Dawn Stoppiello • co-founder and co-director
Trained as a choreographer and dancer, Stoppiello has focused on choreography for bodies interfaced to computers through sensory systems and dancing in synchrony with projected images. She began her career in Portland, Oregon at the Jefferson High School for the Performing Arts. She received a BFA in dance from California Institute of the Arts in 1989 and an MFA in dance from George Washington University in 2014. Stoppiello has received multiple honors from the Princess Grace Foundation-USA over the years including a 1987 Dance Scholarship, three Special Project grants in 2004/2009/2015 and the foundation’s highest honor, the Statue Award in 2004 for her continued excellence in her field. Her first professional performance, while still a student at CalArts, was with Jazz Tap Ensemble in 1986. After Graduation she became a member of the Bella Lewitzky Dance Company where she remained until 1992. Stoppiello has taught on the dance faculty of Portland State University, Loyola Marymount University, Idyllwild School of Music and the Arts and the University of Maryland-Baltimore County as well as teaching numerous master classes at institutions in the US, Canada, Australia and Europe. After 25 years away she relocated back to Portland, Oregon in 2009. dawnstoppiello.com
Mark Coniglio • co-founder and co-director
Recognized as a pioneering force in the integration of dance and media, composer/media artist Mark Coniglio creates large-scale performance works that integrate music, dance, theater and interactive media. A native of Nebraska, Mark received his degree in music composition in 1989 from California Institute of the Arts where he studied with electronic music pioneer Morton Subotnick. From that early time, Coniglio’s artistic practice has included the creation of custom interactive systems that allow performers to manipulate video, sound, and light in real-time. His first technological breakthrough came in 1989 when he created MidiDancer, a wireless system that allowed a performer to interactively control music. His passion for giving control to the performer led him to create the award-winning software Isadora®, a flexible graphic programming environment that provides interactive control over digital media. Mark’s writings about new media in performance have appeared in numerous books and journals, including “New Visions In Performance”, “La Scena Digitale: Nuovi Media Per La Danza” and Movement Research Journal. He relocated from New York to Berlin, Germany in 2008. troikatronix.com