COMPANY
THE PATRICIA RINCON DANCE COLLECTIVE is a San Diego-based professional dance theatre performing company aspiring to 
educate dancers and enrich San Diego audiences by providing diversified, socially-conscious, innovative programming and choreography.
Patricia Rincon Dance Collective is known for its adventurous programming and cultural investigations. Now on its 30th year of dance making, working both independently and collaboratively with other prolific artists and arts organizations since 1982. PRDC continues its programing of engaging artists who move towards risk-taking and broadening audience perspective.
Patricia Rincon
PATRICIA RINCON (Artistic Director/Choreographer) Artistic Director of the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective since 1982. She has performed, directed and choreographed in California, Mexico and Europe, as well as participated in annual workshops and performances as artist-in-residence at the University of Heidelberg Sports Institute, University of Frankfurt Main, University of Manheim and in Konstanz, Germany. She also has taught for many years at the Universities of Zurich, Bern and Lugano in Switzerland. The company has been presented by the UCSD’s University Events Office (UEO) National Dance Series, the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art, Arts Partnership Program. (MCA) in La Jolla, and Sushi Performance and Visual Arts. In 1999 the company was featured as the only American dance troupe at the “Tanz in Olten International Dance Festival” in Switzerland, and the “Cuerpos Entransito International Dance Festival” at the Centro Cultural Tijuana Performing Arts Center, to name a few. The company has won five San Diego Dance Alliance Tommy Awards for its performances. In 1999 Artistic Director Rincon won a Tommy Award of Distinction for her years of service, leadership and vision in creating performance opportunities for choreographers —international and local — as well as local dancers.
Ms. Rincon has developed the successful annual “Blurred Borders Dance Festival” as well as the site-specific Myth Project series in San Diego. Her additional international work for the past ten years has also included traveling to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, where she has been touring her company, teaching and creating choreography for dancers from the Bellas Artes Cultural Art Center there. Ms. Rincon has continued to work with partner, Paula Zacharias, in creating numerous dance video/films projects such as “Project Contemporary Dance San Miguel de Allende,” and “The Walls Have Memories,” which premiered both in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and San Diego, in December 2007. Rincon and Zacharias were awarded a UCSD Latino Studies Research Initiative grant in 2008-2010 for the research and making of their new documentary: “Latino Now-Landscape of Desire,” filmed in Mexico and California about the American Dream. Their video-film “Waiting,” created in Buenos Aries, Argentina in 2008 premiered in San Diego later that year at PRDC’s Blurred Borders Dance Festival. It was subsequently chosen for the Buenos Aries Festival Internacional VideoDanczaBA’08 in October 2008 and presented in San Diego for the Dance-on-Film Festival. premiering in both Tijuana and San Diego in February and March of 2009. PRDC was invited to tour Ms. Rincon’s work “Peeled” and held a week workshop on Society and Dance at the IUNA Instituto Universitario Nacional de Arte in Buenos Aires, Argentina in September 2011. PRDC has recently been invited to tour to Switzerland to the TANZINOLTEN Festival as well as Germany in FY2013. Patricia is the Head of Dance in the UCSD Department of Theatre and Dance.
PERFORMERS AND ARTISTS
Kenna Crouch
KENNA CROUCH (performer) grew up dancing ballet, tap and jazz at the San Juan School of Dance in Los Altos, CA. With certification at the elementary level of the London-based Royal Academy of Dance and national competitive experience under her belt, Kenna arrived to UCSD in 2004 ready to diversify her movement repertoire. This she did under the guise of many distinguished professors of contemporary dance, such as Patricia Rincon, Jean Isaacs, Allyson Green and Yolande Snaith. She took every opportunity she could to participate in Dance Department productions throughout college. In 2007, she moved to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she studied classical and modern dance as well as tango at the Instituto Universitario Nacional del Arte. Upon returning to UCSD, she drew inspiration from her experience abroad to create a piece for the student-choreographed show Highly Sprung 2008. This debut work, Queremos Paz, successfully fused elements of ballet, modern dance, yoga, tango, and contact improvisation. Having graduated cum laude in December ‘08 with Bachelors of Arts in Dance & Sociology, Kenna now works as a Yoga Instructor at Haute Yoga in Solana Beach. She aspires to continue creating and experimenting in the field of dance, both in and outside of San Diego.
