December 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Kalani, Rulan, and the infamous ´core warriors´ Alejandro, Quetzal, Thosh, Brian, Quese, Jeremy, Lawrence and Whe:Whum joined the principal actors as well as Chief Robert Green and son Joseph, and Cheif Atkins and son Steve, of Virginia , at the world premiere of THE NEW WORLD in Hollywood! Red carpet photos taken by the international press can be viewed at www.gettyimages.com or www.wireimage.com. Kalani and Rulan are seen proudly wearing silver jewellery designed for them as congrulatory gifts by the gifted hands of artsist LaRance/Denipah of Flagstaff Arizona.
Rulan and Alex Meraz, our first movie premiere! ( not his last!)
core warriors
Lawrence, Steve (son of one of the Virginia cheifs),Rulan, Alex Meraz, Jacquie West our costume designer, Kalani, Thosh, Quetzal
For the rest of the month, Rulan is travelling throughout the mountains and rainforests of southern Mexico, researching material for the next dance creations, exploring cultural links between Native tribes, “sin fronteras”! She sends Solstice greetings from Chiapas!
November 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
DANCING EARTH performed at the end of the month in San Diego for Native Youth at a health and wellness conference organised by the brilliant Jillene Joseph. We look forward to participation in her spring event in Reno Nevada.
Jessica Allen is continuing in her lead role in the show BLAST, currently touring throughout the United States.
Meanwhile, on location in the jungles of Veracruz Mexico, Raoul Trujillo is acting in a lead role in a new epic film directed by Mel Gibson, set in the ancient Mayan era. Other film leads are dancers as well with backgrounds from powwow to contemporary to Mexican folkloric and Aztec. Rulan joins the cast as the choreographer and physical movement trainer.
October 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
While in Mexico City, Raoul and Rulan attended a performance of Earth In Motion´s AGUAS, choreographed by Alejandro Ronceria andperformed in an outdoor fountain in UNAM. It was a stunning evening, with 5 live musicians and an all female cast, including Penny Couchie, Santee Smith, April Doxtator, and Carla Soto.
August 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
This month, Serena Rascon was selected by the acclaimed LINES BALLET school in San Francisco, to attend their year round program as part of their professional training group, congratulations! She recently was apprenticing for the exciting MOVING PEOPLE DANCE THEATER, a primal force in the Santa Fe dance scene. MOVING PEOPLE is moving into large new dance studios off of Cerillos road at the end of the month.
At the opening of the Poeh Museum of the Pojaque Pueblo, Quetzal Guerrero composed an original score to which a collaborative dance piece was created by himself, Anthony, Alex, Edgar Soto Garcia and We:whum Wulwilder. Kalani, Raoul and New Line Cinema producer Sarah Greene attended to support the event, as well as Rulan who was there to sign newly published copies of NATIVE PEOPLES magazine wearing the exotic desgns of designer Tracey Collins.
Please check out the Sept/Oct issue of NATIVE PEOPLES, featuring 6 interviews with the most exciting Indigenous choreographeric pioneers the US and Canada, and featuring Rulan on the cover.
August 17 Rulan and Kalani do a morning radio interview promoting THE NEW WORLD, and that evening they are joined by whole crew in cluding Raoul, Sarah Greene, Wes Studi and many core warriors for the first NEW WORLD public preview with panel discussion, at the center for Contemporary Arts in Santa Fe.
July 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Check out this months issue of THE NEW MEXICO MAGAZINE, inside you will see stunning photos of Anthony Collins modelling Native fashions in the middle of New Mexico highways!
Richard Bluecloud Castaneda photographed Rulan Tangen early morning on a San Francisco hilltop for the cover of an upcoming issue of NATIVE PEOPLES magazine, see www.nativepeoples.com. She wore stunning contemporary Maori fashions by Marama designs,(Kingi Davis and Tracey Lloydd, a favorite dance collaborator met in Banff), along with feather earrings given to her in Brasil by 14 year old Werimea of the Pataxo Nation, with whom she exchanged songs and açai fruit, during a rainstorm!
June 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Rulan performed spoken word poetry in a dance piece by Kevin Iega (choreographer of Deeply Rooted Dance Ensemble) for the Moving People concert at the Lensic Theater in Santa Fe.
Alex Meraz made his first short film, “Burning Water”, for submission to the ImagineNative (www.imaginenative.org) film festival in Toronto , congratulations!
Rulan Tangen was invited to appear solo at Odyssey Dream, an international literary and arts festival in Amman, Jordan in August/September. She was able to recommend 6 more DANCING EARTH performers, as well as several of the New World core warriors, additional powwow dancers, graffiti artists, filmmakers, photographers and poets, to be on the list for a possible delegation of more than 30 Native artists for participation as representative of the United States!
