FOCUS 2013, a celebration of U.S.-based dance presented by Gotham Arts Exchange, introduces a new program and stage to its annual platform, FOCUS 2013: FOCAL POINT, comprised of three programs each curated by a different dance artist. FOCAL POINT will be presented on Friday, January 11 at 8pm; Saturday, January 12 at 4pm; and Sunday, January 13 at 4pm at The Ailey Citigroup Theater, 405 W. 55th Street, NYC.

The goal of FOCAL POINT programming is to provide three dance programs that bring focus to areas in dance that warrant attention. The artists who curate FOCAL POINT decide what is missing from the other FOCUS 2013 programs, and use the FOCAL POINT to complete the overall picture. This year's programs will be curated by David Parker, Robert Moses and Trajal Harrell.

FOCAL POINT is a part of FOCUS 2013, the National Platform to promote American dance both abroad and nationally. The week-long platform presents performances of U.S.-based dance companies during the annual Arts Presenters Conference in New York City, and one of the largest gatherings of artists, dancers and dance professionals in the U.S. During the second week in January, four venues partner with Gotham Arts Exchange to present the artistic visions of five curators gathered to shape this year's edition:

FOCUS 2013
www.focusdance.us

* DANCE GOTHAM at NYU/Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, curator Martin Wechsler

* FOCUS DANCE at The Joyce Theater, curator Jodee Nimerichter

* FOCAL POINT (new this year), with curators David Parker, Robert Moses and Trajal Harrell, and artistic advisor Robert Battle.

* DANCE MEET and SHOW CASE at New York City Center

ABOUT THE CURATORS

David Parker has made over 30 commissioned works for dance companies, festivals and universities in addition to his dances for The Bang Group. His work has been commended by the New York Dance and Performance Awards committee with a "Bessie" for Design for Slapstuck in 2002, a finalist prize from the 4th International Competition for Choreographers of Contemporary Dance in Groningen, The Netherlands for Bang and Suck, a Special Citation from the Kurt Jooss Awards Jury (led by Pina Baush) in Essen, Germany for Bang and Suck, a citation as Emerging Choreographer of Note from the jury of the Nijinsky Awards in Monte Carlo and a philanthropy prize from Dancers Responding To AIDS. Parker was also honored by Dance Theater Workshop with a MOVE Award for his steadfast commitment to the New York City dance community and by The Gibney Dance Center with an Art+Action Award.

THE BANG GROUP, founded in 1995 by David Parker and Jeffrey Kazin who continue to direct the company together, is devoted to Parker's love of rhythmic form and the humor which flows inevitably from it. TBG appears regularly throughout NYC and has been presented in ten full evening programs at Dance Theater Workshop (now New York Live Arts) including Nut/Cracked (which will celebrate its 10th consecutive season in December!). The company has appeared in 13 countries and 23 of the United States. TBG has been in residence every summer at Concord Summer Stages Dance Festival in Massachusetts for the past 12 years and has presented almost all of Parker's new work there. Please go to www.thebanggroup.com for more information and join our page on Facebook.

Robert Moses Since founding Robert Moses' Kin in 1995 in San Francisco, choreographer Robert Moses has created numerous works of varying styles and genres for his highly praised dance company. His work explores topics ranging from oral traditions in African American culture (Word of Mouth, 2002), the life, times, and work of author James Baldwin (Biography of Baldwin, 2003), and the dark side of contemporary urban culture (Cause, 2004), to the nuanced complexities of parentage and identity (The Cinderella Principle, 2010), and the simple joys of the expressive power of pure movement (Toward September, 2009). Moses has worked collaboratively with numerous artists and organizations, among them Julia Adam, Margaret Jenkins, Sara Shelton Mann, Joanna Haigood, SoVoSo, Marcus Shelby, Keith Terry, Frank Boehm, Will Power, Somei Yoshino Taiko Ensemble, Bill Morrison, Ann Galjour, David Worm, Kid Beyond and Youth Speaks. Since 2008 Moses has composed original scores for several of his dances. In addition to his work with Robert Moses' Kin, Moses has choreographed for San Francisco Opera (La Forza del Destino, 2005), Philadanco, Cincinnati Ballet, Eco Arts, Transitions Dance Company of the Laban Center in London, African Cultural Exchange (UK), Bare Bones (UK), Oakland Ballet, Moving People Dance, and Robert Henry Johnson Dance Company, among others. He has choreographed for film, theater and opera, with major productions for the Lorraine Hansberry Theater, New Conservatory Theater, Los Angeles Prime Moves Festival (L.A.C.E.), and Olympic Arts Festival. www.robertmoseskin.org

Trajal Harrell's work has been presented In New York and the U.S. at many venues including The Kitchen, American Realness Festival, ICA Boston, Danspace Project, Crossing the Line Festival, DTW, P.S. 122, Cornell University, and Colorado College, among others. Internationally, his work has toured in France, Switzerland, Portugal, Japan, Holland, Belgium, Austria, Germany, Poland, Croatia, Brazil, and Mexico, and has been presented in international festivals such as Rencontres Chorégraphiques (Paris), Festival d'Avignon, Impulstanz-Vienna, TanzimAugust (Berlin), Panorama Festival (Rio de Janeiro), among others. He has also shown work in visual art contexts such as Perfoma Biennial, Third Streaming Gallery, The New Museum, The Margulies Art Warehouse (Miami), The Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art, The Bronx Museum of the Arts, and Art Basel-Miami Beach. His ongoing projects, The Ambien Piece and The Conspiracy of Performance have been shown in galleries in New York, Paris, Tokyo and Berlin. He has created six full-evening works: Notes on Less than Zero, Showpony, Quartet for the End of Time, Twenty Looks or Paris is Burning at The Judson Church (S), (M)imosa aka Twenty Looks or Paris is Burning at The Judson Church (M), co-authored with Cecilia Bengolea, Francois Chaignaud, and Marlene Freitas; and Antigone Sr./Twenty Looks or Paris is Burning at The Judson Church (L). He has also created two half-evening works: Twenty Looks…(XS) and Antigone Jr./Twenty Looks…(jr.) He is best known for his seminal series of works, Twenty Looks or Paris is Burning at The Judson Church, which looks at the relationship between the voguing dance tradition and early postmodern dance. betatrajal.org

FOCUS 2013 STEERING COMMITTEE

Rena Shagan, Chair; Laura Colby; Chad Herzog; Ken Maldonado*; Harold Norris; Cathy Pruzan; Bernard Schmidt; Linda Shelton; Michelle Tabnick*; Burke Wilmore*
*staff members

FOCUS 2013 is produced by Gotham Arts Exchange and made possible with major support from the National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. www.focusdance.us

GOTHAM ARTS EXCHANGE, INC. is a non-profit arts organization set-up to provide administrative, management, booking, fundraising, insurance, and fiscal sponsorship services to the artists that make up the roster of Zia Artists. The idea behind Gotham Arts Exchange is to "pool" the resources of many companies together to be able to afford the many aspects of running a non-profit corporation that is vital to the infrastructure of a dance company. By doing this, each dance company that is not an incorporated non-profit becomes a sponsored project of the organization. Gotham Arts Exchange began producing at The Joyce Theater in 2006, presenting Battleworks and Paradigm, followed by Keigwin+Company and Battleworks (2008), Nicholas Leichter and Keigwin+Company (2009), Gotham Dance Festival (2010, 2011, 2012), and Camille A. Brown & Dancers (2012). The most recent venture is FOCUS (2012, 2013), a new initiative that promotes American dance during APAP.