Ice Theatre of New York

For over 35 years, ITNY has established dancing on ice as an ensemble performing art that is inclusive of all people. We aim to awaken the public to the beauty and the artistry that can be performed on ice in a non-competitive format.

We will continue to create new works, increase collaboration within and beyond our field specialization, conduct residencies with noted and emerging choreographers that address the issues we face and ignite artistic imagination and creative approaches.

We will increase our outreach and publicity through our dedicated marketing plan.

We will bring to public notice the wonderful skating artists, choreographers, new media artists and designers who are Black, Indigenous, and People of Color and embrace their communities.

We will build awareness and embodied connection through artistic dancing to other urgent social issues including LGBTQ rights and the importance of shrinking ice sheets and glaciers.

We will assemble Black, Latinx and Asian public school children to not only see performances but also to learn about and experience what it is like to move and even dance expressively on ice.

• Highlight the continued relevance of our art to social issues, including racial justice, human rights, migration, LGBTQ issues, and the climate issue—melting of ice sheets, rising sea levels, increased storms affecting our country and the world -- both through the work of the creative artists we commission and our own ensemble's performances.
• Recruit new ensemble members. Continue to include and promote Black, Indigenous, and other people of color and LGBTQ skaters as ensemble members and guest artists, as well as choreographers, designers, administrators and board members.
• Continue to offer weekly free Master EDGE classes in-person with a back-up of Zoom, led by one of our senior dancers; offer periodic classes for our Junior Ensemble, in-person.
• Expose public schoolchildren in five boroughs, in-person when possible and virtually when not, to ITNY performances followed by the children putting on skates and moving safely on the ice (at Riverbank State Park, Prospect Park—Le Frak Center, and City Ice Pavilion) or in the classroom if virtual.
• Offer free performances at Rockefeller Center, Bryant Park, Wollman Rink in Central Park, at Brookfield Place, Governors Island and other city rinks.
• Provide our inclusive Winter Holiday Skating Celebration on a December Saturday afternoon at Riverbank State Park in Harlem.
• Present Home Season performances featuring collaborations with choreographers and other artists including musicians; in 2022, and, if possible, 2023 in-person which will feature commissioned work by a climate activist choreographer dealing with ice and water and a black new media artist (and former Figure Skating in Harlem skater) who will interrogate figure skating while black.
• Intensify social media promotion in relation to these goals and projects.
• Reach out with the aid of a dance press agent to, dance and general public media, especially NY 1 Spectrum News and the New York Times.
• Institute a major donor cultivation and diversity campaign to grow this sector of our funding.

ITNY's capabilities have withstood the test of time. It stands, post pandemic, as a well-managed small arts nonprofit.

Since its founding in 1984, ITNY has developed a strong fundraising Board of Directors, a full-time Executive Director, full-time Founder/Artistic Director, and two part-time office staff. ITNY also pays its company of dancers, the Ensemble Director, and guest performers for a total of 36 people on payroll.

We have secured iconic Olympic Ice Dance Champions Torvill & Dean as honorees for our first in person Home Season and Gala performance since October, 2019, in early May, 2022. Guest choreographers have been discussed above.

Even at the height of the omicron, we have been providing “pop-up” free performances at Rockefeller Center, Bryant Park and other rinks (see above). We have provided many classes and performances via video and zoom. We have maintained our weekly Master EDGE Class throughout the pandemic. What formerly drew 30 people in person has drawn as many as 400 on Zoom.

Over time, we have worked with Twyla Tharp, Jacqulyn Buglisi, Edward Villella, Lorna Brown who was an original member of John Curry’s Theater of Skating, Ann Carlson, and Deneane Richburg of Brownbody, a McKnight Fellow in Choreography, JoAnna Mendl Shaw, and will soon work with new media artist LaJuné McMillian and continue to work with climate activist choreographer Jody Sperling.

We have a history of collaborating with diverse artists, resulting in adventurous explorations and creation of notable works, such as those mentioned above and even aerial works. Our inclusive ensemble of company performers and frequent guest performing artists have collaborated closely with the artistic staff, choreographers and production staff order to develop and maximize their already magnetic appeal and ability to connect with audiences.

We have upgraded our practice through active participation in solidarity with our arts and culture leadership counterparts throughout NYC in the Culture @ 3 and New Yorkers For Culture and the Arts Zoom conference calls, where we share information, questions, challenges, best practices and advice as a way of helping us all move forward as a field of human amplification and healing both collaboratively and as individual non-profits.

During the pandemic shutdown, we have developed beautiful aerial choreographies with our synthetic ice surface, in order to create videos/film before transferring to real ice when Chelsea Piers opened up again on Sky Rink. Before that we had been covered and videoed in edge class type preparations for the virtual season by NY Times chief dance critic Gia Kourlas in “Trading the Ice for New York City Pavement.” The article, still available on the Times' website, contained six short videos by Carlos Vasta of our ensemble members and highlighted how they captured “the glide” and stayed in shape for the return of open ice rinks.

In featuring our performers in videos, we also helped them learn new off-ice skills and how to work on the synthetic ice (Polyglide panels that fit together) that we keep in our rented storage space in Brooklyn. Recent videos by ITNY: "Fragile" with ensemble member Aaron Singletary; "Shadow" and "I Will Fall for You,” by senior dancer Sarah France (who also edited the videos); and “Skaters During Covid” by volunteer Mesha Green, edited from submittals by our dancers. We also made “Junior Ensemble” of our teenage ensemble developing choreography, guided and videoed by their director, Sarah France. Dancers are always paid for their work making videos.

Variety and quality of pre-pandemic collaborations—Jody Sperling (“Arctic Memory”), Grammy Award-nominated jazz composer, singer and skater Theo Bleckmann, opera and jazz singer and skater Alicia Hall Moran, and the Museum of the City of New York. We have commissioned and begun work on new pieces with new media artist LaJuné McMillian and climate activist choreographer Jody Sperling.

We published a series via email and our website: Black Lives Matter On and Off the Ice, featuring Black artists giving their experiences and opinions as skaters.

We published a series via email and our website: Black Lives Matter On and Off the Ice, featuring Black artists giving their experiences and opinions as skaters.

Quality of Skaters at weekly Master EDGE Class: pre-pandemic, we were able to recruit two new, well-qualified ensemble members from EDGE class.

In our weekly Zoom Master EDGE class, average attendance has been 400, with enthusiastic online participants praising it as a great workout and preparation for using edges, the key to fluency and artistry on ice.

Since the beginning of the pandemic we have actively participated in solidarity with our arts and culture leadership counterparts throughout NYC in the Culture @ 3 and New Yorkers For Culture and the Arts Zoom conference calls, where we share information, questions, challenges, best practices and advice as a way of helping us all move forward as a field of human amplification and healing both collaboratively and as individual non-profits.