Biographies

Administration & Boards

MURRAY SPALDING, ARTIST DIRECTOR
Murray Spalding and her company, originally based in Washington DC, performed regularly at home and toured 26 states and Mexico. Among the presenting venues were the University of Colorado, Boulder; Teatro Ballet Folkloric in Mexico City; and, in New York City, Dance Theater Workshop, Cunningham Studio, and Limon Dance Theater. She created environmental works for both the Grand Salon of the Renwick Gallery at the Smithsonian Institution and The Corcoran Gallery of Art. In 1988, she served as artistic director for City Dance '88 at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

With the encouragement of her longtime mentor and Sarah Lawrence advisor, dance pioneer Bessie Schönberg, Ms. Spalding moved to New York City in 1989. She then created Dancycle Project, which encompassed Dancycle Choreography Workshops, annual Dancycle Concerts at Dia Center for the Arts (now Joyce Soho), and The Salon, which showcased such artists as Doug Elkins, Doug Varone and Sally Hess.

In 1994, she created Blue Ring with video artist Andrea Hull and sound artists Johan Goedhart and Paul Pahnuysen. It premiered in the New Orleans Technological Conference and traveled to the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington DC and to the Tucson Museum of Art in New Mexico.

Since 1997, Murray Spalding has concentrated her energies on creating Mandalas.

Ms. Spalding holds a B.A and M.A. from Sarah Lawrence College. She has received numerous grants from organizations such as the National Endowment for the Arts, D.C. Commission for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Harkness Space Grant Program, the Andy Warhol Foundation, and the 3M Corporation. In 2002, she was awarded a New York Foundation for the Arts Artist’s Fellowship.

Evren Celimli (Resident Composer) has a Master's degree from the University of Sussex, England, and a Bachelor's degree from Brandeis University. His music has been performed in the Music Breaks Free Festival in England and at festivals in Miami and Buffalo. He has worked with choreographers Tanya Kane-Parry, Allen Tibbetts, Jeanette Stoner, Ben Munisteri, Doug Elkins, and Sean Curran for Heidi Latsky. Check out Evren's Web site at http://www.evrencelimli.com.

Amy Filbin (Director) graduated from Dickinson College where she toured nationally teaching the Physics of Dance with Kenneth Laws. Since moving to New York, she has worked with Joanna Mendl Shaw, Mary Seidman, Mark Dendy, Darrah Carr Dance, Capoiera Brazil, and Torque Dance. She is currently studying flamenco with Dionisia Garcia, studying to get her MBA, and working at Microsoft. She is proud to be a member of MSMA since 1999.

Leslie Roybal (Managing Director), a native of New Mexico, began her dance career at age 5. She earned a BFA in theater from Stephens College, and continued her education at the University of New Mexico. Proficient in both the contemporary dance and Flamenco idioms, she performs in many of the New York tablaos, mixes it up with M’oro Flamenco and dances with the Metropolitan Opera in Carmen and La Traviata.

Susan Soetaert (Costume Designer) is a resident designer for several Off Broadway theatres and works as well as with New York choreographers Joanna Mendl Shaw and Janice Brenner. Her other work includes projects with Ringling Brothers, Barnum and Bailey Circus, The Cloisters, La Gran Scena Opera, and Ice Theatre of New York.

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