In Theatre Flamenco of San Francisco’s dance studio at 670 South Van Ness Ave, between 17th and 18th, costumes, props and posters advertising old shows decorate the walls. They are relics of the company’s past – racks of long, heavy dresses used in performances since Adela Clara, fresh from studying in New York, Madrid and Sevilla, founded the company in...
A bit of sunlight brought crowds out to the sidewalks of the Mission on Sunday to watch performers stationed in front of the neighborhood’s murals in “Baile en la Calle: The Mural Dances,” a recurring performance program, now in its fifth year, from Brava Theater Center and the Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center. Featuring Antoine Hunter & His Urban Jazz Dance...
For weeks, six up and coming artists in the world of contemporary dance have been creating performances that dig into the personal and the political that will premiere this weekend in ODC’s 68th season of the Pilot Program in a show called “Wild Bodies.” The choreographers, who are also dancers, have taken the initiative on every part of the production, including ticket sales and technical production. Among...
For the third year running, San Francisco’s Dance Mission Theater will present deeply political performances, this time with a focus on current points of contention like resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline, Black Lives Matter, displacement, deportation, and colonization. Among the programming are various traditional dances with little European influence. The March 24th performance will open with an Ohlone prayer and...
This Saturday will round off a decade in which the Mission’s City College of San Francisco has hosted the annual Aztec [Mexica] New Year celebration, founded by a group of former students determined to share the teachings of their indigenous ancestors with the community. In light of President Donald Trump’s recent anti-immigration policies that have instilled fear in immigrant communities across...
Returning to 24th Street this Saturday is Paseo Artistico – a free art crawl that will enliven the 24th Street corridor from Valencia Street to Potrero Avenue with song, art and film. Activities for the event will kick off at 11 a.m. at the Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center. In celebration of Women’s History Month, participants are invited to embark on a bilingual, guided mural...
This first ran on March 29, 2009. On Valentine’s Day, I always think of Leo & Lupe, featured in one of my favorite Mission Local videos. Today, I caught up with Lupe Bravo, now 84, for an update. Only recently, she said, did the pair stop dancing regularly because Leo Ansis, now 91, moved into senior housing downtown. “Life changes,” Bravo said,...
Part dance hall, part bar and tapas restaurant, Valencia Street’s Latin music and dance venue, El Valenciano, is now for sale. As Capp Street Crap reported on Monday, owner Victoria Vides has put the 4,500 square-foot space on the market for $525,000. The purchase comes complete with food and alcohol licenses and the venue’s rent and lease are negotiable, according...
Choreographer Kate Mitchell was, despite herself, horrified when she discovered wrinkles and sagging start to take hold on her skin. But then she pushed back, artistically. Mitchell had photographer Alessandra Mello take close-up photos of her skin and bones, and what emerged was a topography that Mitchell saw repeated in nature. Extrapolating from this connection and developing a collaborative performance, Mitchell created Terrain,...
For the fourth year in a row, a festival featuring Deaf and hard of hearing dancers opens at Dance Mission theater Friday, August 12 and runs through August 14, featuring styles ranging from belly dancing to hip hop, ballet to Afro-modern, and even sign language from other parts of the world. The festival brings with it not just expressive movement by Deaf dancers,...
For the 37th year, Carnaval will kick off on the corner of 24th and Bryant streets this Saturday and for two days transform parts of Harrison Street into a multi-block party, while a colorful procession of drummers, dancers, and themed floats snaking up 24th street and along Mission Street, will immerse the neighborhood in various aspects of Latin American culture. With...
Can you picture the gentrification of Oakland, the death of Sandra Bland, and the treatment of Haitians in the Dominican Republic … in dance? In its second annual D.I.R.T. Festival (Dance In Revolt(ing) Times), Dance Brigade will present explorations of all these themes and more, starting on January 22. The festival is inspired by the dancers’ drive to go beyond making aesthetic movement and...
While many artists are leaving the Mission, dancer and choreographer Chuck Wilt has returned to his local roots to explore his old neighborhood to produce two collaborative works that debut tomorrow night, first with Rodeo and on Friday and Saturday nights with the two-part program Ships and Salsa. Ships, the first portion of a two-part piece that will show for...
Fear changes everything. That’s part of the premise to be explored tonight and Saturday night (July 8 and 11) in Opaque, a feature in the Summer Performance Festival presented by the performance art incubator SAFEhouseARTS. Kristin Damrow (last seen locally in Dance Mission Theater’s D.I.R.T.) focuses on the fears that any one of us may fall prey to, and the effect they have on us....
