Cameron McKinney

Nagare Technique: Contemporary Floorwork

This contemporary floorwork-based class combines the grace of modern with the speed and fluidity of streetdance, capoeira, and house dance. The class activates oppositional forces and contrasting sensations to achieve fluid transitions in and out of the floor. Phrases will involve every part of the body–whether in the air or on the ground. The class focuses on how to move from smoothly high to low, and on how to rediscover “the down” through the floorwork-oriented aspects of house dance, capoeira, and contemporary dance. By shifting the focus from an internal dialogue to creating movement that, in its own physicality, can tell a story by itself, the class will delve deeper into the cathartic potential of sweat and exhaustion, while offering a new and active method of expression.

Cameron McKinney’s biography:

With more than 18 years of Japanese language study, Cameron McKinney created Kizuna Dance with the mission of using contemporary floorwork to create dance works for those who want to connect, and for those who feel we are all already connected, using both the similarities and divergences – linguistic, historical, aesthetic – between the American and Japanese cultures as primary drivers. He was selected as a 2019-20 U.S.-Japan Friendship Commission Creative Artist Fellow to collaborate with renowned Japanese choreographer Toru Shimazaki and present work in showcases in Japan.

He has also been a Choreography Fellow at The School at Jacob’s Pillow, a Hearst Choreographer-in-Residence at Princeton University, an Alvin Ailey Foundation New Directions Choreography Lab Fellow, and an Asian Cultural Council Individual Grantee. His work has been supported through grants from the MidAtlantic Arts Foundation, the New York City Artists Corps, Brooklyn Arts Council, and the Rader Young Artists Foundation. Through Kizuna Dance, Cameron has also presented work and taught in twenty states and in Mexico, France, the UK, and in Japan at the U.S. Ambassador’s Residence. His commissions include The Ailey School, Marymount Manhattan College, Princeton University, Montclair University, twice from the Joffrey Ballet School, three times from the Let’s Dance International Frontiers Festival (UK), Slippery Rock University, The Dance Gallery Festival, Brigham Young University, and San Jose State University, among numerous others.

His teaching credits include Adjunct & Visiting Lecturer positions at Princeton University, NYU Tisch, Montclair University, Bard College, and Queensborough Community College. He has taught on faculty at Gibney Dance since 2016, and has taught for festivals nationally and internationally. Each year, he organizes Kizuna Dance’s Open Intensive, a week of day-long intensives made entirely free for all participants, featuring high-quality dance education provided by the company artists of Kizuna Dance.

Dates and times:
June 3-7
14:30 – 17:30

Price:
50 € registration fee
150 € total

Package deal:
In the same week Youri de Gussem is teaching in the mornings. You get a 15% discount for registering to both workshops.