Teaching
Community and education are core values to Sellers and the April Sellers Dance Collective. Beginning her career in the Minneapolis Public School system, Sellers is known for her ability to communicate technique and form to her students. A specialist in integrating dance into classroom curriculum, she created Flexible Minds Flexible Bodies, a dance and math integrated curriculum funded by Minneapolis Arts for Academic Achievement/Annenberg Challenge Grant. This integration project was an intense partnership collaboration between individual classroom teachers and dance artists from the area that used concepts central to both math and dance to teach the curriculum to students in grades 2-5.Sellers has led over 100 residencies and teacher-training workshops in New York, Ohio, Montana, Massachusetts, and Minnesota. She spent six years as an Assistant Professor of Dance at St Cloud State University (SCSU) teaching modern technique, composition, and directing the student dance company. Under her direction, the SCSU’s student dance company received two ACDFA Gala Selections.
Selected Workshops and Courses
2016 April Sellers Dance Collective Guest Workshop, Purdue University, Lafayette, IN
2015 Content Driven Choreography Workshop in partnership with Kat Nasti Dance in Residency, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
2015 Guest Choreographer, University of Wisconsin, Madison
2015 Guest Choreographer, Carleton College, Northfield, MN
2007-2014 Master Courses at the American College Dance Festival, Milwaukee
2013-2015 Cowles Center for Dance and Performance, Minneapolis, MN
2004-2009 Assistant Professor of Dance, St Cloud State University, St Cloud
Workshops offered during the spring tour:
April Sellers Dance Collective’s Creative Practice
ASDC uses dance to celebrate ignored streams in society. In this workshop the company will share their creative practice including, methods for devising work collectively, structuring improvisation in performance, queering the body and layering modern-dance technique within everyday gestures and text-based narratives.
Evolving the Feminine/ QUEERing Performance
Queer Studies grew out of feminist scholarship into a distinct field of inquiry with a solid presence in contemporary choreography. The April Sellers Dance Collective has developed a unique approach to creating text based narratives. ASDC uses dance to tell stories and provide a platform for other voices and experiences to be heard. In this workshop the company will share their creative practice including methods for movement generation, structuring improvisation in performance and layering modern-dance technique within everyday gestures and text-based narratives.
Queer performance has roots in burlesque, drag and postmodern expressionism. In this workshop The April Sellers Dance Collective will guide participants through observation and movement inquiry answering the questions: What is queer performance? What elements of queer performance have made their way onto the main stage of contemporary performance? How has the presentation of gender and sexuality on stage transformed through time in reflection to our societies changing values? Participants will learn how to apply drag inspired make up, create a gender bend and perform a reveal.
The Dancers Survival Seminar
The members of ASDC share practical tips and tools for getting started as a dance maker and how to garner support for your work including (working with presenters, developing relationships with press, managing the schedule and budget for your production, and resources for emerging artist)
