Click here to connect with TALK Dance ASIA

 

OUR IDENTITY

Mission
To create and present concert dance events that connect people across cultural, economic, racial and other barriers.

Locally

To create and perform dance works based on stories

of human experience in Mississippi that:

Inspire connection, dialogue and build community

Engage an audience in professional dance performance

Educate new audiences to contemporary dance

Goals

To employ dancers and other artists to create and produce a professional artistic product

To build relationship with dance presenters for the purpose of regional and national touring

To collaborate with other artists

To engage in conversation with the people we serve

To creatively and collaboratively serve the children of Mississippi

To use dance to connect people across cultural, economic, racial and other barriers.

To be administratively and fiscally sound

Values

To be a trusted artistic voice in and for the community

To be technically and creatively excellent

To affirm the value of personhood and interpersonal relationship

To engage in business with integrity

Vision

To artistically represent the state of Mississippi in the cultural marketplace via a                 professional contemporary dance company on a local, national, and international scale.

 

COMPANY

Each performance season TALK Dance Co offers creative and original dance works to inspire our audiences. Funding for our programs come from private donations, The Mississippi Arts Commission, The Jackson Art's Council, The Southern Arts Federation and The Fines Arts Institute of Mississippi. TALK Dance Co is also commissioned by corporations and organizations to produce, cast and manage their special events.

 

TRAINEE PROGRAM

Beginning in September 2009 TALK Dance Co will offer a trainee program. This program is especially designed to prepare dancers to transition into the professional world of dance. The program offers daytimes classes in modern dance, ballet, partnering, choreography, rep, Pilates and career counseling. For schedule and further information check out the GET INVOLVED page on this web site.   

 

OUR MISSISSIPPI INSPIRATION

The soul of Mississippi lies in its rich and diverse cultural heritage. Artists through the decades have represented the state to the world and have helped shape the communities from which they came. Writers such as William Faulkner, Eudora Welty, John Grisham, Tennessee Williams, and Richard Wright as well as musicians such as BB King, Elvis Presley, Jimmy Buffet, and Leontyne Price all found their inspiration from their roots in Mississippi.

Along with the other artistic mediums, dance has an important place in Mississippi. Every four years, Jackson is the proud host of the USA International Ballet Competition. In addition, Mississippi has been the home to several dance companies and boasts nationally recognized college and university dance programs. However, Mississippi has not yet been the home to a professional contemporary dance company. The founding members of TALK Dance Co believe that Mississippi needs artistic representation within the cultural marketplace of the US and abroad. TALK hopes to accomplish this goal by offering professional and riveting contemporary dance performances that are inspired in part by and created within the state. TALK desires to make these dance concerts enjoyable and accessible to novice theatergoers as well as to literate performing arts devotees. TALK's choreography, inspired by the human experience, will engage audiences with excellence in technique, inventiveness, and energy.

 

OUR HISTORY

TALK Dance Company, formerly At Marah Dance Theatre (AMDT), was founded in 1996 in Philadelphia. Its final season as AMDT was in the winter 2004 at which time it began its three year transition to become incorporated as an arts nonprofit organization in Mississippi as TALK Dance Co. Although TALK continues to operate at the same excellent and professional level which was part of the identity of At Marah, TALK seeks to bring this to an artistic voice specifically culturally relevant to Mississippi. Since 1996, At Marah Dance Theatre annually self-produced its performances in Philadelphia. In 1998, AMDT was chosen by The University of the Arts and the Philadelphia Dance Alliance to perform in the festivals “Philadelphia Dances” and “2000 FEET.” In 2000, AMDT toured in California and Louisiana, and also performed in New York City at the Cunningham Studio Theater. AMDT also performed internationally at the National Cultural Centre in St. Lucia, West Indies, at Seneca College in Toronto, Canada, and in Jurmala, Latvia. AMDT was included in the Pennsylvania Performing Arts on Tour (PennPAT) roster in 2002 and 2003 and has since showcased works and was selected to perform at the PA Presenters conference in May 2002. In the summer of 2002, AMDT worked with Nina Watt (of the Limon Dance Company) to set “There is a Time,” performing this work with her in Oxford and Cambridge, England, in coordination with the C.S. Lewis Foundation. At Marah Dance Theatre also participated in several residencies, including at Hancock College and San Francisco State University, CA; Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA; University of Missouri, Kansas City, MO; Belhaven College, Jackson, MS; SO Dance Company, Houston, TX; and St. Lucia School of Ballet and Modern Dance, St. Lucia, West Indies. In 1999, AMDT began a 10-month, 33-hour/week Artist Enrichment Program (AEP) that served between eight and ten students per session between 1999 and 2003. AMDT was a grant recipient from Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, The Philadelphia Cultural Fund, Dance Advance, funded by the Pew Foundation, the Huston Foundation, the 5-County Arts Fund and many other private and corporate foundations.