Spotlight Series: DANDY
Pier 62 | Free
Thursday May 18, 2023, 5–7 pm
This event has passed
Enjoy an evening of dance performances curated by DANDY: A West Coast based creative partnership led by David Rue and Randy Ford designed to celebrate and elevate the brilliance and beauty of QTBIPOC in the PNW and beyond.
All ages welcomeFeaturing contemporary dance performances by DANDY, Symone Sanz, Amanda Morgan, and Cipher Divine!
Program Schedule:
5:00-5:15 DANDY
5:30-5:45 Symone Sanz
6:00-6:15 Amanda Morgan
6:30-6:45 Cipher Divine
David Rue and Randy Ford. Photo courtesy of DANDY.
DANDY
Dandy is a creative partnership designed to celebrate and elevate the Black cultural landscape of Seattle, WA. David Rue (Liberian-born) and Randy Ford (Seattle-born) use art, dance, fashion, and pop-culture as forms of activism, story-telling, and joy centering. Together and separately they take Seattle by storm by curating events like A Dandy Affair, SAMRemix (Rue), and QUEEN STREET Festival (Ford). They’e known for their signature event A DANDY Affair and recently hosted the Teeny Awards.
Photo courtesy of Symone Sanz.
Photo courtesy of Symone Sanz.
Photo courtesy of Symone Sanz.
Symone Sanz
Symone is an experienced dance artist in performance, improvisation, and choreography from Los Angeles. She holds a BFA in Dance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has enjoyed creating live works with artists Heather Kravas, Cherdonna Shinatra, and Washington Ensemble Theatre. Symone is grateful to perform alongside Amanda and Cipher today.
Amanda Morgan
Amanda Morgan
The Seattle Project is a platform for and a network of interdisciplinary artists collaborating to create new work and dance that is accessible to the community and uplifts BIPOC and LGBTQ+ artists.
Amanda Morgan is from Tacoma, Washington. She studied at Dance Theatre Northwest and Pacific Northwest Ballet School, and she attended summer courses at Alonzo King LINES Ballet, Boston Ballet School, and the School of American Ballet. She participated in PNB School’s exchange with the Palucca University of Dance in Dresden, where she also performed with Dresden Semperoper Ballett. Amanda joined Pacific Northwest Ballet as an apprentice in 2016 and was promoted to corps de ballet in 2017 and to soloist in 2022.
Cipher Divine
2019 YoungArts Finalist Cipher Goings, artistically known as Cipher Divine, is an accomplished dancer. He began his dancing career at Northwest Tap Connection. He began teaching in 2017. Trained primarily in rhythm tap along with other African diasporic dance, and contemporary, Cipher has performed professionally since the age of ten. Cipher was a featured dancer in the upcoming movie Spirited, starring Ryan Reynolds and Will Ferrell. He was recently featured on the Late Late Show with James Cordan, featuring Cedric the Entertainer. He also was a part of the 2018 (original) and 2020 cast of Black Bois by Dani Tirrell. In 2020 Cipher had many opportunities to showcase his work, Black Parade, for the Kennedy Center’s virtual event, Arts Across America. He premiered work for Seattle Public Library’s Reflections: What the Water Holds, and Vote art Vote season 17 directed by Raja Feather-Kelly. Cipher has graduated from the University of Washington with a Bachelors in Arts for Dance.
Spotlight on the Waterfront engages audiences of all ages to experience music and visual performances along the new waterfront. Set on one of the city’s most scenic locations, Pier 62, this series provides audiences a chance to discover the region’s arts and culture.
This ‘pop-up’ program is a platform for local artists and cultural communities to introduce themselves, their songs, dance, and cultures, to a wide audience. These performances encourage a sense of spontaneity for neighbors, visitors and other community members along the downtown Seattle shoreline.
Hosted by Friends of Waterfront Seattle
Friends of Waterfront Seattle (“Friends”) is the nonprofit partner to the City of Seattle responsible for helping to fund, build, steward, and program the park — today and into the future. In deep collaboration with individuals, communities, and institutional partners, Friends’ mission is creating, caring for, and activating a renewed place on Seattle’s central shoreline to connect — to the water, to the mountains, to our city, and to one another.
In addition to raising $110M by 2024 to fund park construction, Friends will provide funding and manage the programming and operations of the future Waterfront Park through a joint-delivery partnership with Seattle Parks & Recreation. Park construction has begun following the Viaduct’s removal and the first piece of the park — Pier 62 — is now open.
