| Art Profile |
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Nejla Yasemin Yatkın, who has Turkish roots, was born and raised in Berlin, Germany. In 1993, she graduated from “Die Etage”, a Performing Arts College in Berlin. After graduation, she danced as a principal with numerous companies in Germany (Fountainhead Tanz Theater, Dance Butter Tokyo and Pyro Space Ballet (1992-1995)) as well as the United States (Cleo Parker Robinson (1996-1999) and the Dayton Contemporary Dance Company (1999-2000)). She was critically acclaimed for her performance in Stravinsky’s Firebird as “Firebird” with the Denver Symphony under the direction of Marion Alstop and choreographed by Cleo Parker Robinson. During this time, Yatkın worked with leading choreographers such as Donald McKayle, Eleo Pomare, Anzu Furukawa, Katherine Dunham, and Ron Brown.
In 2000, Yatkın began choreographing solo works for herself inspired by Mary Wigman, Martha Graham , Susanne Linke and other great female choreographers who all started as soloists, and later moved to choreograph for companies and groups. Yatkın has choreographed on the Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Ensemble, Dallas Black Dance Theatre, the Washington Ballet, The Maryland Dance Ensemble, and the Baltimore Ballet. Her work has toured the world: Austria, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Germany, Guatemala, El Salvador, England, France, India, Italy, Mexico, Russia, Scotland, Serbia, Santo Domingo, Taiwan, Ukraine, the United States, and Yugoslavia. As a Guest Choreographer with the Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Company, her work was commissioned and presented at Lincoln Center Out of Doors (2001) as well as the Joyce Theater (2003). Other venues include Dance Place and the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (Washington, D.C.), The Place in London, England, Metropolitano in Medellin, Colombia and the Oscar Neumeyer Museum in Curitiba, Brazil among many others. In her choreography, Yatkın explores the beauty as well as complexity of memory, migration, transformation, identity and multiculturalism through movement. This is achieved by drawing upon diverse traditions of dance, cultures and medium as well as utilizing subjects that are at once universal and timeless.
Since 2001, Yatkın has been the recipient of three Artist Fellowships for her Excellence in Dance and Choreography from the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities, an agency of the National Endowment for the Arts (2001, 2003, 2005), and a three-time recipient of the Creative Performing Arts grant from the University of Maryland (2003, 2005, 2008). In 2002, she was awarded “Local Dance Commissioning Project” by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts to choreograph a new multi-media solo work. The following year (2003), this work was chosen to tour Brazil with a grant from Arts International and the National Performance Network. Later still, this work was shown in Siberia, Colombia and Canada.
In 2005, Yatkın was awarded the Creation Fund from the National Performance Network, Dance Place and Miami Dade Community College in order to create a new solo work entitled “De/Reconstructing Mata Hari.” This won her critical claim in the New York Times and Washington Post and won her two Metro DC Dance Awards. Subsequently, the work toured in Maryland, Virginia, DC, New York, Florida and in three cities in Mexico as part of the International Festival of Tamaulipas. In the summer 2007, she was one of the choreographers selected to be part of “Slow Dancing” exhibition by David Michalek at the Lincoln Center Festival as well as featured in the silent movie “Louis” produced by Wynton Marsalis and directed by Dan Pritzker. Yatkın has also received five Metro D.C. Dance Awards, including “Outstanding Individual Performance” (which was awarded twice), “Best Scenic Design”, “Best Multi-Media Performance” and “Best Overall Production.” In 2005, she was named as one of “Top 25 to watch” by Dance Magazine and was given the award for “Outstanding Emerging Artist” by the D.C. Mayor’s Arts Award Committee. For her choreography, she was selected three times to be part of the adjudicated “Maryland Choreographer’s Showcase” (2001, 2003, 2005). For the work created for the Washington Ballet in 2008, she was a finalist for “Best New Work” in the Metro DC Dance Awards. In 2009, Wallstories choreographed by Nejla Yatkın was selected as Top 10 dances of 2009 in the Washington Post as well as awarded the Overall Excellence in Dance at the New York International Fringe Festival in 2011. Yatkın is a 2011 National Performance Network Creation Fund recipient as well as was a 2008 Princess Grace Choreography Fellow (awarded by the Princess Grace Foundation in New York City) and is an Artist in Residence at the University of Notre Dame.
Awards:
2012, 3Arts Award for excellence in Dance
2012, New York International Fringe Festival Award for Overall Excellence in Choreography
2011, New York International Fringe Festival Award for Overall Excellence in Dance
2009, Washington Post “Top 10 Dances of 2009” for Wallstories
2009, Princess Grace Special Project Award from the Princess Grace Foundation in New York
2008, Princess Grace Choreography Fellowship from the Princess Grace Foundation in New York
2006, Metro DC Dance Award for “Outstanding Overall Production in a small venue”
2005, Metro DC Dance Award for “Outstanding Individual Dance”
2005, Dance Magazine′s “Top 25 to Watch”
2004, D. C. Mayor′s Arts Award for “Outstanding Emerging Artist”
2004, Metro DC Dance Award for “Outstanding Multi-Media”
2003, Metro DC Dance Award for “Outstanding Scenic Design”
2002, Metro DC Dance Award for “Outstanding Individual Performer”
2002, Dance USA Scholarship to attend the Dance USA/National Roundtable in Miami, Florida
2002, “Vaslav Nijinski Award” for Contemporary Choreography (Kiev, Ukraine)
2000, Winner of the category “best female modern solo” at the Music World 2000 (in Fivizzano, Italy)
Reference: ny2dance.com, 3arts.org, kennedy-center.org, danceviewtimes.com |
