Archive: Workshops, Intensives, Master Classes, and Open Houses

Zenon Dance School – Winter Workshop Week and Free Open House Day

Join us for a week of exciting workshops and a free open house day!

Zenon Dance School’s Workshop Week offers unique opportunities to take class from Zenon instructors and local community artists in between sessions.

Winter Workshop Week Schedule:
Thursday, December 29, 10:00-11:45am: Ring in the New Year with Erin Thompson
Tuesday, January 3, 9:00-10:30am: Restful Movement with Chloe Nagle
Tuesday, January 3, 7:00-8:30pm: All Levels Jazz with Ali Rubin Forester
Wednesday, January 4, 5:30-7:00pm: Modern and Music with Ariel Linnerson
Thursday, January 5, 9:30-11:00am: Modern Master Class with Randee Paufve
Thursday, January 5, 12:00-1:00pm: Ballet for Today with Janet Skidmore
Click here to register for Winter Workshop Week!

Zenon’s Open House allows dancers to get a sneak peek at no cost of some classes to look forward to during our Winter Session, and use exclusive discounts when purchasing winter class passes throughout the week.

Winter Open House: Saturday, January 7
9:00-9:45am: All Levels Yoga with Ariel Linerson – ONLINE
9:00-10:00am: Beginner/Intermediate Jazz with Jennifer Glaws
10:00-11:00am: Afro Modern with Roxane Wallace
11:00am-12:00pm: Intermediate Modern with Dustin Haug
12:00-1:00pm: Intermediate Contemporary with Ruby Josephine Smith
Click here to register for Open House Day!

Tuition Discounts: January 2-9
$10 off Class Cards with code OH10OFF
20% off Enrollment with code OHENROLL

The Arena – Moving Practice with Benny Olk

Moving Practice is a weekly class series for professional dancers. Classes prioritize rigor, diversity of contemporary aesthetics, variety of class content, and commitment.

Benny Olk teaches Moving Practice in January:
Tuesdays, 10:00-11:30am

Professional-level dancers of all styles are welcome.
Pre-register here.

Suggested $17 per class; however, there is a pay-as-able option on all classes – we would rather you join us than not be able to attend due to financial limitations.

Class description: This class will offer an introduction to Cunningham technique, emphasizing rhythmic, directional, and physical clarity in order to organize movements with efficiency and at the same time making room for discovery. The class begins with exercises for the torso, then moves to legwork, then across the floor, and finally into jumping. Each class will contain something everyone can do and something no one can do. “The only way to do it is to do it,” as Cunningham himself said.

Benny Olk (he/him) is a performing artist and teacher based in Minneapolis with an interest in contemporizing and contextualizing American modern and post-modern dance. As a member of Lucinda Childs Dance Company, he performed reconstructions of pieces such as Dance and Available Light. He performed in reconstructions of Crises and Suite for Five among others by Merce Cunningham, and has premiered works by Moriah Evans and Anthea Hamilton. Benny holds a BFA in Dance from NYU and an MA in New Performative Practices from Stockholm University of the Arts.

Free Slo Practice with Slo Dance Company

Join Slo Dance Company’s Artistic Director Laura Osterhaus Rosenstone for a free Slo practice at the Southern Theater on Saturday, January 7, 10:00-11:15am.

The Slo practice is an improvisation-based embodied arrival practice that utilizes slowness and listening to tune to the self, space, sound, and other participants sharing in the practice. In conversation with live music, the practice ignites a broadening of awareness through mindfully embodied coordination. The music and dance alike translate this awareness to move creatively within, and test our own caliber of moving outside of, established structures in our performance work, keeping action and reaction alive and accountable.

The Slo practice invites all levels of movers, dancers, and embodied folks! Come ready to move, sweat, and enjoy yourself!

The Arena – Free Open House

Join us for a preview of The Arena’s winter schedule and meet the instructors throughout this day of complimentary classes.

10:00-10:30am – Contemporary Flow with Mathew Janczewski

10:30-11:00am – Moving Practice with Benny Olk in the Cunningham Technique

11:00-11:30am – GYROKINESIS®Method with Non Edwards

Register here or just come on by!

TU Dance Center: Dancing Together Workshops

This eight-week workshop is designed for children ages 2-4 and their parent/caregiver who is interested in a shared movement experience that engages the senses of curiosity and play.

Both child and caregiver will participate in developmentally appropriate movement exercises that incorporate elements such as effort, shape, and tempo. Music will play an essential role in the class as students will be asked to respond to sounds as well as make sounds themselves. Participants will be encouraged to join at their own comfort level with the understanding that observation is often the best form of learning with younger children. This class will give children and caregivers the opportunity to learn more about themselves and one another through the art form of dance.