On Sunday June 19, Rulan performed at the first Annual “Sounds of Change” fundraiser held outside the Bikanda Capoeira Space. The benefit was on behalf of the Berimbau Foundation’s “Project Life”, a multi-aspected project that includes bringing capoiera, permaculture, dance and other forms to disenfranchised youth, within a filmed documentary. Other guest participants came from Brasil, Africa, many Native people were present, as well as circus performers, fire swallowers, percussionists, DJs and incredible cuisine cooked on site including west indian, jamaican, and soul food !
Rulan and Kalani were featured in a live interview June 1st on KPFA radio station, 1pm pacific standard time.
Raoul and Rulan are now on a new ‘podcast’ on the website www.thenewworldmovie.com, under Blogs, under Native Movement, describing the process and research involved in creating the movement quality of Native peoples in the historic period of early contact.
Rulan was invited to perform a solo for the dance nOw/nyc festival (www.dancenownyc.org) in september, performing at the cathedral of St John the Divine. Mark your calendars for September 13 at 7:30 pm, the opening of the ’sacred’ dance element of the experimental modern dance festival. She is considering dancing to Robert Mirabal’s “Witch Song”, a powerful wordless song made in dedication to the sacred womens incantations that were suppressed by colonizing forces.
May 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Quetzal, Thosh and Alejo will be going to Toronto to work with experimental filmmaker Kent Monkman on a new project.
The May 2005 issue of Dance Magazine features a photograph of Rulan, and mention of DANCING EARTH in an article by Janet Eigner about dance in Santa Fe. For more info please access www.dancemagazine.com
DANCING EARTH affiliate artists and friends will be touring the northeast with the show SPIRIT. Including Brandon Oakes and Tamara Podemski as leads, Happy Frejo as dance captain, and fancy dancer Jody Johns joining the cast. For more information, please visit www.spiritseventhfire.com.
Congratulations to Cina Littlebird! She has been accepted to Columbia University with scholarships from Bill Gates and National Merit Society, and looks forward to being in the dance mecca of New York City in the fall. Also with spring flowers comes her 18th birthday, which marks her entry as a full company member of DANCING EARTH, after 6 years of work in Rulan’s choreography!
April 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
DANCING EARTH members will be attending Gathering of Nations Powwow in Albuquerque as well as Mike 360’s hiphop event.
Alejandro Meraz was chosen by acclaimed choreographer Alejandro Ronceria to return to Banff Centre in Canada to work on a special role in a new production titled “The Hidden Place”.
Rulan Tangen attended the memorial service performance of her colleague Homer Avila, an internationally acclaimed dance artist of Central American heritage, who danced with her in Paris and Norway with the Michael Mao dance company. The event was held at St Marks Church in New York City and offered Homer’s choreography as well as the sublime video footage from a documentary named PHOENIX DANCE with the choreography of Alonso King. 3 initiatives have been established in Homers memory; donations may be made to complete the documentary footage, or scholarships for study with Alonso King or zvi Gotheiner, or a health plan being created for NYC dancers.
March 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Dancing Earth took our performances to Brazil! Our performance at the Teatro Nunes in Belo Horizonte was one of the highlights for many participants of the 5th annual ENCUENTRO. see www.hemi.nyu.edu and article in www.forrealism.com. The amazonian nations of maxacali, kaiapo, and pataxo were present to offer welcoming ceremonies and dances, and we were awed by the performances and presentations of incredible indigenous artists, activists and educators from north, central and south america, as well as new zealand and hawaii! We thank the Salt River Pima/Maricopa Indian Community for generously supporting Thosh Collins to attend this historic event.
The Spielberg mini series “INTO THE WEST”, being filmed just outside Santa Fe, features Raoul Trujillo as the historic Chief Red Cloud, Kalani Queypo as White Bird, and Brandon Oakes as Kicking Bear.
Alejo and Thosh returned to Canada to dance alongside April Doxtator in Santee Smith’s choroegraphy for the Aboriginal Achievement Awards in Saskaktchewan, where they danced on a stage designed by Cirque Du Soleil set designer! They reconnected with Tasha Hubbard, an emerging documentarian whose first feature was screened at the Encuentro in Brasil.
Rulan, Kathryn Mark and Alex Meraz in Brasil
January – February 2005
Aug 26, 2009 2005
Rulan, Thosh and Alex joined mohawk choreographer Santee Smith at the Banff Centre for the Arts to collaborate on her new work HERE ON EARTH, performed partially on modernistic totem structures of metal scaffolding. They also were featured in solo roles along with an international cast in her acclaimed KAHA:WI (see www.santeesmithdance.com). They performed in Banff, Calgary, the original mohawk territory of Oneonta NT, and on Six Nations at Brantford, where they also offered a dance workshop to 40 Iroquois youth. KAHA:WI gave the inaugural performance at the theater of the new National museum of the American Indian in Washington DC, where Raoul Trujillo joined our cast in a reprisal of his role as the Ancient One.