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Dance and music have always generated the heartbeat of Richard Daniels's artistic passion. As a child, he studied piano, giving recitals and accompanying musical productions, choirs, and orchestras. The enrichment of his musical training laid the cornerstone for Mr. Daniels's vibrantly musical dancing and choreography. Throughout his schooling, he participated as a dancer, actor, and singer in numerous school and civic productions.
Mr. Daniels began his formal dance studies with Valentina Litvinoff at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where he received a Fine Arts degree in photography. As an arts manager and consultant during the 1980's, he worked with, among others, the Limon Dance Company, Joyce Trisler Danscompany, Ballet Concierto de Puerto Rico, Nancy Duncan's CoDanceCo, Charlie Moulton, Molissa Fenley, and the Center for African Art. He also served as advisor to several visual artists and local art councils, as well as the New York State Council on the Arts. While with FEDAPT, a management consulting firm with a national presence, he worked with numerous dance companies. Mr. Daniels also served as the founding executive director of Chamber Ballet USA, with a working budget of over $500,000.
In the 1990's, he returned to the pursuit of his own creative impulses. To that end, he formed Spirited Design, an interior design firm inspired by the tenets of Feng Shui.
But for Richard Daniels, the experience of living with HIV disease led to a rebirth. These circumstances, which included the loss of his soul mate of 20 years, propelled Mr. Daniels to reconnect with dance as an instrument of his healing. After 15 years offstage, he resumed his dance studies at the invitation and generosity of teacher/performer Janie Brendel. The Day without Art Remember Project, produced by Dancers Responding to AIDS in December, 1995 at St. Marks Church in the Bowery, marked his return to the stage and his debut as a solo dancer.
Mr. Daniels's background in so many disparate artistic talents has fueled and informed his vision, a compilation of the techniques and commonality of various aesthetic styles. Since his debut, his repertory has grown to include dances both given to and commissioned for him by accomplished and respected dance artists like Peggy Baker, Molissa Fenley Christopher Gillis, Zvi Gotheiner, Eleanor King, and Barbara Mahler. Mr. Daniels has completed his repertory with many fine works of his own. He has also choreographed solos for the distinguished dancers Michele Bloom, Rebecca Rigert, and Keith Sabado. Mr. Daniels has appeared at the Joyce Theater, Soho Joyce, 92nd St. Y, Cunningham Dance Studio, Context Buddies in Bad Times Theater (Toronto), and the Gowanus Arts Exchange.
Photo: Danielle Freedman |
