Alethea Adsitt & Company brings to the fore of our interdisciplinary process an innovative performance terrain, by creating compelling intersections between dance, music, theater and visual design. Our investigations mine the complex riddles of our humanity, yielding an aesthetic that taps the familiar and the strange. Attuned to architectural circumstance, the body is engaged in constant renewal of its own poetics, yielding a signature ranging from full-bodied athleticism, to subtle, intricate gesture. Each work explores the spatial and psychological dynamic between performer and observer, provoking an active and thoughtful relationship with the audience. Alethea Adsitt & Company presents work for the theater, site-specific locations and film, forming collaborations with directors, actors, playwrights, filmmakers, designers, composers and dance artists.

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COMPANY BIO

Alethea Adsitt has been choreographing and presenting work since 1996. In 2003, Adsitt relocated to New York from Seattle and formed Alethea Adsitt & Co, dedicated to experimental performance with a strong kinetic sensibility.

Ms. Adsitt’s work has been commissioned and produced in Washington, Massachusetts, New York and West Virginia, by venues including: Dance New Amsterdam, Dixon Place, Draftwork at Danspace Project, Dance Conversations at The Flea, New Dance Alliance’s Performance Mix at Joyce Soho, TISCH, Brooklyn Arts Exchange, BAAD! - Out Like That, DancenOw Festival at Dance Theater Workshop, Bridge at University Settlement by Williamsburg Arts Nexus, White Wave, On The Boards, Velocity Dance Center, The Yard, The Gilded Pony Festival and The Goose Route Dance Festival. Residencies include: The Yard on Martha’s Vineyard, Artward Bound through The Field at Earthdance, and DancenOw Silo Artist Residency in Pennsylvania. The company is developing its 3rd full-length work in NYC, Empty Room (Adsitt’s 5th full-length work to date) which will premiere March 27 – 30th, 2008 in The Performance Project @ University Settlement. The company will produce a benefit, Happy Hour with Alethea Adsitt & Co. A Fun-Raiser to benefit the premiere of the new work, February 10th, 2008 at Dixon Place.

Ms. Adsitt is a two-time recipient of the Bossak-Heilbron Charitable Foundation Grant (2001 Seattle, 2007 NYC), and has received support from the King County Arts Commission – Special Projects, Washington State Arts Commission – PDAP, the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts - Astral Career Grant and generous private contributions.

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ARTIST BIOS

COMPANY MEMBERS

Alethea Adsitt, Artistic Director of Alethea Adsitt & Company, is a New York-based choreographer, performer, teacher and improviser. In the city, she has danced with Gina Gibney Dance, Katie Workum/Will Rawls, and with Kristin Hapke/TinDance. An alumna from Cornish College of the Arts, she has performed in the works of numerous dance and theater companies from both coasts, most notably Mary Sheldon Scott/Jarrad Powell Performance, KT Neihoff/Lingo Dance Theater, Wade Madsen, Pat Graney, Llory Wilson, Theater Simple, Ace Petersen/House of Dames, Rinde Eckert, Ralph Lemon and in the work of Seattle’s glassbones ensemble, with whom she is a former founding member. Alethea specializes in movement-driven workshops to underserved populations throughout NYC, and will pursue her parallel passion for movement science when she returns to school for a doctorate in Physical Therapy.

Courtney Drasner (performer) grew up in Minnesota and later received a BFA in dance from NYU. Since graduating, she has performed for many different choreographers including Jana Hicks, Jordana Che Toback, Janessa Clark/Kilterbox, M. Lindsay Smith, and RDC; she has been a member of Gina Gibney Dance since 2004. This is her third season with Alethea Adsitt & Co.

Jill Frere (performer) has been dancing with Alethea Adsitt and Company for 4 years and couldn't be happier. Frere is also currently dancing for Jody Oberfelder Dance Projects, in the opera Dido and Aneus. Frere is grateful to have been a guest artist with David Dorfman Dance, Ellis Wood Dance, and Larry Keigwin and Company. She graduated from NYU Tisch School of the Arts with a BFA in dance performance in 2004, and from North Carolina School of the Arts in 2001. Jill Frere is the Education Director of the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company, and also teaches Yoga at NYU. Frere would like to thank her husband Noah for all of his love and support.

Corey Harrower(performer) is a Vermonter. He is a co-founding member with Annie Hewlett of R.A.D.-Random (Random Acts of Dance), a performance collective engaged in the expansion of the physical and mental spaces traditionally assigned to modern dance. He has also performed with Skove Works and Michel Kouakou. He is an EMT and holds a B.A. in dance and English from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT. He loves to read.

