Dance
The Dance track trains students in the creative art of movement, through both practical experience and intellectual inquiry. Students work towards proficiency in a particular tradition, acquiring both physical and verbal language skills pertinent to their focus. Simultaneously, they are exposed to a global awareness of movement and its ability to articulate and express ideas of identity, sexuality, gender, ethnicity, race and nationalism.
Students learn to recognize and distinguish the many diverse sources of dance, including historical and contemporary streams of socio-cultural influence and the ever-inspiring natural world that surrounds us. The integration of body, mind and spirit informs intellectual and expressive pursuits essential to dance: technique, choreography, production, aesthetic integrity, dance history and dance ethnography.
The dance track is one step towards preparing students for further study and/or careers in the fields of performance, choreography, dance education and administration.
For more information, contact Cheryl Mrozowski, Director of Dance.
Wheaton Dance Company
This program offers advanced dancers an in-depth exploration of the aesthetic and performing issues of a specific dance idiom. The study of ballet, modern, jazz, and other dance forms begins in the choreographic process and continues through the rehearsal stage, culminating in the performance of selected repertory works. Performance opportunities occur throughout the first and second semester with the emphasis placed on the semi-annual mainstage concerts in December and May.
Andrea Taylor-Blenis, Artistic Director
Andrea Taylor-Blenis started dancing with her parents in International Folk Dance at age 0. Her early Creative Movement experiences were with Ruth Wheeler, co-founder of Dance Collective, and with Ann Brown-Allen. After receiving her BFA in Dance from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, she came to Boston and danced with Danny Sloane Dance, Paradigm Dance, Concert Dance Company, Dance Collective, Micki Taylor-Pinney, Dawn Kramer, Miguel Lopez, Milton Myers, Julie Ince-Thompson, ACE Entertainment, and has been with Prometheus Dance Company for 19 years. She has taught International Dance through the Folk Arts Center of New England, Modern and Jazz Dance at Northwestern and Northeastern Universities, Harvard, Emerson, Boston University, Boston Conservatory and the Jeannette Neill Dance Studio. Andy is the artistic director of Mladost Dance Ensamble and the RSCDS Demonstration Team and loves teaching school residencies through Mass Movement and Revels Inc. Andy is an adoring admirer of Lynn Simonson. Dance is a musical, satisfying, overwhelming, strengthening, challenging, freeing discipline that applies to and enhances each day of our lives.