Biography
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Originally from Washington, D.C., I am pursuing an Master of Fine Arts in Dance with a focus on Choreography and a Certificate in World Performance Studies at the University of Michigan. I received my bachelor's degree in History of Science and a Certificate in the Program in Dance from Princeton University. While pursuing my New York City-based performance and choreographic career, I was a 2012-2013 Arts Fellow at Drisha Institute for Jewish Education and a 2014 resident artist at Dance Omi International Dance Collective. I have presented work at numerous venues including Princeton University's Richardson Auditorium, Dixon Place, Manhattan JCC, Center for Performance Research, Congregation Ramath Orah, The Tank, and Judson Church. Since January 2016, I have traveled throughout North America and Europe to study Brazilian Zouk dancing and pedagogy, teach workshops, and DJ. I co-organized the Zouk Dance Club at U-M where I teach and DJ weekly. My MFA thesis explores Brazilian Zouk as a convergence of partnered social dancing, concert dance, and performance in everyday life though multimedia collaboration.
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Artist Statement
Above all I value community and wade deeply into both Jewish, partnered social dance, and concert dance communities and from them draw material for my choreographic process and body of work. Building community among collaborators from multiple disciplines begins before the crafting of work, often presented as a series of improvisational scores mounted upon a skeleton of set choreography. My movement style is influenced by functional anatomy and kinesiology, Gaga textures, balance and line from Maggie Black ballet philosophy, and physical connection techniques informed by contact improvisation and partnered social dances. My projects are research-based and emphasize deconstruction of ideas both through theme and variation and chance reorganization, as well as re-contextualization through costume, performers, set and performance venue.
I am in a constant state of introspection and transformation, relentlessly seeking ways to fuse my many identities into one. Diverse movement vocabulary, language, ritual, costume, history, race, etiquette, and gender dynamics all provide fodder for my work. By sharing and presenting content from communities in which my artists and I are immersed, it is my hope that my work sparks introspection and dialogue among diverse audiences about their own journeys and suggests that journeying is a state of being and provides a basis for unity and universality.
I am in a constant state of introspection and transformation, relentlessly seeking ways to fuse my many identities into one. Diverse movement vocabulary, language, ritual, costume, history, race, etiquette, and gender dynamics all provide fodder for my work. By sharing and presenting content from communities in which my artists and I are immersed, it is my hope that my work sparks introspection and dialogue among diverse audiences about their own journeys and suggests that journeying is a state of being and provides a basis for unity and universality.
| sydney_schiff_cv_fall_2017.pdf |
Copyright © 2010-2017 Sydney Schiff All Rights Reserved
Perpetual Metamorphosis is a service mark of the Sydney Schiff Dance Project
Perpetual Metamorphosis is a service mark of the Sydney Schiff Dance Project