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Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival 2014 – Opening Week With The Hong Kong Ballet & Carmen De Lavallade

June 30, 2014 by 4dancers

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by Christopher Duggan

It’s been a glorious first week back at Jacob’s Pillow in every way. Fantastic dance, beautiful sunshine and lots of making pictures. I wait all year for this and it’s finally here.

This year was my first time photographing the Pillow’s Gala in many years. It was fun to be a part of all the season opening festivities again.

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My friend John Heginbotham received the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award given to visionary artists for their creativity.

The amazing Carmen De Lavallade danced with the back barn doors of the Ted Shawn Theatre open, in my mind symbolizing the opening of the festival’s doors for all to come this summer.

A few of my Inside/Out images were included in the Gala’s silent auction, and though the auction is not officially over, I’m honored to say it looks like my dance photography brought in a few thousand dollars!

The Hong Kong Ballet is a stunning and exciting company. So many dancers. Impeccable technique. Really fun to photograph. The company only did one dance in costume for our photo call together, but it was plenty for me. I’m so glad these strong ballet dancers are opening the festival.

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It’s hard to describe photographing Ms. De Lavallade. She has such grace and dignity. She raises the bar just by walking into the room. Her show is poignant and funny, and it’s just a treat to watch such a high level of performance coming from a woman who has more than six decades of experience onstage. She holds the distinction of the longest Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival performing career on record, and made her Pillow debut with Lester Horton Dance Theatre in 1953. Just out of this world.

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Contributor Christopher Duggan is a wedding and dance photographer in New York City, the Berkshires and beyond. Duggan has been the Festival Photographer for Jacob’s Pillow Dance since 2006. In this capacity, and as a respected New York-based dance photographer, he has worked with renowned choreographers and performers of international acclaim as well as upstarts in the city’s diverse performance scene.
Christopher Duggan, Photo by Julia Newman
Christopher Duggan, Photo by Julia Newman

He photographs dancers in the studio and in performance, for promotional materials, portraits and press, and he often collaborates with his wife, Nel Shelby, and her Manhattan-based dance film and video editing company Nel Shelby Productions (nelshelby.com). Together, they have documented dance at performances from New York City to Vail International Dance Festival.

Christopher Duggan Photography also covers the finest wedding venues in the Metropolitan and Tri-State areas, in Massachusetts and the Berkshires, and frequently travels to destination weddings.

His photographs appear in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, The Knot, Destination I Do, Photo District News, Boston Globe, Financial Times, Dance Magazine, and Munaluchi Bridal, among other esteemed publications and popular dance and wedding blogs. One of his images of Bruce Springsteen was added to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and his dance photography has been exhibited at The National Museum of Dance and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.

His Natural Light Studio (http://www.christopherduggan.com/portfolio/natural-light-studio-jacobs-pillow-photography/) at Jacob’s Pillow is his most ambitious photography project to date – check out his blog to see more portraits of dance artists in his pop-up photo studio on the Pillow grounds.

Filed Under: Dance Photography, Finis Tagged With: carmen de lavallade, christopher duggan, hong kong ballet, jacob's pillow, john heginbotham, ted shawn theatre

Jacob’s Pillow Dance – Looking Forward To Summer 2014

June 4, 2014 by 4dancers

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by Christopher Duggan

Every June, my wife, dance videographer Nel Shelby, and I move back into our cabin in the Berkshires to spend the summer filming and photographing the incredible artists who perform at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival. The Pillow’s 10-week run includes 2 new mainstage dance performances and 4 free outdoor performances on Inside/Out stage every week. We keep very busy and have a blast.

This summer, I’m excited to photograph some familiar dance companies – Doug Elkins, Dance Theatre of Harlem, LeeSaar, Mark Morris Dance Group, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Dance Heginbotham, Yin Yue Dance Company, Dorrance Dance, Trey McIntyre Project, Reggie Wilson, Aspen Santa Fe Ballet…I’ve had the pleasure of photographing all of these dance artists at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in past seasons, and they are all coming back to the Pillow this summer.

My dance photography for Jacob’s Pillow is meant to preserve these performances for years to come. The Pillow has a rich history and I love that I get to be a part of capturing it. I love photographing the artists at the Pillow so much that I started a passion project two summers ago. My Natural Light Studio is an outdoor studio where I collaborate with the dancers at the Pillow and make portraits.

I write a blog post every Friday with photos from the week’s dance performances and sneak peeks at new portraits in my Natural Light Studio. I’d love to share my photos from these 10 weeks with you. Sign up for my dance emails and you’ll get a photo and a note from me every Friday, June through August.

