COMPANY BIO: Bennett Dance Company (BDC) engages diverse audiences by presenting dance as an empowering, accessible art form through the creation of collaborative, multi-media performances, which are developed both site-specifically and for the stage. Collaboration is at the heart of the work which blends contemporary dance with visual arts, including sculpture, landscape and photography; diverse movement forms including aerial dance and martial arts; and original music composition, often performed live. The Company crafts work collectively by utilizing the strength and experience of its members. BDC's commitment to marrying dance with diverse mediums continually challenges dancers to discover a new physicality during the creative process. Through visceral, athletic movements in non-traditional settings (on stilts, tangled in nets, encased in boxes), BDC dancers enmesh themselves in unexplored environments, realizing and revealing a sense of poetry and fearlessness beyond mere technique or physicality. DeAnna was a founding member of the company; she danced with BDC from 1999-2007, during which time she was also the company's Rehearsal Director and Assistant Choreographer.
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"Hinges Keep a City: Neighborhood Stories" A multi-media play featuring Bennett Dance Company presented by The Huntington Theatre Company's Education Department in association with the Boston Center for the Arts
For the development of "HINGES", Huntington educators conducted and transcribed nearly 300 pages of oral history interviews with residents from the South End, Fenway, Mission Hill, and Lower Roxbury. These transcripts were turned over to a team of artists who focused in on the most compelling themes and flushed out a narrative storyline. The artistic team included playwright Kirsten Greenidge, theatre director Judy Braha, visual artist Chandra Dieppa Ortiz, composer Hugh Hinton, and Bennett Dance Company, led by dancer/choreographer Christine Bennett, and dancer/assistant choreographer DeAnna Pellecchia. "HINGES" wove together the memories, transitions, and legacies of people living in Boston neighborhoods during the 20th century, specifically focusing on the social and racial issues facing the community at that time. "HINGES" ran January 14- 23, 2005 at the Stanford Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts. The play was produced by the Education and Community Outreach Department’s Storytelling for the Ages (STAGES) program. This edition of the program, funded in part by The Boston Globe Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts, was designed as part of the Huntington’s inaugural year-long celebration of the new Calderwood Pavilion.
