The CUNY Dance Initiative (CDI), an expansive program providing New York City choreographers and dance companies with creative residencies on CUNY campuses, announces the awarded artists for its 2024–25 cycle.
From July 2024 to June 2025, CDI is underwriting residencies for 24 early- to mid-career choreographers. These dynamic NYC-based artists, selected from an open call that drew 245 applicants, work in a wide range of dance styles and forms, from ballet to musical theater to flamenco to contemporary and culturally specific traditions. In addition to providing space and financial support for the development of new and existing projects, all residencies include master classes, guest lectures, or open rehearsals to directly connect artists with CUNY communities. The full roster of awarded artists is listed below, and details on public performances in fall 2024 will be announced in the coming months.
2024 marks CDI’s 10th year. Since its launch in 2014, CDI has facilitated 247 residencies at 13 CUNY colleges from Harlem to Hollis; granted more than 12,000 hours of studio and stage time to artists; sponsored master classes for more than 5,000 students; and attracted thousands of New Yorkers to performances and showings at CUNY performing arts centers. CDI has also expanded its impact by partnering with three arts organizations in the outer boroughs: Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden (Staten Island), Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning (Queens), and Brooklyn Arts Exchange (Brooklyn).
“The CUNY Dance Initiative reflects CUNY’s commitment to New York City,” says Jeffrey Rosenstock, AVP of Governmental Affairs and External Relations at Queens College, which is CDI’s home base. “Over the past 10 years, we have contributed to our city’s creative economy by building a consortium of CUNY colleges that directly supports local dance artists. We provide choreographers with tangible resources to advance their careers – time, space, and money – while CUNY students and communities surrounding the campuses benefit from the master classes and performances we sponsor. There is no other residency program of this nature in the nation, and we are so proud that it lives at CUNY.”
2024–25 CUNY Dance Initiative Resident Artists and Host Partners
Baruch College: Baruch Performing Arts Center (Manhattan)
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BMCC: Tribeca Performing Arts Center (Manhattan)
IMGE Dance / Ishita Mili
Jon Lehrer Dance Company
Arts & Social Justice Residency at Brooklyn College in partnership with
Brooklyn Arts Exchange (BAX)
Enya Kalia Creations / Enya-Kalia Jordan
Brooklyn College: School of Visual Media and Performing Arts (Brooklyn)
Reggie Wilson / Fist and Heel Performance Group
The City College of New York: City College Center for the Arts (Manhattan)
Michael Greenberg
Ballet Neo
College of Staten Island: Department of Performing and Creative Arts, in partnership with
Snug Harbor Cultural Center (Staten Island)
Dancers Unlimited
Hostos Community College: Hostos Center for the Arts and Culture (Bronx)
Juan Usera y La Tribu del Juey Sambuco (The Sambuco Tribe)
Stephanie Peña
John Jay College: Gerald W. Lynch Theater (Manhattan)
NVA & Guests / Nicole von Arx
Tabula Rasa Dance Theater
LaGuardia Community College: LaGuardia Performing Arts Center (Queens)
Arsenal Movement dance project
Laura Peralta
Lehman College: Department of Dance and Theatre (Bronx)
Austin Warren Coats
Julia Bengtsson from The New York Baroque Dance Company
Medgar Evers College: Department of Mass Communications, Creative and Performing Arts & Speech (Brooklyn)
Bianca Leticia Medina
Kendra J. Bostock Works
Queensborough Community College: Dance Program (Queens)
Camryn Stafford
onCUE Chronicles / Quilan Arnold
Queens College: Kupferberg Center for the Arts and Department of Drama,
Theatre & Dance (Queens)
CarNYval Dance
Nélida Tirado Flamenco / Arte 718
York College, in partnership with Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning (Queens)
Renegade Performance Group / André M. Zachery sugar vendil
The CUNY Dance Iniatiive
The CUNY Dance Initiative (CDI) is a transformative incubator that secures two vital yet scarce resources—rehearsal time and performance space—for New York City choreographers and dance companies. Housed within the City University of New York (CUNY), the nation’s largest public urban university system, CDI is a residency program that supports local artists, enhances the cultural life and education of college students, and builds new dance audiences at CUNY performing arts centers.
In 2024, CDI marks a decade of supporting the NYC dance field by connecting artists with CUNY communities. The program was developed in response to the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s 2010 report “We Make Do,” which cited how destabilizing the shortage of affordable rehearsal space in New York City is to the dance sector. A successful pilot supporting residencies on four CUNY campuses in 2013, underwritten by the New York Community Trust, led to CDI’s formal launch in 2014. Ten years later, CDI has become key player in New York City’s performing arts ecosystem, leading a consortium of 13 CUNY colleges and three arts organizations to host 20+ residencies each year.
The CUNY Dance Initiative’s 10th Year Impact Report can be read here.
The program is spearheaded by the Kupferberg Center for the Arts at Queens College. Alyssa Alpine has been the director of the CUNY Dance Initiative since its founding in 2014.
The CUNY Dance Initiative receives major support from the Howard Gilman Foundation and the Mertz Gilmore Foundation. Additional support is provided by the SHS Foundation, Harkness Foundation for Dance, and the National Endowment for the Arts.
More information about the CUNY Dance Initiative is available at www.cuny.edu/danceinitiative
Photo credit: by Kiesha Stephens.