Here’s a look at photos we’ve made together before. I can’t wait to capture more this season.

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Contributor Christopher Duggan is a wedding and dance photographer in New York City, the Berkshires and beyond. Duggan has been the Festival Photographer for Jacob’s Pillow Dance since 2006. In this capacity, and as a respected New York-based dance photographer, he has worked with renowned choreographers and performers of international acclaim as well as upstarts in the city’s diverse performance scene.
Christopher Duggan, Photo by Julia Newman
Christopher Duggan, Photo by Julia Newman

He photographs dancers in the studio and in performance, for promotional materials, portraits and press, and he often collaborates with his wife, Nel Shelby, and her Manhattan-based dance film and video editing company Nel Shelby Productions (nelshelby.com). Together, they have documented dance at performances from New York City to Vail International Dance Festival.

Christopher Duggan Photography also covers the finest wedding venues in the Metropolitan and Tri-State areas, in Massachusetts and the Berkshires, and frequently travels to destination weddings.

His photographs appear in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, The Knot, Destination I Do, Photo District News, Boston Globe, Financial Times, Dance Magazine, and Munaluchi Bridal, among other esteemed publications and popular dance and wedding blogs. One of his images of Bruce Springsteen was added to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and his dance photography has been exhibited at The National Museum of Dance and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.

His Natural Light Studio (http://www.christopherduggan.com/portfolio/natural-light-studio-jacobs-pillow-photography/) at Jacob’s Pillow is his most ambitious photography project to date – check out his blog to see more portraits of dance artists in his pop-up photo studio on the Pillow grounds.

Filed Under: Dance Photography, Finis Tagged With: christopher duggan, dance photography, jacob's pillow

Jacob’s Pillow Dance – Festival Commercial

May 12, 2014 by 4dancers

by Nel Shelby

I edited this Jacob’s Pillow Dance commercial a few weeks ago, and I’m always excited to share what we make for the festival.

This summer, we made this commercial to encapsulate Jacob’s Pillow in a short period of time. Mainly because the festival season overview video is eight minutes long (watch it here). Although it’s great to have the video overview on the website or even playing on the festival grounds so everyone can get a sense of the full summer’s offerings, eight minutes is a lot for people to watch!

We wanted people to get a taste of Jacob’s Pillow from this commercial!

Contributor Nel Shelby, Founder and Principal of Nel Shelby Productions, is deeply dedicated to the preservation and promotion of dance through documentation of live performances, fully edited marketing reels, live-stream capture, and documentaries and films that encapsulate the essence of nonprofit organizations.

Nel Shelby, Photo by Matthew Murphy
Nel Shelby, Photo by Matthew Murphy

Her New York City-based video production company has grown to encompass a diverse list of dance clients including American Ballet Theater II, Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, Gallim Dance, Gotham Arts, Kate Weare and Company, Keigwin + Company, Monica Bill Barnes Company, The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Shen Wei Dance Arts, Wendy Whelan and many more. She has filmed performances at venues throughout the greater New York area including The Joyce Theater, New York Live Arts, Lincoln Center, Symphony Space, St. Mark’s Church and Judson Church, to name a few.

For nearly a decade, Nel has served as Festival Videographer for the internationally celebrated Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the Berkshires. Each season at the Pillow, Nel’s responsibilities include documenting aspects of festival culture in addition to its 20 mainstage dance performances, filming and overseeing documentation of more than 100 free performances and events, managing two dance videography interns and an apprentice, and educating students about the technical and philosophical aspects of filming dance.

She also serves as Resident Videographer at the Vail International Dance Festival where she spent her first summer creating five short dance documentary films about the festival in addition to documenting its events and performances. Her longer-form, half-hour documentary on Vail’s festival, The Altitude of Dance, debuted on Rocky Mountain PBS in May 2013.
She has created four short films for Wendy Whelan’s Restless Creature, and she collaborated with Adam Barruch Dance to create a short film titled “Folie a Deux,” which was selected and screened at the Dance on Camera Festival in New York City and the San Francisco Dance Film Festival. She is making a dance documentary featuring Nejla Y. Yatkin, called Where Women Don’t Dance.

Nel has a long personal history with movement  – she has a B.A. in dance and is a certified Pilates instructor. She continues to train with world-renowned Master Teachers Romana Krysnowska and Sari Pace, original students of Joseph Pilates. In addition to her dance degree, Nel holds a B.S. in broadcast video. She often collaborates with her wonderful husband, dance photographer (and fellow 4dancers contributor) Christopher Duggan on creative projects with dancers in New York City and beyond. They live with their beautiful daughter Gracie and son Jack in Manhattan.

