects and over 30 experimental films. www.tatsuaoki.com
Francis Wong (music) was dubbed one of “the great saxophonists of his generation” by the late jazz critic Phil elwood. Few musicians are as accomplished as Wong: for over two decades he has performed his innovative brand of jazz and creative music for audiences in North America, Asia, and Europe. A prolific recording artist, Wong is featured on more than forty titles. www.franciswong.net
Olivia Ting (media & graphic design) is interested in the role of digital technology in the fabric of contemporary lives and how our perception of recorded media (film, photography, audio) as “reality” has shifted as technology becomes more sophisticated. Olivia has done design work for Oakland Museum of California, San Francisco Arts Commission, San Jose Children’s Museum, and collaborated with various dance companies in the Bay Area. Her work shifts between video projection and altered 360 VR film experiences. She holds an MFA in Art Practice from U.C. Berkeley. www.olivetinge.com
Naoko Brown (dance – Boston) is a native of Nagoya, Japan. At the age of six, she was introduced to the world of classical ballet by Michiko Matsumoto. She continued her training with Barbara Banaskowski Smith in Lansing, MI. While there, she performed with the students of the National Ballet School of Gdansk in Poland, as well as students from Vaganova Ballet School in St. Petersburg, Russia. Brown received her B.F.A. in Dance from The Boston Conservatory. While there, she performed works by Daniel Pelzig, Sean Curran, Lar Lubovitch and José Limón. She also attended the Boston Ballet School Summer Dance Program, Ballet Intensive from Moscow, and was a full scholarship recipient at Summer Stages Dance in 2012. She has performed with Michiko Matsumoto Ballet, Urban Nutcracker, Zoé Dance, Contrapose, Prometheus Dance and Jo-Mé Dance. She is currently a faculty member of The Boston Conservatory at Berklee, Walnut Hill School for the Arts Community Dance Academy as well as Boston Ballet.
IJ Chan (陳加恩) is a dance artist and educator from Boston, MA. She has dedicated her life to training and performing intensively in multiple dance genres and under many choreographers. In her own choreographic work, IJ is interested in intersecting and exploring the Asian-American narrative. She is committed to bringing quality performing arts instruction to low-income and minority youth populations within Boston. She also works as a freelance graphic designer, visual artist and seamstress.
Lynn Huang (dance – San Francisco)Trained in modern dance, ballet, and Chinese dance, Lynn has performed with Lenora Lee, Erin Malley, & Philein Wang in San Francisco, and HT Dance Company, Dance China NY & Ella Ben-Aharon/Sahar Javedani in NYC. She studied at Minzu University Dance Conservatory in Beijing, China on a Fulbright fellowship and graduated magna cum laude from Barnard College of Columbia University.
Flora Hyoin Kim Han (dance – Boston) is a Korean-American dancer, choreographer, and dance educator. Since earning her B.F.A. in Dance from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2014, she has worked with The Click, Prometheus Dance, Jenna Pollack, Lenora Lee Dance, beheard.world, Jennifer Lin, Deborah Abel Dance Company, Lorraine Chapman, and Urbanity Dance. Flora is currently an Assistant Professor of Dance at the Boston Conservatory at Berklee, a Lecturer of Dance at Brandeis University in Fall 2021, a senior faculty at Urbanity Dance and Coastline Ballet Center. Flora’s artistic vision is to bring inclusivity, empowerment, and joy to individuals and communities through the power of dance.
Johnny Huy Nguyen (dance – San Francisco) is a second generation Vietnamese American multidisciplinary dance artist based in Yelamu (aka San Francisco). His practice is centered on the body, recognizing its power as a place of knowing, site of resistance, gateway to healing, and crucible of imagination. Drawing from fluency in multiple movement modalities rooted in a street dance foundation, he weaves together dance with text, ritual, performance art, and other mediums to navigate the intersections between the personal and the political. He has appeared in the works of Lenora Lee Dance, KULARTS, and Embodiment Project and has performed nationally in Oregon, Boston, and NYC. His work has been presented by APAture Festival, the United States of Asian America Festival, and SOMArts, and his most recent solo work, Minority Without A Model, premiered in 2021. www.johnnyhuynguyen.com IG: @johnny.huy.nguyen
Convergent Waves: Boston is supported by ArtsEmerson, Pao Arts Center, and by generous individuals. The creation, presentation of and production residency for Convergent Waves: Boston was also made possible by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts. To find out more about how National Endowment for the Arts grants impact individuals and communities, visit www.arts.gov.
Special Thanks to: Asian Community Development Corporation, Carmen Chan, Chinatown Community Land Trust, Chinese Historical Society of New England, Susan Chinsen, Ken Eng, Stephanie Fan, Amy Guen, Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Harry Lee, Paul Lee, Tunney Lee, Angie Liou, Lydia Lowe, Cynthia Soo Hoo, Cynthia Woo, and Cynthia Yee.
Pao Arts Center is a program collaboration between Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center and Bunker Hill Community College.
