Still Moving

October 4th at the Tomorrow Theater @ 4:00PM | Run Time: 39 mins + 20 min Panel

 

We’re all aging. Along the way, we encounter ourselves anew and inhabit the vulnerabilities and freedoms of change. Over the past ten years, we’ve had the privilege of watching so many filmmakers and dancers in our community grow and evolve, including local artists Suzanne Chi, Carla Mann, and Robert Uehlin.
As we reflect on a decade of PDFF, it felt especially meaningful to share their documentary, Still Moving: Dancing Across A Lifetime. The film invites us to think about what it means to keep moving, creating, and dancing as our bodies and lives change. The 40-minute film will be followed by a 20-minute panel discussion—Dancing 40 and Beyond—moderated by Still Moving directors Suzanne Chi and Carla Mann. Please join us!
Get Tickets to Still Moving

When Suzanne Chi turned 40 during the pandemic, she was forced to confront the question all professional dancers eventually face: should I be done dancing?

This documentary follows Suzanne and her castmates—five dancers aged 42-65 — as they rehearse and perform a new evening-length choreography. In navigating the challenges of aging in an industry that valorizes youth, these dancers offer their own perspectives on how and why they are still moving.

Oregon Artist

Filmmakers: Suzanne Chi @ch.ch.chia8, Carla Mann @cjmmann, Robert Uehlin
Dancers: Suzanne Chi, Margretta Hansen @margretta_dances, Carla Mann, Claire Olberding @Claire.olberding, Andrea Parson @andreaparson0311, Kemba Shannon @kembashannon
Featuring: Katharine Sammons, Rachel Slater, Natalie Becker, Maeve Ethridge, Ellie Toop, Samantha Cruz, Amanda Mailen, Dinah Gardueu, Adrian Davy, Jessica Post, Anna Sass, Franco Nieto, Omar Vargas-Nino, Britta Paulin, Kiri Maasen

“On the Velvet Grass”
Choreographer: Andrea Parson Composer: Jana Crenshaw
Costumer: Fuschia Lin
Lighting Designer: Jeff Forbes

Director Biography – Suzanne Chi, Carla Mann, Robert Uehlin

Suzanne Chi is a dancer, producer and curator living in Portland, OR. Performing has taken her around the United States, and to Bulgaria and Germany. She has had the pleasure of working with many Portland based artists and choreographers, and co-directs Muddy Feet Dance with Rachel Slater. Together, Muddy Feet’s award winning dance films have been screened all across the world.

Dancer, choreographer, filmmaker and teacher Carla Mann creates performances and participatory events for stage, alternative sites, installation, and film. Presented across the U.S. and in China, Israel, and the Czech Republic, her choreographic works include multiple commissions for the Northwest Dance Project, and Heidi Duckler Dance Theatre/NW among others, and her 2022 dance film “Suddenly, the sky . . . ” has been screened internationally. Carla serves as the Judy Massee Professor of Dance at Reed College. Together with Suzanne Chi, she co-directs Still/Moving, a project to engage issues of aging in dance through performance and film. Her work is profiled in Emily Wiederholt and Gregory Bartning’s book, Beauty is Experience: Dancing 50 and Beyond.

Robert Uehlin is a filmmaker based in Portland, Oregon specializing in the translation of contemporary choreography into the language of film. His work has been screened at the American Dance Festival, The Utah International Screendance Festival, The Sans Souci Festival of Dance Cinema, and across the United States. In 2018, he was selected to receive the inaugural Oregon Dance Film Commission and, the following year, he was named the Hinge Alumni Artist in Residence in West-Central, Minnesota. He has adjudicated for the Portland Dance Film Festival and he is the resident curator of the annual DanceBARN Screendance Festival.

 

DANCING 40 AND BEYOND PANELISTS

Erin Boberg Doughton

Erin is an artist, educator and Artistic Director & Curator of Performance at PICA (Portland Institute for Contemporary Art,) where she curates and produces performance as part of PICA’s TBA Festival as well as year-round presentations, commissions and residencies. She holds an MFA from Pacific NW College of Art, Willamette University, and a BA in Theatre from Lewis & Clark College. 

Tiffany Mills

Tiffany Mills is the artistic director, choreographer, and founder of the NYC-based Tiffany Mills Company, founded in 2000. Joining Lewis & Clark College as the Director of Dance in 2024, Mills returns to her Oregon roots and embraces a bi-costal presence. As a creator of dance-theater, Mills’ work centers on human relationships, is grounded in partnering/improvisation, and is fueled by collaboration across mediums. She collaborates with artists from various disciplines and backgrounds to viscerally, aesthetically, and intellectually stimulate a wide-ranging audience. Her company’s recent works have been presented at: National Sawdust, LaMaMa, The Flea, and BAM Fisher.

Mills has taught extensively at universities and festivals nationally and internationally. She has been an ACDA adjudicator six times. Her company conducts partnering and improvisation intensives and pop-up workshops. Mills’ recent endeavor is filmmaking. Her first dance film, “Not then, not yet (in situ)”, was selected for screenings in the USA, Turkey, India, Italy, and France. Her second film, “Murmuration”, premiered at the Asia Pacific Dance Festival.