Filed Under: Dance Video Tagged With: dance video, jacob's pillow, nel shelby

Finis: Dance Heginbotham

December 31, 2013 by 4dancers

by Christopher Duggan

I first met John Heginbotham at Jacob’s Pillow, and Nel was an intern with Adrian, his company manager, so it’s nice having that Pillow connection. John came and did some really fun out of the box portraits with me in my Natural Light Studio in 2012, but his dance company’s performance at BAM Fisher was my first opportunity to photograph his work in New York.
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Contributor Christopher Duggan is a wedding and dance photographer in New York City, the Berkshires and beyond. Duggan has been the Festival Photographer for Jacob’s Pillow Dance since 2006. In this capacity, and as a respected New York-based dance photographer, he has worked with renowned choreographers and performers of international acclaim as well as upstarts in the city’s diverse performance scene.

He photographs dancers in the studio and in performance, for promotional materials, portraits and press, and he often collaborates with his wife, Nel Shelby, and her Manhattan-based dance film and video editing company Nel Shelby Productions (nelshelby.com). Together, they have documented dance at performances from New York City to Vail International Dance Festival.

Christopher Duggan Photography also covers the finest wedding venues in the Metropolitan and Tri-State areas, in Massachusetts and the Berkshires, and frequently travels to destination weddings.

His photographs appear in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, The Knot, Destination I Do, Photo District News, Boston Globe, Financial Times, Dance Magazine, and Munaluchi Bridal, among other esteemed publications and popular dance and wedding blogs. One of his images of Bruce Springsteen was added to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and his dance photography has been exhibited at The National Museum of Dance and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.

His Natural Light Studio (http://www.christopherduggan.com/portfolio/natural-light-studio-jacobs-pillow-photography/) at Jacob’s Pillow is his most ambitious photography project to date – check out his blog to see more portraits of dance artists in his pop-up photo studio on the Pillow grounds.

Filed Under: Dance Photography, Finis Tagged With: dance heginbotham, dance photography, jacob's pillow

Finis: Brian Brooks And Run Don’t Run

October 31, 2013 by 4dancers

by Christopher Duggan
I’ve known Brian Brooks for a few years now, and we’ve become closer and closer friends through filming with Nel Shelby Productions for Wendy Whelan’s Restless Creature, photographing his work at The Joyce, Dance From the Heart by Dancers Responding to AIDS and his company’s performances at Jacob’s Pillow…
It’s always exciting to see what he has in store for his dancers, and I was looking forward to photographing his dress rehearsal for the premiere of Run Don’t Run for weeks.
Brian Brooks Moving Company performed Run Don’t Run at BAM Fisher in Brooklyn. It’s a great new theater and the dance’s set design was an exciting feature to photograph. Philip Trevino designed the set. He’s a good fiend of ours. We’ve worked with him MANY times.
Another good friend Jo-anne Lee has danced with the Brian Brooks Moving Company for 11 years. This was her last performance with the company, so it was really special to photograph her in Run Don’t Run.

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Contributor Christopher Duggan is a wedding and dance photographer in New York City, the Berkshires and beyond. Duggan has been the Festival Photographer for Jacob’s Pillow Dance since 2006. In this capacity, and as a respected New York-based dance photographer, he has worked with renowned choreographers and performers of international acclaim as well as upstarts in the city’s diverse performance scene.

He photographs dancers in the studio and in performance, for promotional materials, portraits and press, and he often collaborates with his wife, Nel Shelby, and her Manhattan-based dance film and video editing company Nel Shelby Productions (nelshelby.com). Together, they have documented dance at performances from New York City to Vail International Dance Festival.

Christopher Duggan Photography also covers the finest wedding venues in the Metropolitan and Tri-State areas, in Massachusetts and the Berkshires, and frequently travels to destination weddings.

His photographs appear in The New York Times, The Huffington Post, The Knot, Destination I Do, Photo District News, Boston Globe, Financial Times, Dance Magazine, and Munaluchi Bridal, among other esteemed publications and popular dance and wedding blogs. One of his images of Bruce Springsteen was added to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and his dance photography has been exhibited at The National Museum of Dance and Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival.

His Natural Light Studio (http://www.christopherduggan.com/portfolio/natural-light-studio-jacobs-pillow-photography/) at Jacob’s Pillow is his most ambitious photography project to date – check out his blog to see more portraits of dance artists in his pop-up photo studio on the Pillow grounds.

Filed Under: Dance Photography, Finis Tagged With: brian brooks, brian brooks moving company, christopher duggan, dance photography, jacob's pillow, nel shelby, restless creature, run don't run, wendy whelan

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