Joshua Palmer(performer) born and raised in the state of Maine, began his dance training at a small studio in his home town before moving to New York to attend NYU. He has attended the Bates College Dance Festival, the Bates College Young Dancers' Workshop, and most recently, the summer festival at the Salzburg Experimental Academy of Dance, where he was able to learn and perform repertory of William Forsythe as well as work with teachers from all over Europe. Josh Graduated from NYU Tisch School of the Arts in 2007. He is currently working with Alethea Adsitt & Co., Tracy Lang, Cherylyn Lavagnino Dance Company, and Danielle Russo Dance Company.

Robin Kurtz (Actor/Writer/Director) has been collaborating in the realm of dance/theater and film with Alethea Adsitt since 1998. In 2001, she was part the original Seattle cast of Jalopy. Additionally, she has worked with director Gwenyth Reitz on numerous projects including, the New York Fringe Festival production of Spare Change, by Pauline Luppert, in Seattle with Manual Arts Theater’s, The Vulgar Librarian, and Ms. Reitz’s original work, The Rhinestone Experience, produced by On The Boards. A Seattle transplant, Robin has worked with a multitude of companies focused on new plays such as, Theater Simple, Book-It Repertory and Theater Schmeater’s production of John Lennon’s Gargoyle, directed by Jerry Manning. Robin has toured abroad to Russia with New York’s Irondale Ensemble Project in the company’s adaptation of Jack Black’s novel, You Can’t Win, and throughout Europe with Insight America’s, True West, in which she played both “Sal” Kimmer and Mom. Her most recent film credits include Mayor Diane Reamed in the indie feature, A Nuclear Autumn, and Andy in Mulletville. Ms. Kurtz received her BFA in Acting with hono`rs from Carnegie Mellon University.

Jeff Lorenz (Sound Designer/Composer) is a graduate of Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington and specializes in sound design and music for film and theater. He is a multi-instrumentalist who has also engineered recordings for various musicians in Washington and Philadelphia. Jeff is an ongoing collaborator with SaBooge theatre company, having designed the sound and performed original music for 4 SaBooge shows: cozy, Fathom and Speak Easy, in Montreal, NYC, Philadelphia, Kingston and Toronto, ON, and Dublin, as well as Every Day Above Ground at PS. 122 and Bric. He was part of the creative ensemble that earned SaBooge a Best Production Award at the Dublin Fringe and Best Text MECCA 2004. Jeff’s sound design for The Flying Machine’s original production of Frankenstein at SoHo Rep earned him a 2005 Drama Desk Award nomination. Jeff’s collaborations with Tami Stronach included La MaMa Etc for Dance for Pinchas, the fish people and the great flood, and The Vampire Cowboy’s show Living Dead in Denmark.

Alisha Trimble (Costume Designer) is a new genre fashion artist. Her handmade works carefully articulate the whimsy of childhood dress-up using form, proportion, embellishment, style, and color. She pays attention to the technical aspects of craft and wearability, while exploring concept & aesthetics in performative installations. The concept for her Spring 08 collection is "Bachelorette Party:" lingerie-inspired daywear, cocktail dresses, and evening gowns, all executed with Alisha's signature ladylikestyle. www.alishatrimble.com

Gina Bashour (performer) is originally from MA. Gina has performed internationally with Pavel Zustiak's Palissimo Dance Theatre, for which she is the rehearsal director and a founding member. She has been working with Ashleigh Leite since 2005 and is currently creating a role in a production of Dido and Aeneas directed by Jody Oberfelder. Gina has performed and collaborated with Alberto Denis, twirled around with Melissa Rikers' Kinesis Project, flown in the air with Julie Ludwick's Fly By Night Trapeze, danced as a principle in the Off-Broadway production Thin Line directed by Derek Mitchell, and danced with Skip Costa's COREmovement Project, among others. She is a freelance choreographer and also co-creator of the children's theater company interCATaction. Gina is thrilled to be starting her first season with Alethea Adsitt & Co .

Natasha Yannacañedo (Performer – the new jalopy) has a Master of Fine Arts in Acting from the American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. She has performed in plays and been in films in New York, California, and Cuba. She is grateful to have played Lisa in the West Coast premiere of Girl Gone by Mac Wellman. Natasha appeared as Carmen in CBS’s The Education of Max Bickford with Marcia Gay Harden. She played a lead role in the film 107 Street that had its world premiere at the New York International Latino Film Festival. Natasha is also an Argentine tango dancer. She is a company member of Judith Shakespeare Company and Theater in the Flesh. Natasha is passionate about the craft of acting and public speaking; she teaches private and group classes for her own company, The N.Y. Acting Company, as well as Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, Artsgenesis, and St. Francis College. Natasha is thrilled be the recipient of the HOLA (Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors) award for Outstanding Achievement by an Ensemble Cast for Fireflies with Thalia Spanish Theatre. She recently directed the satirical, anti-war piece Blood Astounds Me at N.Y. Artists Unlimited.

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