Koreograpiya Award

 The 2020 AET koreograpiya award has been awarded and shared with 5 independent Filipino dance artists;

Sasa Cabalquinto, PJ Rebuilda, Jared Jonathan Luna, Rhosam Jr Prudenciado and Ava Maureen Vilanueva.

Responding to an extraordinary time in our midst during this COVID-19 pandemic, the award recognizes the hardship of artists during this very trying time and open up the award to assist and reach as many artists.

 Congratulations to Sasa, PJ, Jared, Rhosam and Ava as this year’s recipientS of the AET Koreograpiya award for their continued efforts staying strong and active to keep dance alive as part of their creative gestures and to help contribute their dance energy to the arts community.

 May we keep safe and strong during this pandemic crisis; may the human, systemic and cultural shifts for greater equality for all that we are shaking and facing now bring us a stronger voice to persist, be resilient, be compassionate, generous and kind and to reinvigorate our importance as artists for the world.

Alvin Erasga Tolentino

AET Koreograpiya Awardees 2020
SASA CABALQUINTO is an independent movement artist, freelance dancer, choreographer and actress from Manila whose interest is pursuing the possibilities of movement performance in the works of Butoh through Collaborative Arts. Born in October 1992, her performance career spanning 8 years has been a journey of learning and unlearning the phenomenon of dance where she reached the momentum in her art the free-spirited expression and the movement language of dance through Butoh. She took the Theater Arts course in Polytechnic University of the Philippines Sta. Mesa with the recognition of Outstanding Student Achievement Awardee in the Arts on 2013 in the Field of Dance. She also received a Gloria Macapagal Arroyo Award of Achievement for Culture and Arts in 2009 on her high school graduation.

“AET Koreograpiya Award is really a huge help for independent dance artists like me who are still pursuing my career in dance even through this pandemic. The current global situation has affected us in so many ways especially in our field where social and human connections are essentially fundamental. I had residencies and collaborative performances that has been cancelled since the Lockdown, and shifting to the virtual system is still challenging for me. Meanwhile, I am currently working on some movement research with some artists and brewing my own program for movement in Butoh marrying Filipino traditional values, and continue to attend and support online workshops here in the Philippines and in other countries as well.”

 PJ Rebullida has seventeen years experience as a Professional Artist, Choreographer, and Teacher for Theater and Dance in Manila and Germany. He was part of Ballet Philippines and Ballet Lüneburg among other groups. He received back-to-back awards from PhilStage Gawad Buhay and Broadway World for his choreography of ‘American Idiot’ and ‘Newsies,’ among other nominations. He founded Galaw.Co Dance Theater in 2019 and is charting new paths in his art. He is also creative manager of LikhaPH with Rhosam Prudenciado Jr. at the helm who is another AET Koereograpiya co-awardee.

“I will continue to forge Galaw.Co forward and continue my work with LikhaPH and the Artists Welfare Project. I really try my best to share the work/possibilities I get to all my dancers in the company and the community. This is so that we all have income. And it is proving profitable. So we may expand our initiatives soon. We will create work for all of us  — that is the goal. I am not a fan of just waiting for donations. I believe in working hard and this will reap it’s own fruits. Just like now. Thank you for believing in me and the people who are with me in this journey.”

Jared Jonathan Luna is a dance scholar and artist based in Quezon City, Philippines. They are an alumnus of the UP Streetdance Club and Daloy Dance Company. As an independent artist, they are interested in vernacular movement vocabularies in urban spaces. Their curiosity stems from an understanding of culture as a web of meanings and a political process of meaning making, that underpins and at the same time is shaped by the dancing body. Since going independent they have presented solo and collaborative works in Manila, Hungary, Tokyo, and Hong Kong. They were a finalist in the 2018 WifibodyPH choreographers’ competition and a resident artist in Art Omi in 2019. Their most recent solo ‘They [a singularity] •’ received Jury Prize in Hong Kong International Choreography Festival 2019.

“A friend and teacher once told me that for some, art is their only means of survival. Despite unfortunate circumstances and lack of resources, people continue to create and perform. 

During this pandemic, dance has become my refuge. I find power in being present in my body as I get lost in the moment of dancing. Dancing has become a process of letting go, discovery, and collecting myself amidst uncertainty. 

 I am grateful and humbled to receive the AET Koreograpiya Award as it will help me sustain myself during this time of crisis. More importantly, this is also an opportunity to pay forward blessings and favours that have come my way.”