Two upcoming sessions. Take one or both!
January 14-March 4
March 11-May 13 (no classes April 3-15)
Saturdays, 9:00-9:45am

To learn more and register, click here.

Zenon Dance School – Youth Jazz Workshop with Hannah Pierce

Hannah Pierce offers a great 4-week workshop series for new and continuing jazz dancers who love to move! Students will learn fundamental techniques and choreography while expanding their knowledge of rhythm and movement.

This class is a great foundation for any young dancer ages 7-10 years. All levels of experience are welcome!

Youth Jazz Workshop – Sundays, 12:00-12:45pm
January 22
January 29
February 5
February 12

Full enrollment: $55
Single class drop-in: $15
In-person only; limited space available. Drop ins welcome.

Register today!

Critical Conversations Series – Art of Business: The World of Grants

Grants are a substantial part of maintaining one’s self as an art business, that is unique to Minnesota. With that process arises a lot of questions. How do you fit yourself into the application process? How do you make sure you are reading the requirements right? How do you put together work samples, what different types of work samples? What makes a strong resume? How do you articulate yourself as a person, artist, and your vision in a digestible way? What even are the grants that I’m eligible for and how can I understand if I am or not?

Join us in conversation as we gather to unpack the world of grant writing. This discussion will be open to all. Come to share your thoughts or just listen.

Art of Business: The World of Grants
January 22, 2023
2:00-3:30pm
The Cowles Center – Tek Box, 2nd Floor
Free and open to the public. Refreshments provided.

Moderators
Jessi Fett, The Cowles Center Director of Programming and Education
Colin Edwards, Programs Coordinator and McKnight Artist Fellowship Programs Assistant for Dance and for Choreographers

Participants will include:
Dana Kassel, McKnight Artist Fellowship Programs Director for Dance and for Choreographers 
Mirella Espino, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council

Master Tap Workshops by Guest Artists Dianne Walker and Guillem Alonso

Master Tap Workshops by Guest Artists Dianne Walker “Lady Di” and Guillem Alonso. Come join us to take classes by these incredible tap dance masters!

Sunday, January 22

Dianne Walker
Intermediate Class: 1:00-2:15pm
Advanced Class: 2:30-3:45pm

Guillem Alonso
Advanced Class: 1:00-2:15pm
Intermediate Class: 2:30-3:45pm

Classes held at Heartbeat Performing Arts Center.
Tuition: $25 per class
Ages 12 through adult.

To Reserve a spot in class, email kristinheartbeatpac@gmail.com or call Heartbeat, 952-432-7833

The Arena – Moving Practice with Brenna Mosser

Moving Practice is a weekly class series for professional dancers. Classes prioritize rigor, diversity of contemporary aesthetics, variety of class content, and commitment.

Brenna Mosser teaches December Moving Practice:
Tuesdays, 10:00-11:30am

Professional-level dancers of all styles are welcome.
Pre-register here.

Suggested $17 per class; however, there is a pay-as-able option on all classes – we would rather you join us than not be able to attend due to financial limitations.

Class description: Let’s play with physics physically. I am currently researching internal expansion and space while giving into gravity and weight to carry me with minimal effort within dance phrase work. This class series will build on oldies but goodies of choreutics concepts (dynamics/division of space/decentralization) while delving into newer waters of intentional ambiguity.

Brenna Mosser (she/her) is a dance artist who seeks to illuminate the awe in her surroundings by sculpting falls, stumbles, and asymmetries gracefully. She spent two years in the Conservation Corps, where she faced the reality of climate change and has since dedicated her work to bringing awareness and justice to this crisis. She earned her bachelor’s in dance performance at the Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance in London, UK. She supplemented her degree at le Centre national de la danse contemporaine in Angers, France where she earned the US equivalent of a BA in dance performance and in arts management. Brenna founded Analog Dance Works in 2019, a dance company whose mission is to explore the intersection between dance and science through choreographic works and roundtable discussions. Alongside her own practice, Brenna currently dances for Threads Dance Project, Alternative Motion Project, and Bernadette Knaeble.

Ring in the New Year Class with Erin Thompson

A light-skinned woman in her 60s, with close cropped hair, leans against wall-mounted ballet barres and tilts off to the left

Please join Erin Thompson for her “Ring in the New Year” contemporary dance class in honor of New Year’s Eve on Thursday morning, December 29, 10:00-11:45am.

Before you make your New Year’s resolutions, come find peace with internal awareness, thrust your holiday limbs into the ground and fly across the floor flinging 2022 away! Accompaniment by the wonderful Dean Magraw.

Intermediate/Advanced Contemporary
Thursday, December 29, 10:00-11:45am
In-person only!

Registration is open through Zenon’s MindBody portal and closes ten minutes before class.