Stefanie Slade
Stef was a born artist. It was the way she perceived and conducted herself in this world. A dance major at the U of U, she was a choreographer, painter, and a painter with light– that is, a lighting designer. She collaborated with SB Dance for over a dozen years, both on lighting and many other elements of the performance. Tragically dying young, Stef’s imprint remains in everything we do.
Carolyn “Winnie” Wood
Winnie is so many things– actor, director, choreographer, painter, costume designer, writer– that it’s hard to even begin to describe her. For SB Dance, she is mainly our “fixer”, a mentor-guide who helps deliver a work-in-progress to the finish line. That job often means saying the tough truths that no one wants to hear, like “it’s not working”. She has stopped our heart more than once. Then she makes it beat much much stronger. The company’s work will always be indelibly marked by Winnie’s sensibility.
ABOUT SB DANCE
SB Dance was a Rose Wagner resident organization organization from 1998 to 2022, when the company’s focus turned toward outdoor performance through its Curbside Theater program. For a dozen years, SB Dance director Stephen Brown presided over the nonprofit coalition representing all of the Rose residents (Performing Arts Coalition or PAC). SB Dance is still a PAC member.
SB Dance’s primary mission is innovation, and the Rose was the laboratory where we rigged new devices, reconfigured performance spaces, and experimented widely. We were the second group to perform in the building, back when only the Blackbox side existed. We pushed a lot of buttons here, making the landlord (Salt Lake County) sweat bullets with nudity, profanity, and after-parties. No wonder they stripped the joint of any mention of us after we skedaddled. Our feelings about the Rose are summed up in this ode, written before this performance called “Birthday Suit(e)” celebrating the space’s 25th anniversary in 2022:
Rose, you are red
Was it something I said? Or something that we did together?
Was it perchance
The birthday suit dance? Or the one with whips und zee leather?
But Rose what is the point
Of seats in this joint except for things that provoke later?
So please acquiesce o another hot mess
For a mistress whose name is theater.
Please read more about SB Dance here.
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