COMPANIES IN RESIDENCE
MOCEAN DANCE
Mocean Dance is an award-winning contemporary dance company based in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Led by Co-Artistic Directors Susanne Chui and Sara Coffin, Mocean commissions Canadian and international choreographers to create dance that is highly physical, collaborative, and technically and emotionally rich. Founded in 2001 by Carolle Crooks Fernando, Sarah Rozee, Sara Harrigan, Alicia Orr MacDonald, and Lisa Phinney Langley, Mocean Dance is nationally recognized as a leading company from the Atlantic region. A resident company of Halifax Dance since 2002, Mocean is committed to its home base in Nova Scotia, contributing to the province’s dance and arts community by providing opportunities for creation, performance, collaboration, development and education.
VOTIVE DANCE
Votive Dance was established in 2012 by Kathleen Doherty and Stephanie Mitro, and has been under the Artistic Direction of Doherty since inception. Based in K’jipuktuk/Halifax, the company was founded to support and develop professional artists from the Atlantic region and to create more performance and choreographic opportunities for local artists. Since 2012 the company has commissioned new works by: Jacinte Armstrong, Kendra Armstrong, Rhonda Baker, Kathleen Doherty, Vanessa Goodman, Catherine Hayward, Katelyn McCulloch, Stephanie Mitro, Dyana Sonik-Henderson, Amanda Stafford and Lydia Zimmer. These works plus others have been performed at Neptune Studio’s Scotiabank Studio Theatre, Alderney Landing Theatre, David Mack Murray Studio Theatre, The Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, The Sonic Temple, DANSpace on Grafton, The Bus Stop Theatre, as a part of The Atlantic Fringe Festival, as well as touring to Annapolis Royal, Saint John, Moncton, Calgary, Edmonton, Toronto & Montreal. Most recently, Votive premiered its newest work, Strike Tone, by Vanessa Goodman at FODAR 2020 in Annapolis Royal.
In 2017, the company started a professional development program, offering weekly training in Jazz dance and other related fields through the Jazz Dance Initiative. Votive Dance continues to support and develop professional artists from the Atlantic region, and has become an important part of the Nova Scotia dance scene and community.
KINETIC STUDIO
KINETIC STUDIO is a Halifax-based non-profit organization dedicated to the development and presentation of contemporary dance choreography and performance in Nova Scotia. Kinetic Studio supports professional dance by offering classes, workshops and a season of contemporary dance performances for finished and unfinished works. Our annual performance series, the Open Studio Series, features local and Canadian dance artists.
PHIN PERFROMING ARTS
phin: an exquisite riot.
Dance uplifts, entertains, inspires, grows community spirit, and fosters creativity in all aspects of life. Founded in 2010, Phin Performing Arts is a contemporary dance performance company dedicated to creating moving dance and multi-disciplinary works for the stage. Supporting the creative work of Artistic Director and choreographer Lisa Phinney Langley and her collaborators, and embracing both the choreographer-led creative process and cross-disciplinary experimentation, Phin’s artists embrace an attitude of organic evolution of structure and artistic practice. Excited about exquisite simplicity, a connectedness that shatters the boundaries of nature/culture, art/science, idea/performance, and riotous expressions of creativity that leave us all utterly sated, Phin creates rich, decadent dance and multi-disciplinary works for the stage and alternative venues.EndFragment
THE WOODS
The Woods is Atlantic Canada’s first professional hip-hop dance company, (June 2010, in residence, Halifax Dance) under the direction of Alexis Cormier. Alexis believes in the progression of urban dance and has spearheaded the Atlantic Canadian movement to bring quality education to local dancers, under the mentorship of Lenny de la Pena (Flavor Shop, Toronto, and Closing Ceremonies Choreographer, Winter Olympics 2010).
The Woods aesthetic consists of grounded urban movement with the polish expected from a traditional dance company. The company consists of 17 local dancers, ages 15 to 25, training and rehearsing weekly in downtown Halifax. Their debut performance was in Grand Parade, Halifax, as part of the hip-hop festival, HopscotcH (September 4th to 11th, 2010), in partnership with HRM and local b-boy company, Concrete Roots. The Woods was the sole hip hop dance group to perform at HopscotcH, was featured in the festival commercial airing on CTV, and provided performances in the national b-boy competition, 3 Coast Roast, and opening act for the Classified concert, sponsored by HRM. Since then The Woods have been featured in HopscotcH 2011, Nocturne, music videos, and Canada Games 2011.
