ABOUT

Contremune Dance is an emerging modern dance collaborative that uses dance as a platform for physical dialogue, engaging in conversation, social research and developing repertory that addresses issues of social justice and inequality. We are committed to the process of building empathy seeking justice and tearing down the practice of “othering” human beings. The goal of Contremune Dance is to serve as an umbrella for the practice of continually exploring processes of engagement through movement, creating opportunities for dance to serve as a tool for peacebuilding and community dialogue. Through physical conversations, research practices, performances, and community engagement, we aim to provide a dance and movement-based framework to link the movement-based arts to peacebuilding, reconciliation and addressing systemic inequality and injustice.

Since its inception in 2013, Contremune Dance has performed as a company throughout New York and New Jersey at venues including: Riverside Church Theatre, Triskelion Arts, as part of the Fertile Ground Series, the Small Plates Festival, Manhattan Movement Arts, Liberty University, Shetler Studios, the Connelly Theatre, Dixon Place, and as part of Voices Transposed in partnership with UNHCR to bring awareness to the Syrian refugee crisis.

Moving forward, Contremune Dance has evolved from solely a traditional modern dance company, to a multidisciplinary platform for connecting with movement artists and artists of varying disciplines; aligned around research, dialogue, and collaborative co-creation.

Mission Statement:

Contremune Dance's mission is to use the medium of dance to create empathetic movement dialogues that facilitate conversations and support community peacebuilding and fighting systemic inequalities.

Current Collaborations:

Contremune Dance is currently in collaboration with composer Moira Lo Bianco on the project “Reconnection to Self and Community through Music and Dance”. Inspired by the sociological studies of disconnection in relation to increased levels of overall societal anxiety and depression of researcher and journalist Johann Hari, this project explores how movement and the integration of music can support the process of meaningful reconnection to self and the re-integrated self to community.