Rhosam “sickledsam” Prudenciado Jr., Founder of LikhaPh Program, Linear Fluidity Movement Style for Contemporary Dance and Former Artistic Director of Airdance Philippines.

He is a recipient of “Ani ng Dangal 2010” given by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts for winning the Grand Prize in global stage contemporary dance competition “ Yokohama Dance Collection 2009” held in Japan. As part of the prize, Sam went to Paris, France to study Contemporary Dance under Micadances,Menagerie de Verre and National De la Dance.

He is also awarded dance residencies by both the local and international dance communities. From 2009-2015, his works were featured in dance festivals around Southeast Asia. He joined Dance Dance Asia under the Japan Foundation, and has toured with them from 2016-2018. His latest projects are a residency program under Youkobo Arts Space and the Tokas Research Residency which will take place in Tokyo, Japan from 2019-2020.

“Since the Pandemic happened and we can’t go back to the studio I was one of the few Teachers who started teaching online to continue our passion and also to help our students to continue their training. It has been a struggle going virtual but we cope up, we do what we can and we adjust to the situation. 

To continue the effort and help to the Community,  I started a Fund Raiser Event with few friends under my Outreach Program for Dance – “LikhaPH” from there we are now running a Sustainability Program and We are trying to help the best way we can to our fellow Dance Artists.”

Ava Maureen Vilanueva

Performing artist, teacher and choreographer, Ava graduated from the Philippine High School for the Arts major in Ballet and earned her degrees from the University of the Philippines Diliman, College of Music: Diploma in Creative Performing Musical Arts (DCPMA) and Bachelor of Music Major in Dance. Ava was the former Artistic Director of Airdance, a contemporary dance company based in Quezon City and former Dance lecturer at the U.P. College of Music in Diliman. She is a certified Progressing Ballet Technique Teacher. At present, she is a mother of two healthy boys, a full-time teacher at Ava’s School of Dance and an Instructor at UPLB. Ava is now in her first year at U.P. Los Baños studying Masters in Public Affairs majoring in Education Management.

“I chose to use this grant to support my co-teachers in my ballet school. It has been a hard few months and it is our first time to miss a summer recital after 18 years. The remaining funds after distributing to my teachers will be used to buy supplies that can help guard my students and their families from this pandemic specifically masks and sprayers with alcohol.

This pandemic has challenged me to be more creative in a virtual way. Through Facebook, Instagram, and especially Zoom where I conduct all of my dance classes for now. This has also given me a chance to create video snippets of how I feel in some days thru contemporary dance improvisations. It is just fulfilling to hear after posting in social media that when they see or watch my videos, they feel happy and feel relaxed. “

Ea Torrado is a Filipina dance artist, and artistic director of Daloy Dance Company, a dance theatre group that advances, produces and tours her creations and workshops. Presenters include WIFI Body Dance Festival, Ballet Philippines’ Neo-Filipino, Contemporary Dance Map, The Lopez Musem, KARNABAL Festival, Imaginarium Multi Arts Festival of the Absurd, Erehwon Arts Center, FRINGE Manila Arts Festival, Malasimbo Lights and Dance Festival, Pasinaya Arts Festival, Aliw Theatre- International Dance Day Festival at Aliw Theatre, UP Center for Women and Gender Studies and Paghilom Festival. Internationally she has performed at Ho Chi Minh International Dance Festival, Low Fat Art Fest Thailand, Goyang International Dance Festival, Lively Arts Performing Arts College in Pennsylvania & Cape Fear Community College for the Performing Arts in North Carolina, USA, SensUnique Gallery in Ghent, Belgium for Sorry Not Sorry Festival and participated in Radical Contact, Tanzplatform,Tokyo Performing Arts Meeting, Asia Pacific Improv Festival and Southeast Asia Choreolab.

Her work has been supported by The National Commission for Culture and the Arts,
Japan Foundation and Music Artes. Choreographic and Research Residencies include Pineapple Lab and The Asian Cultural Council Grant.

As a dancer she has performed for Ballet Manila, Ballet Philippines and Dance Theatre of Tennesse, Dance Forum, Airdance, Steps Dance Project and Contemporary Dance Network Manila. In 2014, Ea received the Alvin Erasga Tolentino Koryograpiya Award and Remedios De Oteyza Choreography Award in 2016.

Ea is Filipina dance artist whose creations manifest in choreographies, film, installation, site-specific work, and improvisational performance. Her pieces reflect on Filipino societal culture, women’s issues and body politics.