The Show:
"She" is a dance theater show in two parts that evokes the voices of women, heard and unheard. Curated by internationally renowned Dalia Carella, Artistic Director of the Dalia Carella Dance Collective (DCDC), “She” is a powerful representation of the myriad aspects of womanhood. It will run from October 22-25, 2015 at Triskelion Arts in Brooklyn, NY.
The first part will feature some of the finest NYC-based World Dance Artists who will depict traditional feminine archetypes, such as mothers, warriors, goddesses and femmes fatales, as well as explore modern day feminist values. The second part will be DCDC's 2015 NYC premiere of “The Abduction of Genoveffa”. This multidisciplinary docudrama tells the story of Dalia’s grandmother, Genoveffa Maria Colonna, who at sixteen years old was abducted and forced to marry her abductor. The whole show is dedicated to Genoveffa, whose story has been unheard until now.
The History of “The Abduction of Genoveffa”:
Genoveffa's story begins as a young woman engaged to marry a man she truly loved. The very night before her intended marriage, she was kidnapped, held against her will for two days, then forced to marry the man who took her to "repair the shame she brought on her family" as the people in her town would say. Her husband, seventeen years her senior, took her from her home in Pulsano, Italy to America and established her home in Niagara Falls, NY. Isolated by culture and language, and trapped in a loveless marriage, she had to forge a new life for herself and her children.
Her story touches on many themes, both deeply personal and universal. In one devastating night, Genoveffa was robbed of the life she thought she would have. She was the victim of a gender-based crime, to which that society turned a blind eye, and struggled daily against adversity while carrying on with dignity and strength.
Dalia has just returned from Pulsano, Italy, where she and her cousins pieced together Genoveffa's life in Italy before she came to America through first-person interviews with family members, genealogical documents and photos. All of this will be used as source material for the script, the choreography and the backdrop to help bring Genoveffa's story to life!
The Campaign:
So far, we have successfully secured funds for air travel, hotel accommodations, a theater deposit, photographer, social media manager and other preliminary production costs.
However, we still need to raise funds for rehearsal costs, marketing materials, technical staff, costumes and, most importantly, salaries for eleven (count 'em!) artists.
All these expenses are higher than our projected box office income! If we were to rely solely on the box office, we could not stay solvent, and mounting future projects would be that much more challenging. Our goal is to raise enough money to meet our expenses and have money left over to put towards our long-term growth and sustainability.
Risks and challenges
The biggest challenge that artists face is lack of funding. Many deserving and special projects struggle to take off simply because there isn't money to fulfill the artistic vision.
In our case, even if our project is fully funded, we may still need to offset unexpected costs/difficulties by scaling down some of the artistic elements of our production. This might mean choosing simpler (read: cheaper) costumes, lighting design or set design. It might mean opting for a smaller press & social media campaign, which would ultimately limit our exposure and viewership. It might even mean rehearsing fewer hours to save money when we’d rather take our time to develop the work. These are the tough choices that we may have to make as we swing into the final phase of production.
Having said that, this show is truly a labor of love, and no matter what, the show will go on! All of the people involved, from the artistic to the technical to the research to the administrative crews are passionately committed to seeing it come to life. People have generously donated time, goods, and expertise to help bring you this project and we are confident that we will do justice to the soul of this story!
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Funding period
- (30 days)