Sustainable Dance Ecology
The curators for the Movement Research Spring Festival 2009: ROLL CALL, in collaboration withSUPERFRONT, invite you to participate in an idea competition to design a “Sustainable Dance Ecology” at The New York City Farm Colony on Staten Island. Architectural plans, business models, videos, animations, writings, and drawings are all welcome in this competition. A jury of architects, urban planners, and performing artists will select winning entries to exhibit at Common Room 2. Common Room 2, located in Manhattan’s Lower East Side, displays works and projects engaging the community in a dialogue about the structures of the built environment: including social, economic, and political structures. All entries will be displayed on www.sustainable-dance.org.
THE CHALLENGE:
Take the existing New York City Farm Colony on Staten Island and create a sustainable dance ecology. A sustainable dance ecology is a place where artists interested in movement can go to explore an idea, refine a performance, add production elements such as sets, lighting, sound, and video to their process, and share their experience with other artists. Help generate ideas on how this dance community could be artistically, environmentally, and financially stable - possibly including, but not limited to, performance space, rehearsal studios, gallery space, housing, food, farming, community rooms, libraries, media labs, bodywork studios, child care, classes, wood and metal shops, silk screening, sculpture or other visual art studios, administrative offices, and storage. Below you will find information on the New York City Farm Colony as well references to places where contemporary dance is currently being created and performed.
TO SUBMIT:
Individuals or teams may compete. Click the following link to register and submit to the competition.
REGISTER NOW
DUE DATE:
All submissions must be posted by APRIL 16, 2009.
INFORMATION ON THE NEW YORK CITY FARM COLONY:
Click the link below to download the Historic District Designation Report for the City Farm Colony.
Historic District Designation Report PDF (4.6mb)
Site Area: The competition site is a subset of the 320 acres on which are located both the New York City Farm Colony and the Belleview Hospital. The Farm Colony itself is less than 100 acres.
Buildings (10 total)
4 - Large dormitories (8750 sqft approx.)
3 - Medium to Large dormitories (7500~8700 sqft approx.)
1 - Small dormitory (2500 sqft approx.)
2 - Pavilion (1250~2500 sqft approx.)
1 - Garage
2 - Utility buildings (8700~9000+ sqft approx.)
REFERENCE
“The buildings are part of the New York City Farm Colony/Seaview Hospital Historic District, a 320- acre site in Willowbrook, between Brielle Avenue and Manor Road, that in 1985 was designated the first historic district in Staten Island by the Landmarks Preservation Commission. A more recent designation is more sobering: in 1999 the Preservation League of New York State listed the district as one of the state’s most endangered places.
The Farm Colony/Seaview Hospital district is made up of two sets of buildings, cited in the landmarks report as reflecting “innovative architecture” when the city was committed to improving health services.
The Farm Colony building is a Colonial revival dormitory of fieldstone and brick built between 1904 and 1916. The dormitory housed workers on a self-sustaining farm, opened to “able-bodied paupers.” In 1999 a sister dormitory was demolished because of its proximity to a ball field”
CITY FARM LINKS:
Streetscapes: The Farm Colony; ‘Historic’ or Not, It’s a Jungle in There - New York Times
CURRENT DANCE/ART LOCATIONS TO RESEARCH:
QUESTIONS?? Please email mrfestival@movementresearch.org