Company SBB
Company SBB // Stefanie Batten Bland is an intercontinental dance-theatre company whose interdisciplinary creations for stages, spaces, and films question contemporary and historical cultural symbolism - and the complexities of human relationships. Based in New York since 2011, Company SBB was founded in France in 2008, where it quickly caught the attention of presenters, fellow artists, and audiences with its award-winning choreographic installations, riveting performers, and intellectually ambitious creations. The company creates work which aims to impact local and global communities. Company SBB's social and philosophical messages are visceral and accessible to a diverse public, enabling people to embrace emotional content from a place of kinetic empathy. The company is in permanent residence at University Settlement in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, is regularly produced by La MaMa Experimental Theater of New York City and is supported by the Jerome Robbins Foundation.
Performance highlights include the 7 time award winning dance cinema piece Kolonial, commissioned by Baryshnikov Arts Center, 2022 world premiere of Embarqued: Stories of Soil at Duke Performances, and 2018 tour to France and the Spoleto and Lecce Festivals of Italy of Bienvenue欢迎WelcomeBienvenidoأهلا بك, an interdisciplinary performance which examines the various definitions of walls and our willingness to share space with others.
The company has been seen throughout the United States at such festivals as Lincoln Center Restart Stages, Bates Dance Festival, Ringling International Arts Festival, Jacob’s Pillow and Kinderhook, Saratoga… Throughout Europe in internationally renowned theatres and festivals such as Spoleto Italy, Lecce Italy, Prague, Brussels, Montpellier, The Paris Opèra, Festival Avignon Off, Festival Onze Bouge. The company is artist in residence at the Center of American Art and Culture in Paris, France.
Upcoming: Embarqued: Stories of Soil at BAM Next Wave Festival in November 2022 and Look Who’s Coming to Dinner at Celebrity Series Boston in early 2023.
Company SBB has well established humanities and educational programming presented in association with touring works as well as within residency workshops. Physical Perspectives allows participants of any discipline, spanning a broad age demographic, to discover their physicality in space and in relationship to Company SBB installation and dance theatre approaches. Residencies and workshops have included The Yard on Martha’s Vineyard, Alliance Française FIAF, Ithaca College, Cornell University, Virginia Commonwealth University, Jacksonville University, Santa Fe College, Richmond University, Rutgers University, Skidmore College, and Ohio University.
Stefanie Batten Bland
2021 National Dance Project Awardee
Child of a jazz composer/producer father and writer mother, and raised in Soho when it was still led by artists, Stefanie Batten Bland was clearly destined for a future in the arts. She situates her work at the intersection of dance-theatre, film, and installation, with a focus on the interrogation of contemporary and historical culture.
Jerome Robbins Awardee Batten Bland has been featured in The New York Times, NYT Style Magazine, Dance Magazine, Marie Claire, The Brooklyn Rail, TV 5 Monde, and Dance Europe. In 2021, she was awarded the National Dance Project Production Grant for her work Embarqued: Stories of Soil, premieres at Duke Performances in April 2022. In addition, she was 2021 commissioned artist by Baryshnikov Arts Center and Duke Performances and a 2021 Toulmin Creator Fellow for the Center for Ballet Arts at NYU.
Known for her unique visual and movement aesthetic, she served as movement director for Eve’s Song at the Public Theater (Forbes 2018 Best Theatre), European Union at the United Nations, NY, and is currently Casting and Movement Director for Emursive Productions (producers of Sleep No More). She has created for fashion and lifestyle partners Louis Vuitton, VanCleef & Arpels, Hermés, and Guerlain. Her choreography is currently in active repertory at American Ballet Theater, Alvin Ailey II, Transitions Dance Company in Greenwich, UK, and Frontier Danceland in Singapore. Her work has been seen internationally at the Spoleto Festival in Italy, Danse à Lille, in France, and Tanztendenzen in Germany.
SBB’s 2021 dance film, Kolonial, produced by Baryshnikov Arts Center has won seven US & international film awards, and was nominated for two Bessie Awards. She has created fourteen other dance cinema films that have been shown in international festivals from South Africa to Buenos Aires and Greece to Germany.
A global artist, Batten Bland established her own company, Company SBB, in France in 2008 while positioned as head choreographer at the Paris Opéra Comique. Upon returning to New York City in 2011, she received the support of Mikhail Baryshnikov as a part of the esteemed residency program at Baryshnikov Arts Center, where she has continued to present work. The company just reopened live performances at Martha’s Vineyard with a partnership between The Yard, Martha’s Vineyard Museum, and the MV African American Heritage Trail.
SBB received her MFA in interdisciplinary arts from Goddard College, is Assistant Professor at Montclair State University’s Department of Theatre and Dance, and lives in SoHo with her family.