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Sebastienne Mundheim (Director/Co-choreographer, Writer, Designer, Fabricator, Performer) has created 18 original, performances commissioned by institutions including: the University of Pennsylvania, The Rosenbach Museum and Library, The Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Franklin and Marshall College. Her shows have been performed locally and internationally. Mundheim is known for synthesizing complex ideas into lyrical accessible works for audiences of all ages. Her performance A Potable Joyce: a Watered-Down Version of Ulysses has been performed over one hundred times, touring Ireland in 2004 through a grant from the Irish Ministry of Arts and Culture. This performance was later made into a film. Her performance Currently Franklin:The Story of a Paper Boy premiered in 2006 and was performed over 100 times in one year. Her newest work, Sea of Birds, is scheduled to tour New England in Spring 2009, to museums/theatres, including MassMoca, Marlboro College, Keene State University, and Stonington Opera House. In addition to making her own work Mundheim has collaborated in the works of other artists including: Whit McLaughlin, New Paradise Laboratories, Thaddeus Phillips, Lucidity Suitcase, Madi DiStefano, Brat Productions, Kate-Watson Wallace, and the Reactionaries. Sebastienne has also been a community artist/educator since 1992. Sebastienne received her BA/BFA from the University of Pennsylvania in 1990, and her EdM from Harvard in 2000. |
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Karin Bookbinder-Otto (Performer/Choreographic Collaboration) has enjoyed working as a choreographer and performer with many local artists and dance companies. She has performed with independent choreographers, as well as companies such as Leah Stein Dance Company, SCRAP Performance Group, White Box Theater, Ring Dance Theater, and Travesty Dance Group. Karin received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Dance Performance/Choreography and Dance Therapy from Goucher College. Her original works have been presented at the Philadelphia Fringe Festival, The Independent Choreographer's Exchange, The Community Education Center, GLUE/Kumquat, 7Dance Festival and, Waxworks/NYC. When she is not dancing, she enjoys a thriving practice as a Yoga teacher. |
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Charlie DelMarcelle (Performer/Choreographic Collaboration) has been working as a professional director, actor and theatre educator for over ten years. He devotes much of this time to community outreach and theatre for young audiences serving as the associate director of the Fulton Family Theatre Ensemble. He is an adjunct professor of theatre at West Chester University, a roster artist for the PA Council on the Arts and a frequent guest artist at local colleges. As a director, he has worked regionally for the Fulton Opera House, PA Youth Theatre, Vagabond Acting Troupe, Triangle Theatre, Theatre of the Seventh Sister, PRC Theatre, University of Pennsylvania, Moravian College and Millersville University. Three of his productions have been honored in Philadelphia, two with Barrymore nominations for Outstanding Ensemble (A Christmas Carol in 1999-2000 and The Art of War 2004-2005) and one with a 2001 Philadelphia City Paper critic’s pick for Bravest Production (Desinence: An Evening of Work by Samuel Beckett). |
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Danielle Paloumpis (Performer/Choreographic Collaboration) is a dancer, teacher, choreographer, arts administrator and video artist. She is a founding member of map dance collective and a co-facilitator of SWAP (Sharing Works and Process)—a new workshop/performance series/thrift store for artists. In 2006 she graduated from Hollins University with a B.A. in Dance and English. Since coming to Philadelphia in August of 2007, Danielle has performed in the Hollins Fall Dance Gathering (Roanoke, VA); AUNTS, Spontaneous Combustion: Lang Cabaret, Body Blend, Danspace's Academy Dances (NY,NY); as well as nEW Festival, paraphrase/NEXUS, the CEC's Art Grows Here Benefit Show, and StudioSeries (Philadelphia, PA).http://myspace.com/mapdancecollective |
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Marcelo Rueda (Performer/Choreographic Collaboration) is co-founder of DANZA COMUN (www.danzacomun.com). He holds a BFA in Sociology from Colombia’s National University and a Certificate of Professional Studies from the Jose Limon Dance Foundation. From 2004-2007 Rueda has received grants from the Fulbright Commission and the Limón Institute to study technique and choreography in New York City, and from UNESCO in order to develop his own choreography in India. Mr. Rueda’s work has been presented in several international festivals in Colombia, Mexico, Venezuela, Switzerland, India and the U.S. He has been teaching dance professionally since 1997 to different audiences including actors and dancers from universities and high schools. Rueda is currently a Future Faculty Fellow at Temple University’s Department of Dance. He lives in Philadelphia. |
| Alison St. Pierre (Co-Fabricator) has a background in two and three dimensional art-making. She graduated from Tyler School of Art in 2006 with a BFA in painting. Her relevant work experience includes an internship (2006-2007) at Philagrafika, a non-profit arts organization committed to the history, craft, and contemporary relevance of printmaking, a self-initiated, collaborative photographic study and exhibition ‘Divine Lorraine’ using photography to explore architecture in transition (2006). |