Thomas McDonnell
THOMAS MCDONNELL (performer) performed with Santa Barbara Dance Theater of UCSB from 2002 to 2010, as well as the Santa Barbara Ballet, and Oakland Ballet companies. Along the way Thomas taught at Cruz Dance and Entertainment, Curtis Studio of Dance, Montecito School of Ballet, Santa Barbara Ballet Center, and the Festival Ballet and Ballet Omaha. His training includes New York University, Tisch School of the Arts, Pennsylvania Academy of Ballet, San Francisco Ballet School and San Francisco Ballet Center with Alonzo King. Thomas approaches movement with a curiosity about the depth of potential that the human body can achieve. In dance he finds the thrill of exploring, discovering new ways to move and to think, and also to approach life. He enjoys using new tools and resources to improve his movement. The spirit animates the body, says Thomas. This is his first season with the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective.
Sarah Navarrete
SARAH NAVARRETE (performer) graduated with a B.A. in Dance with emphasis on Education and Kinesiology from New Mexico State University under the direction of Debra Knapp. Upon graduation she moved to New York City where she danced with acclaimed modern dance companies Yung-Li Dance and 4th Right Dance. Sarah also choreographed for and danced with an Aerial/Modern dance company, Project in Motion, as well as with many independent artists including Joanna Hughes, Adelka Polake and Martha Tournay. Over the past 9 years Sarah has developed her passion for movement education teaching Pilates, Dance and Creative Movement for all ages and physical abilities throughout New Mexico, Texas and NYC. She has taught Pilates and Dance for New Mexico State University and presented for national workshops including the American College Dance Festival, the National Dance Education Organization, and the American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance. Recently her life endeavors lead her to the sunny west coast city of San Diego. Here she continues to grow as a movement educator, choreographer and dancer founding her company, Movement Arts, a fitness/dance initiative aimed to facilitate movement in efforts for all to exist as active, healthy and expressive individuals. She is also excited to work with the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective, move with the artists and dancers in Brown Paper Bag Dance Company and begin choreographing for multiple projects throughout the city. Sarah continues educate and inspire individuals to “move to live and live to move!”
SARAH NORWOOD (performer) is a recent graduate from San Diego State University where she obtained a BFA in Dance. She produced her own thesis performance in May 2012. She has had the pleasure of working with Leslie Seiters, Joe Alter, and Jess Humphrey over the past two years. This is Sarah’s first season performing with the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective.
Natalia Valerdi
NATALIA VALERDI (Associate Artistic Administrator) is a video artist, social media specialist, and creative collaborator with the Patricia Rincon Dance Collective. She is currently developing and implementing PRDC’s social marketing strategy. Valerdi began her work in dance and techonlgy as the Audio-Visual specialist in the Dance Department at the University of Utah and was recently a visiting lecturer at the University of California, San Diego. Her collaborations with Patricia Rincon include The Myth Project V: Cowboys, Peeled and BODYPARTS. Valerdi has also collaborated with choreographers Alicia Rincon and Yolande Snaith. Valerdi received her M.F.A. in Dance and Technology from the University of California, Irvine. She currently co-teaches PRDC’s outreach program at La Jolla Country Day with Patricia Rincon, teaches dance at Southwestern College and works with Collaborations of Teachers and Artists.
FORMER ARTISTS with PRDC
Special thanks to former PRDC artists who have gone on: Sammy Mithchel, now a graduate student at the University of California, San Diego, Justin Viernes new artistic director of Brown Paper Bag Dance Co., Keely Campbell who moved to San Francisco, Sarah Larson who is traveling the world and Paula Zacharias who continues to tour making films and teaching contact improvisation. Good luck to you all!
