Director, Bates Dance Festival

Congratulations to Shoni Currier, who has recently received two grant awards. A Major Grant from the Maine Humanities Council will support a weekend of Hip Hop events, including a battle, performance showcase, and panel discussion at the 2024 Bates Dance Festival. This event is a collaboration between the BDF and  CRĀV, and seeks to create a holistic experience and understanding of Hip Hop culture by offering discussion, history and context in addition to the opportunity to see those practices in action and to learn how to embody the practice.

An National Endowment for the Arts Grant for Arts Projects award will support bringing Gesel Mason to the 2025 Bates Dance Festival to develop and present her work “Yes, And”, a collection of performance experiments that place an expanded vision of Black Womanhood at the center of the creative process.

Congratulations to Shoni on both of these awards!