SYREN Modern Dance receives $21,680 Cultural Development Fund Grant

SYREN Modern Dance, is pleased to announce that it has received an award of $21,680 from the City of New York. This comes as part of New York City Mayor Eric Adams and New York City Department of Cultural Affairs (DCLA) Commissioner Laurie Cumbo's recent announcement of over $58 million in Cultural Development Fund (CDF) grants to 1,070 cultural organizations across the five boroughs. SYREN Modern Dance received this award for the company's 20th year which will include the creation and performance of a new fully produced piece of repertoire and outreach events between October 2022 and May 2023. All public engagements are offered to all age ranges unless otherwise noted.

"Throughout our city, we have a multitude of diverse cultural organizations that reflect the rich history of New Yorkers that have been hidden for too long," said Mayor Adams. "This administration believes in uplifting these cultural groups with our words and our dollars. By utilizing equity reforms, we are spreading the investments to not only our well-known cultural organizations, but to this city's smaller, local, and more diverse groups that reflect the histories of all New Yorkers. No matter in what borough, New Yorkers can learn about some of the unique cultures in their own backyards or in locations across the city. I am proud to support and invest in our cultural groups to ensure we are all connected as one."

"Our arts and cultural organizations are 'Getting Art Done' in every corner of our city, for every community in our city," said Deputy Mayor for Economic and Workforce Development Maria Torres Springer. "We're so thrilled to make this historic investment in the nonprofit arts groups that bring joy and create opportunities for reflection and connection. The thoughtful, far-reaching reforms that we're rolling out this year have helped make sure this public support truly serves the public and lifts up artists and cultural groups across the five boroughs."

"Culture is the bedrock of our communities and an integral part of who we are as a city," said DCLA Commissioner Cumbo. "We are honored to invest this historic funding in New York's vast and vibrant nonprofit cultural community. With the competitive process returning for the first time since the pandemic, hundreds of new groups had the opportunity to apply, and the result is the largest number of grantees in agency history. Our ongoing reform process helped advance first-time grantees, smaller organizations, and those led by people of color — a big first step in fostering greater equity. We'll continue to work with our cultural community in the months ahead to ensure that our support reaches every corner of New York City in a fair, equitable way and continues to move our city forward."

For this year's CDF process, DCLA introduced a series of equity reforms dedicated to identifying and reducing biases in the grantmaking process, and saw the return of the competitive, peer-panel review process for the first time since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. With a record investment from the Adams administration and the City Council, DCLA awarded the most funding to the largest number of cultural organizations ever, marked by major boosts for smaller groups and organizations led by people of color, as well as an increase in the number of groups receiving city support for the first time. The CDF awards also continue to invest in priorities like language and disability access, as well as individual artists, and includes an infusion of funds from Mayor Adams' "Blueprint for New York City's Economic Recovery."

Learn more and find a full list of this year's CDF grantees in the City's official press release.

About SYREN Modern Dance

SYREN Modern Dance is a New York City based company Co-founded by Lynn Peterson and Kate Sutter. Now celebrating its 20th year of sharing dance, SYREN exists to embrace dance as a conduit of connection, communication, curiosity, and collaboration! In February 2022, SYREN performed on behalf of the U.S. State Department as a U.S. Cultural Ambassador at Expo 2020 Dubai (the first "World's Fair" ever held in the Middle East). SYREN has shared dance where people gather in classrooms, theaters, churches, temples, over Zoom, in the grass, in art galleries, libraries, and museums in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Maryland, North Carolina, Washington D.C., Texas, Rhode Island, Ohio, and Paris, France. In addition to hundreds of individuals, SYREN has received support from Mid Atlantic Arts through USArtists International, a program in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Trust of Mutual Understanding, Aleph Fund, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, Dance/NYC, Jewish Community Fund, and Queens Council on the Arts, Particle Fever, Harkness Space Grants (92nd Street Y), The Chelsea Art Museum, and by residencies at DanceNOW/NYC's Silo and DTW's Outer/Space. SYREN has been exploring the intersection of science and art since 2015, which led to the premiere of "Red and Blue, Bitter and Sweet" in 2017. This dance was inspired by quantum mechanics, specifically entanglement, uncertainty principle, super position, and duality. SYREN's most recent work "Ticktock" is performed in collaboration with Astrophysicist Paul Sutter and is an exploration of time using dance and narrative sequences, "Ticktock" has been presented at Expo 2020 Dubai, Bryant Park, Museum of Science-Boston, and Houston Museum of Natural Science. In an effort to share the process of this intersection of science and art, SYREN created "Science in Motion", and has since shared it with The American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington D.C., Society of Physics Students at NYU, Women in Physics at Yale, Children's Museum of Manhattan, American Physical Society's New England Conference, IONA College, The Chapin School, St. Paul's School for Girls, Cambridge Science Festival, High Tech High School, OSU Dance Department, The Young Women's Leadership School of Astoria, and Girl's Inc. of NY. In New York City, SYREN has been presented by Gibney Dance Center, Bach Vespers at Holy Trinity, Green Space, Children's Museum of Manhattan, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Riverside Theatre, Symphony Space, 92ND Street Y, Dance Theater Workshop, Dixon Place, Queens Theatre in the Park, d.u.m.b.o. Arts Under the Bridge Festival, and St. Mark's Church. SYREN has self-produced performances at Baryshnikov Arts Center, The Ailey Citigroup Theater, University Settlement, John Jay Theater, and St. Francis Xavier. SYREN's visual arts partnership with The Art Students League of New York was exhibited at The Office of the Manhattan Borough President. SYREN's commissioned work by composer Galeet Dardashti was presented by JCC of Manhattan, 92Y Tribeca, and Le Poisson Rouge. SYREN has worked with students in NYC at P.S. 123, Ballet Tech, Columbia Grammar and Preparatory School, and Mark Morris Dance Center. Outside of New York City, SYREN's has been presented by Expo 2020 Dubai, Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, Cité Universitaire in Paris, Purchase College, Bach Society of Houston, Sacred Music at the Red Door, Midwest Regional Alternative Dance Festival, White Plains Performing Arts Center, Educational Center for the Arts, New Haven Ballet, and Grounds for Sculpture, among others. For more information, visit syrendance.org.