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DANCE NEWS: 2023 Dance Magazine Awards Will Honor Dance’s Finest
With ‘Education’ As the Guiding Theme
Monday, December 4, 2023 at 7 PM
92NY, Buttenwieser Hall at The Arnhold Center
1395 Lexington Ave, New York City
Dance Media Foundation, in conjunction with Dance Magazine, has announced the honorees for the 66th Dance Magazine Awards, which have a theme of education: Antoine Hunter, Alicia Graf Mack, Norton Owen, Bijayini Satpathy, and Maria Torres. The Chairman’s Award will go to Jody Gottfried Arnhold. The recipients of the Harkness Promise Award, a grant for innovative young choreographers funded by the proceeds from the Dance Magazine Awards ceremony, are Amadi “Baye” Washington and Sam “Asa” Pratt, of Baye & Asa, and Omar Román De Jesús. For the first time this year, in a new category, posthumous Dance Magazine Awards will be given to Syvilla Fort, Gregory Hines, Pearl Primus, and Helen Tamiris.
“We are thrilled to recognize this year’s list of honorees for their contributions to the field of dance, for their dedication to dance education, and for their tremendous talent,” states Frederic Seegal, Dance Magazine Awards Chairman. The Dance Magazine Awards, given since 1954, are the most prestigious honors in the dance field, created to celebrate artists who have made a lasting impact on dance.
Changes to the awards for 2023 include the addition of an annual theme, the establishment of criteria for the selection committee, and the inclusion of posthumous awards to recognize some of the many artists active since 1954 who were not given awards during their lifetimes.
The selection committee for the 2023 Dance Magazine Awards includes teacher and choreographer Sheila Barker, Dance Magazine contributor Joseph Carman, Dance Magazine features editor Margaret Fuhrer, Dance Media president Joanna Harp, former Dance Theatre of Harlem artistic director Virginia Johnson, New York City Center vice president for programming Stanford Makishi, managing editor of Pointe, Dance Teacher, and Dance Spirit Lydia Murray, Dance Magazine editor at large Wendy Perron, former American Dance Festival director Charles L. Reinhart, and Dance Magazine editor in chief and Dance Media content director Caitlin Sims.
The Dance Magazine Awards ceremony, including performances and celebratory speeches, will take place on December 4, 2023, at 7:00 pm at the at Buttenwieser Hall at The Arnhold Center, 92NY, 1395 Lexington Ave, New York City. The Awards Ceremony is a fundraiser for the Harkness Promise Award Scholarships. Tickets are now on sale starting at $125 for general admission and going up to $1,000 for the Visionary ticket, which grants access to a pre-performance reception with Harkness Award honorees.
2023 Dance Magazine Award Honorees:
Oakland native Antoine Hunter aka Purple Fire Crow is an award-winning internationally known Black, Indigenous, Deaf, and Disabled choreographer, dancer, actor, instructor, speaker, producer and Deaf advocate. This Two-Spirit creates opportunities for Disabled, Deaf, and hearing artists, produces Deaf-friendly events, and founded the Urban Jazz Dance Company in 2007 and Bay Area International Deaf Dance Festival in 2013. Awards include the 2022 Disability Futures Fellowship, 2021 Dance Teacher Award, 2019 National Dance/USA fellowship, 2018 inaugural Jeanette Lomujo Bremond Humanity Arts Award, and 2017 Isadora Duncan (Izzie) for Bay Area International Deaf Dance Festival. In 2020, Hunter founded #DeafWoke, an online talk show that amplifies BIPOC Deaf and Disabled stories as a force for cultural change.
Alicia Graf Mack was named dean and director of dance at The Juilliard School in 2018. A former dancer with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Dance Theatre of Harlem, and Complexions Contemporary Ballet, Graf Mack also danced with Alonzo King’s LINES Ballet, Beyoncé, John Legend, Andre 3000, Alicia Keys, and Jon Batiste. Graf Mack graduated magna cum laude with honors from Columbia University and holds an MA in nonprofit management from Washington University in St. Louis. She has been an assistant professor at Webster University and adjunct faculty at the University of Houston and Washington University in St. Louis. She is the co-founder of D(n)A Arts Collective, and host and co-producer of the podcast Moving Moments.
Norton Owen is a curator, writer, and archivist with more than 50 years of professional experience in dance. Since 1976, he has been associated with Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, where as director of preservation he oversees projects involving documentation, exhibitions, audience engagement, and archival issues, as well as extensive online archives, podcasts, and more. In 2000, Dance/USA selected him for its Ernie Award, honoring “unsung heroes who have led exemplary lives in dance,” and he has also received awards from the Martha Hill Dance Fund, Dance Films Association, the José Limón Dance Foundation, and the Theatre Library Association.
Considered a foremost master of Odissi, Bijayini Satpathy has four decades of intensive practice as a performer, teacher, and research scholar. Her journey in choreography began four years ago with ABHIPSAA—A Seeking, commissioned by Duke Performances, Baryshnikov Arts Center, and NEFA's National Dance Project. She was the artist in residence with Live Arts at the Metropolitan Museum from 2021 to 2022. Satpathy is currently a resident fellow at NYU’s Center for Ballet and the Arts and was a New York Dance & Performance Award (“Bessie”) Honoree in 2020. Satpathy’s Odissi practice began in her motherland, Orissa, India, and flourished for a quarter of a century at Nrityagram until 2018.
Maria Torres has sculpted a diverse career spanning direction, choreography, education, and production. Torres pioneered the dance technique Latin jazz, now taught worldwide. She has worked extensively on Broadway (Swing, On Your Feet!, Summer: The Donna Summer Musical), in film (Dance with Me, Enchanted), and on television (“So You Think You Can Dance”). Torres has participated in the Dance Oral History Project at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, and is now helping document the style of social dance she grew up with, the Hustle. She is a trustee of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation and on the board of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society and the League of Professional Theatre Women.
Chairman’s Award: Jody Gottfried Arnhold (MA, CMA) dance educator, advocate, and founder of Dance Education Laboratory (DEL) 92NY, taught dance in NYC public schools for 25 years. She is Executive Producer of the documentaries PS DANCE! Dance Education in Public Schools and PS DANCE! The Next Generation, raising awareness and for her mission, Dance for Every Child. She supports the dance program at the NYC DOE, created the Arnhold Graduate Dance Education Program at Hunter College, and is the visionary benefactor behind the doctorate in dance education and the Arnhold Institute for Dance Education Research, Policy & Leadership at Teachers College, Columbia University. She is the recipient of honorary doctorates from Juilliard and Hunter College and has been honored by Lincoln Center Education, Dance Theatre of Harlem, José Limón Dance Foundation, and American Dance Guild for her visionary support of dance and dance education.
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Harkness Promise Awards: Amadi “Baye” Washington and Sam “Asa” Pratt, of Baye & Asa, and Omar Román De Jesús are the recipients of the two Harkness Promise Awards, which offer a grant and rehearsal space for innovative young choreographers. These awards, conferred in partnership with the Harkness Foundation for Dance, are funded by net proceeds from the Dance Magazine Awards ceremony.
Posthumous Dance Magazine Awards will be given for the first time ever in 2023, paying tribute to dancer, choreographer, and teacher Syvilla Fort; dancer, choreographer, actor, musician, and teacher Gregory Hines; dancer, choreographer, anthropologist, and educator Pearl Primus; and choreographer, dancer, and teacher Helen Tamiris.
For more information on the Dance Magazine Awards or to purchase tickets, please visit dancemediafoundation.org. For sponsorship opportunities, media access, or interviews, please contact Jordanna Brody at dmawards@dancemedia.com.
