About
Angelina Lin Hannum, Ensemble Director at Ballet Rincon Academy of Dance, received her MFA in dance choreography at the School of Dance at The University of Arizona. During her tenure at Ballet Rincon Academy of Dance, she has created multiple original works for the Ballet Rincon Performance Ensemble that have premiered at the Tucson Museum of Art and Centennial Hall. She is the primary architect for Art in the Park, a city-wide multidisciplinary youth-based arts festival. Angelina has also re-staged several significant classical ballets, including Les Sylphides, Coppelia, and Swan Lake. When she is not in the dance studio, she runs Neuma Movement Studio, a boutique GYROTONIC® and Pilates practice, has fun with her family, and revels in making all things creative and beautiful.
Angelina received her training in the ballet department at the Beijing Dance Academy; the Alvin Ailey American Dance Center; and the Académie de Danse Princesse Grace in Monte Carlo, Monaco under Russian ballet pedagogue Marika Besobrasova. As an international performer, she has appeared throughout the U.S. as well as, in Monaco, Jerusalem, and throughout greater China.
As a performer, she has worked with Ballet Magnificat!, Hosanna Sacred Arts, Jose Mateo’s Ballet Theatre, the Mussorgsky Ballet in St. Petersburg, Russia; the Jerusalem Dance Theatre, in Israel; and the Beijing Dance Theatre, in China. Locally in Tucson, Angelina has appeared with the UA Dance Ensemble, Art.if.act Dance Project, Arizona Ballet Theatre, Hawkins Dance, as well as various independent projects.
Angelina’s choreography has been showcased in Boston, New York City, Jerusalem, Beijing, and Shanghai. In 2009, she was invited by director Alison Friedman of Ping Pong Productions in collaboration with Beijing’s Xinya Kongqi Chamber Orchestra to choreograph Igor Stravinsky’s The Soldier’s Tale, which premiered in Shanghai’s historic Lyceum Theatre. An excerpt from this production was selected to be a part of the 5th Guangdong Modern Dance Festival’s Youth Dance Marathon Showcase. In Beijing, she initiated the ILLUME明 (pronounced Illuming) monthly performance series at the Penghao Theatre that brought artists from various disciplines together to experiment and inspire audiences to embrace individual creativity. She also served as rehearsal director/ballet mistress for the Beijing Dance Theatre’s premier international collaborative showcase Prism, which featured the choreography of Pontus Lidberg (Sweden), Louise Midjord (Denmark), and Nadine Thouin (Canada).
In addition to her dance career, Angelina graduated with honors from Boston University, specializing in International Relations and Russian Studies. Her academic interests led her to an eight-month stint in Jerusalem, Israel, where she was staff writer at the ICEJ, and her writings on the interplay between faith and politics were featured in the Jerusalem Post: Christian Edition. The combination of Angelina’s artistic pursuits, international exposure, and academic interests has convinced her that art can cross all boundaries. In putting this to practice, Angelina used the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympic Games as a backdrop to organize humanitarian tours for several dance companies from the US and Australia. Dancers came to Beijing, China and worked with local aid organizations to teach workshops and give performances for orphans, children of migrant workers, and victims of human trafficking and abuse. The same summer she was also crucial in bringing to China LA-based Urban Poets, and their sold out debut performance at Beijing’s Yu Gong Yi Shan Club.
Angelina is a certified pre-trainer in the GYROTONIC EXPANSION SYSTEM®. She holds additional certifications in GYROKINESIS®, Pilates, and is an ABT® Certified Teacher, who has successfully completed the ABT® Teacher Training Intensive in Pre-Primary through Level 3 of the ABT® National Training Curriculum. She is the founder and principal of Neuma Movement Studio.
Artist Statement
I cannot recall the moment that I was called to movement. I only remember the abounding joy and freedom that filled my being when I discovered that in stretching my arms to the sky, I became the warm glow coming from the rays of the sun. In movement, there was power in knowing I could still believe that stars are not just combusting balls of gas burning billions of miles away, but that they could be ephemeral flashes of magic suspended in the thickness of negative space. In these kinds of moments I realized that I would never have words enough to express the profound beauty of existence. But through movement I might have a chance.
Dance is a studied practice of movement, and movement is the manifestation of life. As an artist, through dance I endeavor to share a human experience. My inspirations stem from life experiences that are unquantifiable and indescribable, but trigger profound visceral responses. My efforts to sculpt, shape, refine, and polish these responses so that they are approachable to another person summarize my process and artistic journey. Ultimately, my progress towards an end product is motivated by my belief that we are all capable of empathy; and though an audience may not understand, they will consider what I have to offer.
Teaching Philiosophy
In this day and age of uniformity and automation, my first priority in teaching is to affirm and empower my students as individuals. A human is not a machine. We are more like gardens, and we need tending. My teaching practice is based on my belief that we all need to learn how to tend ourselves. For myself, the art of dance is my life’s pursuit, and one that encompasses the physical and metaphysical—including the emotional, psychological, and spiritual. It allows me to be completely vulnerable, honest, and genuine towards myself as well as my surrounding environment. In my experience, the beauty of dance exists between the dancer’s constant endeavor to obtain perfection, and failure, which manifests him/herself as human. Maturity through consistent practice is the process by which the dancer closes the gap between these two.
As a dance educator, I encourage this process by creating a safe, friendly, learner-centered, and judgment-free space. I center on imparting my experience and knowledge in order to physically equip and intellectually inform dancers. I strive to motivate and inspire their individual journeys to artistic self-discovery and autonomy. This stems from my belief in the importance of a dancer’s awareness of his/her physical body. This is accomplished through the pursuit of healthy movement practices and diligence towards executing movements with clear intention, purity, and integrity. This provides the most versatile foundation for a dance artist. It is achievable by all aspiring dance students, and each dancer’s path is highly individualized.