International

International Choreographers Residency Program

2017 ICR Guillaume Pires Parada's work for the ICR concert

Program Dates:
This program will resume in summer 2022.

The International Choreographers Residency (ICR) program invites promising choreographers to ADF for five and a half weeks and immerses them in the unique breadth and depth of the ADF environment. Since the ICRs come from such a wide variety of backgrounds, and each has different and individual needs to be met, the program is designed to be flexible enough to accommodate each participant's individual agenda by providing an abundance of program options. ADF makes many of its resources available to the ICRs, including:

  • The ADF Summer Dance Intensive, run by an internationally-known faculty, special workshops, seminars, master classes, lectures, and discussions with visiting artists, critics, and scholars.
  • The opportunity to see performances by the masters of modern dance as well as the newest emerging talent (from the U.S. and around the world).
  • The opportunity to present work created or set on ADF students.
  • The opportunity to teach one master class in ADF's WFSS program.
  • An archival repository containing film and video footage of ADF's performances and special activities dating back to the 1930s — an invaluable resource chronicling the history of an art form.

"I spend 24 hours a day thinking, taking classes, observing, and thinking about my process as a choreographer, my process as a creator—and that was the most important thing I found—to be closer with the process, to start to look for the real thing in dance." –Raul Parrao – ICR, Mexico

How to Apply

The cost for this unique program is $6,350, which includes tuition, performance tickets, room, board, and health fee. Participants are responsible for their own transportation to and from the US.

For more information about the ICR program, please contact kelsey.riner@americandancefestival.org.

About the program

Classes

2015 ICR Juliana Costa de Carvalho Sabino - Brazil

2015 ICR Juliana Costa de Carvalho Sabino – Brazil

A primary component of the ICR program is the ADF Summer Dance Intensive, where dancers from around the country and around the world come to train and to create, to see, and to be seen. Students of all levels are invited to engage in collaborative creative processes with ADF's diverse and outstanding faculty, extraordinary musicians, and vibrant student body. Participants may take three two-hour classes a day, on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, choosing from approximately 40 daily classes. Available courses will include Contemporary Technique, Composition, Improvisation, Repertory, Ballet, African Technique, Voice & Gesture, and Hip Hop. Special workshops and master classes are offered on Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

2015 ICR Mr. Gilberto Rincón - Venezuela

2015 ICR Gilberto Rincón – Venezuela

Footprints
Participants will have the opportunity to audition for ADF's Footprints program during the opening weekend of the program. Participants chosen to perform in a Footprints piece will have the opportunity to study intensively with a choreographer on a new work for the full 5 weeks. Rehearsals for Footprints will happen within the Six Week School schedule for 3 hours at the end of the day. They will also have the rare opportunity to perform on ADF's main stage (Reynolds Industries Theater) as part of the ADF performance series during the last week of the festival.

Weekly ICR Sessions

ICRs will participate in special weekly sessions with the ICR Program Director, Gerri Houlihan, where they will have the opportunity to further develop their choreographic ideas, discuss the performances and choreography through the lens of their respective backgrounds, and to solicit peer feedback on their work.

Gerri Houlihan began her professional career at the Juilliard School, studying with Antony Tudor, Alfredo Corvino, and members of the Martha Graham and Jose Limon dance companies. She performed with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet Company and the Paul Sanasardo Dance Company and spent five years as a soloist with the Lar Lubovitch Dance Company touring extensively throughout the United States and Europe. Ms. Houlihan has taught or choreographed for such institutions as NY's High School of Performing Arts, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the Bates Dance Festival, the Boston Ballet, Meredith College, the University of South Florida, the North Carolina School of the Arts, the University of North Carolina–Greensboro, and Virginia Commonwealth University. From 1984 to 1987 Houlihan directed her own school and company, The Boston Dance Project. She was one of five finalists in the Boston Ballet's International Choreography Competition. From 1988 to 1999, Ms. Houlihan was on the faculty of the New World School of the Arts in Miami, FL. During that time, she was also the artistic director of Houlihan and Dancers. The recipient of two Florida Individual Artist Fellowships in Dance/Choreography in 1991-92 and 1996-97, Houlihan and Dancers was on the touring roster for the state of Florida. Ms. Houlihan is on the Advisory Board for the American College Dance Association and the American Dance Festival. She has been on the faculty of the American Dance Festival from 1981 to 1983 and from 1987 to the present. As an international representative for ADF she has participated in seventeen international linkages, teaching in Korea, China, Brazil, Paraguay, Chile, Estonia, Poland, the Philippines, Moscow, and Mongolia. She is the 2005 recipient of ADF's Balasaraswati, Joy Anne Dewey Beinecke Endowed Chair for Distinguished Teaching. She was Co-Dean and then Dean of the ADF School from 2010 to 2015. Completing her undergraduate work at Virginia Commonwealth University, she went on to get her MFA from the Hollins/ADF MFA program. She joined the dance faculty at Florida State University in 2007 and received the Pearl S. Tyner Distinguished Professor in Teaching award from FSU in 2012. She recently retired from FSU and currently teaches year-round at the American Dance Festival studios and as a guest artist at Elon University.Durham & Duke University

Performing Companies

An essential component of the ADF experience during the summer is the opportunity to see some of the best modern dance companies performing today. ICR participants will receive a complimentary ticket to one performance by each visiting company in the ADF performance series.

Life at ADF

HOUSING

ICR participants stay in Duke University apartments. The apartments are shared, 2-bedroom apartments located within short walking distance to the ADF offices and dance studios.

TRAVELING TO ADF

The closest airport is the Raleigh-Durham International Airport (RDU). It is approximately 18 miles away from Duke University.
Map of Duke University's campus.

For more information about the ICR program, please contact kelsey.riner@americandancefestival.org.

2015 ICR Alan Yuan - Hong Kong

2015 ICR Alan Yuan – Hong Kong

ABOUT ADF

ADF is held for five weeks each summer at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina. The studios are spread across the Georgian-style campus. Performances by visiting dance companies occur in the Durham Performing Arts Center in downtown Durham and Reynolds Industries Theater on Duke's West Campus. ADF participants are able to use Duke facilities such as swimming pools, tennis courts, bookstores, libraries, and computer labs. The grounds of the University include the formal Sarah P. Duke Gardens and the Nasher Museum of Art.

Founded in 1934 in Bennington, Vermont, by choreographers Martha Graham, Hanya Holm, Doris Humphrey, and Charles Weidman, the Festival serves professional and pre-professional dancers from around the world. The site of 662 premieres, the festival plays a critical role in increasing the repertories of companies through its commissions and reconstructions; what is seen at the ADF is ultimately seen by audiences throughout the world. Hailed by The Wall Street Journal as "the most important gathering of modern dance professionals and students in America," each year the ADF school provides world-class instruction to hundreds of dance enthusiasts.

View past participants list. View the list of countries the ICRs have come from here.

View International Timeline and History.

2017 ICRs