December 6, 2016

National Performance Network's Creation Fund will co-commission ADT's "Shyamali"

The National Performance Network (NPN), including the Visual Artists Network (VAN), is a national organization supporting artists in the creation and touring of contemporary performing and visual arts.

The NPN has made a FY2017 Creation Fund Award to Ananya Dance Theatre (ADT) for the production of “Shyamali: Sprouting Words,” co-commissioned by the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater, Pittsburgh, PA, Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia, PA, Maui Arts & Cultural Center, Kahului, HI, Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles, CA, and The O’Shaughnessy at St. Catherine University, St. Paul, MN.

The Creation Fund Award to ADT is $19,000.

Photo by James Davies

“Shyamali” is an evening-length dance work created by ADT and inspired by the ways that women across the world repeatedly talk back and embody dissent against injustices, despite daunting consequences.

“Shyamali” will receive its world premiere performances at The O’Shaughnessy in September 2017.

Weaving movement with text, speech, breath and song, “Shyamali” will create a rich, multi-lingual performance celebrating the histories and stories of women’s courageous acts that may have slipped through the bonds of public memory. The metaphorically staged, juxtaposed stories in this work will be choreographed in Yorchha, the company’s unique vocabulary of contemporary Indian American dance, and will be produced through collaborations with several design artists.

The creation of “Shyamali” will proceed through a community-engagement process and will incorporate several strategies for audience engagement during the performance.

Support for the research and development of new performances is rare, and funding sources often require artists and presenters to define new works before that process has even begun. The Creation Fund was established to provide direct and unencumbered assistance to the process of creation and to encourage others to do the same.

The NPN Creation Fund contributes a minimum of $13,000 directly to artists toward the commissioning of new work. NPN Partners apply for Creation Fund support for projects by artists who live either outside or inside the initiating NPN Partner’s community. This flexibility encourages NPN Partners to work with emerging artists in their own communities while introducing and promoting these artists’ work to the NPN Partners at large.

Click here for more information about Creation Fund Projects.

“Shyamali: Sprouting Words” is a National Performance Network (NPN) Creation Fund Project co-commissioned by the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater, Pittsburgh, PA, in partnership with the Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia, PA, the Maui Arts & Cultural Center, Kahului, HI, the Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles, CA, The O’Shaughnessy at St. Catherine University, St. Paul, MN, and NPN. The Creation Fund is supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Ford Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Arts (a federal agency). The Forth Fund is supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. For more information: www.npnweb.org.