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In rehearsal with Sean Aaron Carmon, the Resident Choreographer at Banyan Dance Festival’s Inaugural week, dancers practice phrasework close to a light grey marley floor. In the foreground, a young white woman with loose brown hair in navy basketball shorts, black kneepads and black socks hinges backward. Carmon, a young black man with curly hair and a red bandana demonstrates floorwork in the background of the photo. Other dancers are busy at work in the rest of the photo. Some are part way out of frame.
Photo: Anthony Bethel
  • Reviews

Banyan Dance Festival: I Am Because We Are

E. Wallis Cain Carbonell
  • "We must remember on whose shoulders we stand.”
Several lines of students are mid bounce/step, focused on executing the choreography. All face front toward a wall lined with mirrors. The instructor stands in the middle of the front row of dancers. Participants wear a variety of athletic wear–workout sweats, tanks, shorts, long-sleeve zip ups–and most dance in sneakers.
Photo: Kirwei Lo
  • Reviews

Variety and Conformity in Community Work

Zoe Farnsworth

The enthusiasm and community were vibrant, but the choreography left me wanting more at Philly Dance Day's 2026 Showcase

Nia Love, Vincent Thomas, Miko Doi-Smith, Paloma McGregor, Will Bond, Leah Cox, Elisa García Radcliffe, and Ruby Morales in Wicked Bodies at Arizona State University, Gammage (2022). Organized in three staggered lines atop individual black stools, (three dancers, two dancers, three dancers), the performers each assume a “superman” position on their stomachs, back muscles taught as arms and legs lift off. The dancers wear an array of costumes (billowing pants, structured blazer, expansive gauzy skirt, a polka dot jumper) in shades of black, white, fuchsia, and red. Collectively, they cast their gaze stage left, the direction of their “flight” as haze descends over the top ⅔ of the stage height.
Photo: Tim Trumble
  • Book Reviews, thINKpieces

A witch, some kitsch, and a theory walk into a book

Jennifer Passios

On Liz Lerman’s "Shape and Momentum"

At the RISE 2025 Summit held at the New York Library for the Performing Arts, panelists for a discussion entitled “Data is Revolutionary” gather in black office chairs with silver legs in front of a large projector screen that reads “Dance Data Project, Harriet Tubman Effect Institute, & Women Count” in a pastel blue above the title “Data is Revolutionary” in a light yellow. Six circles containing the headshots of the panelists dot the rest of the projection. Amidst the other seated speakers, Nancy Owen stands holding a microphone in her right hand. She leans forward toward the audience, eyes alight, mouth open in speech that slips through an excited smile. In the lower left corner of the frame, a bald man in a crisp blue suit brings the crook of his thumb and second finger to his chin at stage right. He looks out toward the audience with his chair angled away from the six panelists.
Photo: Victoria Detres
  • Interviews

Dance Leadership by the Numbers

Jennifer Passios

A Conversation with Elizabeth “Liza” Yntema of Dance Data Project®

thINKingDANCE is a consortium of dance artists and writers who work together to provide critical coverage for dance, to build audiences for dance, and to foster the art of dance writing.

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The Latest from thINKingDANCE

Around 20 workshop participants pose in front of an abstract oil painting in a bright gallery. They are all in different positions inspired by the artwork. Many stretch their arms out and up as if reaching. Some arch their backs or bend forward.
Photo: Chika Kobari, courtesy of KinoSaito
  • Reviews

The Four Mothers of Miki Orihara, or Learning Dalcroze’s 20 Gestures with my Daughter

Caedra Scott-Flaherty
  • Miki Orihara explores early modern dance and mothers in her newest work.
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From the Archives

A collection of featured work from our archives across the years

Two women standing in a spotlit space, each with a yellow top and white pants with the taller, Zoe Rabinowitz, gazing aside, embraces and holds Mary McGrath to her chest, one arm around her blond hair, the other around her back, her face buried in Rabinowitz’s chest.
Photo: Sara Radin
  • Reviews

Two tD Writers + Two Fringe Shows — A Reflective Conversation

Jonathan Stein
  • Dance and theater from artists/daughters address their mothers’ dementia.
Photo: Colleen Sirisky
  • Reviews

‘Time of Truth’–A Coming of Age Dance

Rhonda Moore
  • The entire cast jockeys between individual and collective truths.
Photo: Sam Tower
  • Reviews

New Maps from the Fringe Festival

Ellen Chenoweth
  • What new connections and directions emerge this year from the Fringe Festival's explosion of artistic expression?
Photo: Julieta Cervantes
  • Reviews

We Are Moses

Kalila Kingsford Smith
  • Reggie Wilson/Fist and Heel Performance Group's Moses(es) brings to life the nature of leadership within a community.

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