history

MOVING
touching, poignant, affecting, in motion, dancing

CURRENT
present, happening now, contemporary, stream of charged particles

Moving Current Dance Collective believes passionately in the power of dance as a catalyst for growth and change.  The dance collective was founded in July of 1997, by Erin Cardinal, Cynthia Hennessy, Elsa Valbuena and G.B. Stephens with a focus on fostering a deeper understanding and appreciation of dance in our communities, by producing professional dance concerts, conducting school focused shows and developing educational programs. Our programs provide people of all abilities, ages, genders, economic, and cultural backgrounds opportunities learn about dance and express themselves through movement.

From its inception, with a group of talented and diverse choreographers and dancers. Moving Current focused on building a modern dance community in the Tampa Bay Area. As a collective, the company is an ensemble of athletic, talented artists who breathe life into a range of dance works. Moving Current has successfully produced well over 100 evening concerts, presenting local and national choreographers, dancers, musicians, poets, actors, and visual artists. In addition to our self-produced performances, the collective has been commissioned to show work in venues such as: Arts and Culture Center of Hollywood, FL; Alvin Ailey Citigroup Theater NY, NY; The Colony Theater, Miami; Byron Carlyle Theater, Miami; 3 day residency in Immokalee;  Largo/Cultural Center, St. Petersburg  Culture for the Arts, Bonita Springs; Nova University, Ft. Lauderdale; Palladium Theater, St. Petersburg; Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX; Studio 620, St. Petersburg; Tampa Museum of Art; Tarpon Springs Performing Arts Center; Touhill Performing Arts Center, St. Louis, MO, and The Willow Theatre, Boca Raton.

Annually, Moving Current produces NewGrounds, composed of several programs that foster choreographers of all levels. The NewGrounds Concert, is juried concert for emerging and professional voices. This platform provides artists and their dancers an opportunity to share their work with Tampa Bay audiences. To encourage more experienced dance artists in our community to create work, we co-sponsor the CHOREO workspace, with the dance program of Hillsborough Community College. CHOREO workspace is a creative incubator for new work that begins with an intensive weekend of rehearsals with the choreographer’s creative team, information sessions, and mini showings followed by feedback from the group. Artists continue working on the project independently with several opportunities to show the work for feedback. Several times a year we host SHOW+TELL, free discussion formatted performances open to all levels on first come, first served basis. Also as a part of NewGrounds we have a community project that is free & inclusive. With a choreographer, students become artists & together they create and perform a dance performed as a part of the NewGrounds concert.

In response to the 2020 COVID 19 pandemic we created a new virtual program titled NewGrounds: dance film collection.  This genre features dance created for viewing on a screen, very different from recordings of dance created for live concerts. Dance film artist answer an open call for Dance for Camera applications. An experienced panel reviews and chooses 7 films. The films are combined into one screening and offered virtually to the general public, block bookings and as a part of Moving Current Dance Collective’s interactive website, Dance à la carte.

Moving Current Dance has extensive experience creating well-rounded, all-inclusive programming for many different communities. Our varied educational programs include master classes for experienced dancers, classes in public schools, residencies and ongoing community classes available to movers of all capabilities.