spinning sun dance company

Company Bios 2010-11

Ann Dewey - Artistic Director, Choreographer

Ann Dewey trained at the National Ballet School of Canada and at Rambert Academy in London. She has performed with many professional companies in The U.K and New Zealand, namely Janet Smith and Dancers, DV8 Physical Theatre, Douglas Wright Dance company and Michael Parmenter’s Commotion Company.
Ann is one of New Zealand’s foremost Contemporary Dance teachers and choreographers. She has taught both nationally and internationally at levels ranging from professional companies to community classes. In addition to those companies mentioned above she has taught Ballet Rambert, Rosas, Black Grace Dance Company and most recently the Royal New Zealand Ballet.
Ann choreographs dances for her own company Spinning Sun. She recently won the award for Best choreography (Paper Tiger) at Tempo 07, Aucklands’ Festival of Dance. Their work has toured throughout N.Z., the U.K. and most recently to New Caledonia during. Ann and her company are also regular tutors in many education projects in Auckland schools most notably with the Royal New Zealand Ballet. She has written the first Contemporary dance syllabus in the country, which is taught throughout New Zealand. Ann lives in Leigh where she is enlivening the locals with her dances and preparing a new work for 2011.

Dancers

Liz Kirk
Liz Kirk graduated from New Zealand school of Dance in 1989 and went on to achieve a BA (Honours) in Performing Arts from Middlesex University, London in 1995. She has also studied extensively in New York. Since returning to New Zealand in1995 she as worked for many acclaimed choreographers such as Mary-Jane O’Reilly, Sean Curham, Shona McCullagh and Ann Dewey. Many of these dance pieces have toured New Zealand and Australia. Liz is also experienced in theatre, working as a Dancer/Actor Singer with Auckland Theatre Company and has been employed in the TV and Film industry since 1997. Liz is also an experienced rehearsal director and teacher of contemporary technique and Classical Ballet. She has taught at Unitec, Te Wananga Aotearoa and the Auckland Performing Arts School and has taught choreographic and dance workshops in schools and holiday programmes for the last ten years. For the last five years Liz and Ann have curated and produced the award winning show Old Yeller. 

Julie van Renen
Julie has been working as a freelance dancer and choreographer since graduating with a BPSA in Contemporary Dance from Unitec in 2003.She has danced for various choreographers such as Megan Adams, Clare Luiten, Julia Milsom, and Wilhemeena Gordon. Julie has choreographed two short works on the Pointy Dog Youth Dance Company, which she was a founding member of and is where she first started working with Ann Dewey. She choreographed ‘Emporium’ a site specific dance piece for shop windows which was performed on K Road and for the Wellington Fringe Festival in 2006.This year Julie has been working with ‘Mixit’ a Refugee Youth Arts Project and working for DANZ Tamaki. She danced for Rosie Feltham in the ‘Generation Project’ at The Edge and her choregraphy on Pointy Dog was part of the 2008 Tempo Dance Festival.

Liana Yew
Liana is an Auckland based dancer who graduated from Unitec’s school of Performing and Screen Arts in 2000. Since then her freelance career has given her opportunities to work with many choreographers in diverse styles. Liana credit’s include Fleur De Thier, Sean Curham, Alexa Wilson, Malia Jonhston, Raewyn Hill, Black Grace and Friends, Sarah Sproull Foster, TAnemahuta Gray, Megan Adams,Julia Milsom, Curve Dance Collective and World OF Wearable Arts. In 2008  Liana choreographed a solo work Kiwi, which premiered at the Dunedin festival, and was also performed in Wellington and Auckland. She was awarded Best Emerging Choreographer for her work by the Tempo festival. Flicker is her first project with Spinning Sun.

Zoe Watkins
Zoe trained at the New Zealand School of Dance in Wellington before re-locating to Auckland to begin her as professional dance career. She has worked with many of New Zealand's top choreographers and teachers including Ann Dewey, Shona McCullagh, Michael Parmenter, Raewyn Hill and Douglas Wright. Projects have included Paper Tiger and Queen Camel with Ann Dewey, Black Milk with Dougas Wright, Death of A Bull fighter with Shona DunlopMc Tavish. She also finished in the top 3 females in TV3's season of So You Think You Can Dance.