| Mike Riggs (Lighting Designer) is proud to design lighting for theater, opera and dance companies at all points on the spectrum, from the scrappy to the venerable. He works regularly with One Year Lease, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, the Kennedy Center, various regional opera companies, and the Debate Society among others. He was nominated for the NY Innovative Theatre Award in 2007 for 6969. For many years Mike worked as production manager and/or lighting supervisor on several world tours including Momix, Parsons Dance Co., the Flying Karamazov Brothers, and The Presidents featuring Rich Little. |
| James Sugg (Composer) is an actor, sound designer, composer/musician. He received his Bachelor of Music at Oberlin Conservatory for vocal performance, an opera or musical theatre singer. He is a member of Pig Iron Theatre Company, with whom he has created/performed in Joan of Arc, Gentlemen Volunteers, Mission To Mercury, The Snow Queen, Anodyne, Shut Eye, Flop, James Joyce Is Dead and So Is Paris, Hell Meets Henry Halfway and Chekhov Lizard Brain. He began working as sound designer for Pig Iron, The Wilma, The Arden Theatre, Seattle Rep, Actors Theater of Louisville, Freedom Theatre, UArts, Princeton University and Lantern Theatre. James has received the Barrymore for “Outstanding Sound Design” four times and has been nominated for design and composition ten additional times. Composition projects include: rock and roll score of Pig Iron's James Joyce Is Dead and So Is Paris and the bluegrass/country music to a new Mark Twain musical, A Murder, A Mystery and a Marriage (10 Barrymore nominations) which had it’s world premiere at Delaware Theatre Co. He premiered his rock and roll song cycle, The Sea, at the Wilma (Live Arts 06). James is also the front man in the band The Brothers Suggarillo. |
Chad Kinsey (Musician) is an Emmy winning guitar player/producer/composer. He has scored several short films and documentaries including: Fake Clouds (Sundance 2003), In the Tsunami's Wake, Children in a Jar, Rough Cut, and Mayor for Life (Outstanding Music Composition 1997). In the 1990s, Kinsey's band, Burning Bus, released several albums and played over 600 shows, sharing the stage with big acts like Sting and DMB, to name a few. He performs regularly with Loretta Bilieux, Imitation #9, and Highfalootin'. |
| Kate Watson-Wallace, (Co-choreographer) a 2007 Pew Fellow in the arts, is a choreographer and dancer based in Philadelphia. She is director of anonymous bodies, an inter-disciplinary performance company that creates site-based installation. Her work has been funded by The Rockefeller Map Fund, Dance Advance, The Independence Foundation and the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. She has been a guest artist at Drexel University, The University of the Arts, Franklin and Marshall College, Temple University and at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Her dancing, choreography and study have taken her throughout Europe, and across the U.S. Internationally, she has worked with Bulgarian physical theater director Petar Todorov onAmerican Silences, and with British choreographer Carol Brown . As a dancer, she has performed and toured extensively with Group Motion Company, Headlong Dance Theater, and Myra Bazell/ Scrap Performance Group. She was recently mentioned in Philadelphia Magazine as a person to watch in 2008, and voted as a "Best of Philly 2007" in the City Paper. She is honored to be working with Sebastienne on Sea of Birds. |
| Lee Ann Etzold (Dramaturgical Consultant) is a performer, writer, director and a co-founder of New Paradise Laboratories. She is a two-time nominee for the Haas Award for Emerging Artist, a seven-time Barrymore Award Nominee and she shared the Barrymore for Outstanding Ensemble for The Comedy of Errors; Lantern Theatre Co. She recently directed for Brat Productions and created P’s & Q’s for the Live Arts Festival. Performance credits include The Happiness Lecture with Bill Irwin; Philadelphia Theatre Company, and School for Wives; Lantern Theatre Company, and work with Pig Iron Theatre Co., Headlong Dance Theater, Arden Theatre Company, and Azuka Theatre Collective. |
Fabrication/Installation Support: Andy Brehm, Leigh Mumford, Kim Traube, Leslie Rogers, Sarah Odonell, Amanda Elizabeth Olsen, Jamie Labov, Martin Lautz, Doug Magners, Adrienne Cali, Jason Burnham, Stephen Shuster, and Ingrid Boucher.
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| Special Thanks: David Orphanides, John Fries, Tom Miles, Andrew Warner, The Crane Arts Center, Nick Kripal, Richard Hricko, Cole Perera, Adrienne Cali, Doug Magners, Andy Brehm, Sarah Odonell, Jason Burnham, Brian Driska, Jason Krapf, Mat Davis, Nick Stuccio, Live Arts Festival, Sarah Labov, Mara Zepeda, Andrew Zitcer, Anna Drodzowski, Doris and Wayne Guymon, Carol Ann Graham, Scott Johnston, Stephen Shuster, Judith Jerome, Sara Coffey, Morgan Jenness, Fran Kumin, and Guna Mundheim.
Sea of Birds is made possible in part by a grant from the Philadelphia Theatre Initiative, a program of the Philadelphia Center for Arts and Heritage, funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts and administered by The University of the Arts.
Additional support for Sea of Birds comes from Sigi Berwind. |
