Note from the Director

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Dance is important, timely, and critical. Moving is the first thing we do when we enter this world, and by moving, we continue to express our human condition throughout our lives. Dance can be both literal and abstract, timeless and fleeting - it is a way of expressing experience in ways that do not require words.

As a dance artist, I was shaped by many vibrant experiences as a dancer and independent choreographer in the 1980s and 1990s. At that time, typical performing opportunities for independent choreographers and smaller companies were unpredictable; many of the spaces we had access to were galleries converted into performance spaces with rough floors and a scattering of floor-level can lights. We thrived in these spaces, but as many of us continued to choreograph, some of our work demanded a larger stage and a greater range of technical support.

Born out of necessity, and in response to the success of the Oak Theatre Project, conversations among choreographers Frank Fishella, Paula Frasz, Winifred Haun, and Christy Munch led to the launch of Chicago's NEXT Dance Festival, which was then produced by Winifred Haun & Dancers. The NEXT Festival provided an annual opportunity for independent choreographers and smaller companies to be presented and produced on full stages for seven consecutive years. It appeared on the stages of the Athenaeum Theater, the Dance Center of Columbia College, and the Harold Washington Library Theater. The NEXT Festival grew into the city's largest producer of new work by Chicago-area choreographers, and in 2000, the NEXT Festival received a Ruth Page Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Chicago Dance Community.

My motivation for establishing the Rockford DanceMakers Festival was to create an annual event that could do for Rockford dancers and choreographers what the NEXT Dance Festival, which was integral to my development as a dance artist, had done for me. Call it giving back, call it reaching forward, call it taking space; creating a vibrant event for choreographers and dance artists to show work and gather is at the heart of every aspect of this project. I'm extremely humbled and grateful for the dedication, creativity, and passion that each participant has brought to this project and to the Rockford Dance Community.

- Christy Munch