Mocean Dance is delighted to welcome home
Halifax-native dance artist Sara Coffin from her current base in Vancouver, who will be taking on the role of Interim
Artistic Director for the 2011/2012 season to relieve our Artistic Director, Carolle Crooks Fernando, for her upcoming
maternity leave.
"Sara is bringing home a wealth of
knowledge and experience; she’s been creating and producing her own work, performing, teaching, and working with
many great mentors," says Carolle. "She’ll be an asset to Mocean and to the entire dance community
this Season, and we’re ecstatic to have her here."
Growing up in Sackville, Nova Scotia, Sara
received her pre-professional training in the ITP Program at Halifax Dance where she danced with Mocean’s
founders Carolle Crooks Fernando, Alicia Orr MacDonald, Sara Harrigan, Lisa Phinney Langley and Sarah Rozee in the
Young Company.
Sara has spent the past eleven years creating,
teaching and studying in Vancouver, where she completed her BFA in dance at Simon Fraser University School for the
Contemporary Arts (2003), and holds important roles in the arts community, such as sitting on the Dance Centre’s
Artistic Advisory Board and teaching and programming for the dance department at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts.
Sara has always maintained strong connections
to the East Coast dance community. She is a co-founder of SiNS (Sometimes in Nova Scotia) Dance, a collective that
collaborates and has performed coast to coast with Halifax dance artists Jacinte Armstrong and Susanne Chui since
2005. She has also been a faculty member of DANS Summer Dance since 2006.
One of Mocean’s core goals is to
contribute to the growth of Halifax as a centre for dance creation, performance, innovation and development.
We’re pleased to bring a Halifax-native artist back to the community as it serves our purpose to provide
opportunities for local artists to create and perform here.
"Mocean has created a wonderful working
model for growing the dance scene here in Halifax, so I am thrilled to take this opportunity to expand my own artistic
base while giving back to my place of beginnings," explains Sara. "It is with great pleasure and excitement
that I work with the company as Interim Artistic Director to further build upon the company’s driving force and
offer a new perspective to the momentum already in motion. This is an exciting time for the Atlantic dance scene and
the beginning of many more prosperous networks. I feel that the Atlantic region may very well be at the crest of
another wave, with the expansion of many more collaborative approaches and fluid exchanges, so I am delighted to add
to this growing tidal force and be a part of the growing arts and culture as a whole in Nova Scotia."
Click here for more details,
including Sara’s bio.
Mocean Dance recently received a lovely gift in the mail – the Legislature of Nova Scotia passed a resolution to congratulate Mocean Dance on its 10th Anniversary and thank the company for its contribution to the Province’s cultural economy.
The resolution, moved by Andrew Younger, MLA of Dartmouth East, recognized Mocean as "a pillar of dance innovation and creation in Halifax". It also acknowledged Mocean’s success in being the first dance company east of Quebec to receive the annual creation production support from the Canada Council for the Arts. "We appreciate the recognition." says Artistic Director Carolle Crooks Fernando. "These are important milestones for Mocean and for dance in Nova Scotia, and it’s a lovely gesture to formally recognize that."
Thank you to all our supporters for helping us get to this point. We couldn’t have done it without you!