Geof Gilson
Geof has worked solidly as a contemporary dancer and choreographer for the last ten years with NZ choreographers such as Michael Parmenter, Ann Dewey, Sean Curham, Malia Johnston, and Guy Ryan. Geof has also recently completed a diploma in filmmaking, having just completed his first short film, and studies organic horticulture in his spare time. He has also worked with directors such as Stephen Bain and Campbell Farquhar on interdisciplinary theatre, multimedia and film works.  In recent years he has been overseas much of the time - working on cruise ships in the Caribbean in 2007 and 2008, while in 2009 he was invited by choreographer Michael Parmenter to work with a Scottish dance company, as well as performing in electronic glowing robot costumes in Hong Kong, Sicily and Delhi with Vospertron.

Sarah Baron
Sarah graduated from New Zealand School of Dance in 2007 with a Diploma in Dance Performance. During her time at the school she performed in the World of Wearable Arts Award shows and in Stitchbirds by Daniel Bellton at the Christchurch body Festival 2007. Sarah received a scholarship for Jacobs Pillow Cultural Traditions program 2007, held in the US. She began her association with Spinning Sun by understudying for Flicker in 2008. During 2009 she performed in the tour of Flicker and the premiere season of Left and Right, and is presently working with the company on their forthcoming production.

Creative collaborators

Jo Randerson - Dramaturg
Jo Randerson, founder of Barbarian Productions (an independent comic-theatre troupe) and author of The Knot, The Spit Children and The Keys to Hell,  is a freelance performer and writer based in Wellington. Winner of the Bruce Mason Playwrighting Award in 1997, and the Robert Burns Fellowship in 2001, Jo has travelled internationally with her work to the UK, Scandinavia, Europe and Australia. Jo was a Winston Churchill Fellow in 2002 and visited Russia to study literature there. She was also the designer of the successful 'Posted Love' exhibition at the National Library, and curated 'My House Surrounded By A Thousand Suns' at The New Dowse. Her art work has featured in exhibitions at the City Gallery in Wellington, and the Physics Room in Christchurch. Jo was one of the Billy T Comedy Award finalists in 2005 - overall, she is an artist who works across many mediums and is above all interested in strong and different voices within the arts community.

Charlotte Rose LTCL, BMus, MCPA (1st Class Honours) - Composer/Sonic artist/ Sound engineer
Charlotte Rose is a composer, sonic artist, musician, freelance sound engineer, and teacher. She has studied with John Rimmer, John Elmsly, Eve de Castro-Robinson and John Coulter, and graduated from the University Auckland School of Music with a Master's degree in Creative and Performing Arts, majoring in Sound and Electro-acoustic Composition. She currently lectures Sound Design and Music Technology at the University of Auckland, while pursuing a second Master's degree under the tutelage of Eve de Castro-Robinson and John Elmsly, this time majoring in orchestral composition.

Once a full-time television and post-production sound engineer, she has since worked on as many shows (dance, theatre, music) as time will allow, as sound engineer, operator, stage manager, producer, composer, performer and musician. As well as performing her own compositions, she is also a great supporter of local composers: 2008 found her regularly performing around Auckland City with composer and contemporary violinist Johnny Chang, as well as performing some of the more theatrical works of Eve de Castro-Robinson and Jack Body. She also regularly contributes electro-acoustic works and sound installations for various University of Auckland Concerts.

She has collaborated as a composer with a number of choreographers, including Clare Luiten, Suzanne Cowan, Rachel Aitkinson and Linda Parker of Splash Flying Dance & Theatre Company. Most recent works were Grotteschi (Maidment Theatre, Tempo Dance Festival 2008), Women & Honour:Notes on Lying (Auckland Town Hall, February 2008), and Aries & Hephaestus (Touch Compass's Anniversary Tour, end of 2007).

She continues to works part-time for Sky TV as a post-production audio engineer, often fills in as recording engineer and sound technician at the Auckland University School of Music , and is currently working on a soundtrack for TV show pilot.