Work Sample #1 – Sharp & Fine – Choreographers Megan & Shannon Kurashige [DEAR 2019]

Excerpt from “Just Ahead is Darkness”
Start Time: 00:05
Recorded in February 2020 at Z Space, San Francisco

Megan & Shannon Kurashige explored how elements of cultural identity and their Japanese family history become ingrained in the imagination and body through storytelling. The work was created as an ongoing collaboration between the choreographers, dancers, composer Cory Wright and the musicians. The project was developed during their DEAR residency during the fall and early winter of 2019/20 and premiered at Z Space in San Francisco.

Work Sample #2 – Chibueze Crouch [DEAR 2020]

Excerpt from “mouth//full”
Start Time: 03:06
Recorded December 2019 at CounterPulse, San Francisco

Performed by Chibuese Crouch and Gabriel Christian, “mouth//full” uses multidisciplinary performance techniques to focus on faith spaces as radical grounds and resilience mechanisms for ancestral tradition retention, syncretic cultural creation, and communal catharsis among Black/African descended people.

Work Sample #3 – Amadeus Julian Regucera [DEAR 2019]

Excerpt from “Absence in relief”
Splinter Reeds : Kyle Bruckmann, oboe | Bill Kalinkos, clarinet | David Wegehaupt, saxophone | Jeff Anderle, bass clarinet | Dana Jessen, bassoon
Start Time: 07:11
Recorded in November 2021 at the Dresher Ensemble Studio,, Oakland

Originally commissioned and conceived prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, “Absence in relief” (audio and visual studies in intimacy), was reimagined as an audio-video installation for Radius Gallery in Santa Cruz during the spring of 2021. Composer Regucera and Splinter Reeds then recreated a live performance of the piece, premiering it in the Dresher Ensemble Studio. The work, developed in close collaboration with the performers, engenders conversations about consent and trust, complicity and gaze, and power dynamics in performance.

Work Sample #4 – Fred C. Riley III [DEAR 2019]

Excerpt from “The Ground”
Start Time: 09:36
Recorded in June 2022 at the Dresher Ensemble Studio, Oakland

“The Ground” is a sonic/visual poem, a dreamscape exploring the intersection of technology and the natural world. Our central character, a nameless tabletop puppet carved by Fred C Riley appears, thrust into a natural world as a symbolic representation of humanity. Like many of us, she is compelled to “improve” her world through human innovation. Her perceptions of her interior and exterior worlds are depicted on an upstage screen with shadow puppets. These shadow images are at times her environment and setting, her thoughts and emotions, and other times characters in her story.

Work Sample #5 -Clarissa Dyas and Jacob Pek [DEAR 2022]

Excerpt from “Kadili Dance”
Start Time: 12:31
Recorded in October 2021 at the artist’s studio, Oakland

Clarissa Dyas (mover) and Jacob Pek (composer) submitted this sample with their application. “Kadili Dance” records their first exploration of action painting and creating a body score. In their residency, they will create a large number of “graphic body scores”- action/dance paintings created improvisationally by Clarissa dancing painted in black on canvas in dialogue with Jakob’s live music. They will film the process and represent it as a video installation during their final live “In Studio Performance”.