Latest – Asia Pacific Dance Festival

From the APDF Team: “The Positive Impact of Performing Arts As An Interdisciplinary Experience”

September 2, 2025September 2, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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Three University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa students reflect on their roles on the 2025 APDF team, and the impact of the festival overall. Featuring photos of the conference, intensive, and concerts, as well as testimonials from participants. These students were supported by the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP). Read about…

Honolulu Star-Advertiser: Asia Pacific Dance Festival continues at UH Manoa

June 20, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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From Nina Wu at Honolulu Star-Advertiser: "'By bringing together these three different resident artists, we’re able to create this amazing exchange of storytelling and co-learning,' [associate director SheenRu] Yong said. 'Artists all take each other’s classes, as well, so the artists are in classes with the students. So it’s this…

HI Now: A dance festival at the University of Hawaii at Manoa showcases classes, workshops and performances

May 19, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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Hear from APDF's SheenRu Yong and Michelle Huynh, as well as the artists of Hālau Kilipohe Nā Lei Lehua, on Hawaiʻi News Now. "The dancers say performing is a lot of fun, and learning the dances connects them to their culture, their relatives who have passed, and the generations of…

Kathak: the Churning of Tradition and Creative Resurgence

May 14, 2025May 14, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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by Teri Skillman कथा कहे सो कत्थक ।He who tells a story is a Kathak. मंथन Manthan (churning)Hulihia (overturning; change) The Sanskrit word मंथन/manthan, to churn, is parallel in meaning to the Hawaiian word hulihia, to overturn. Both terms convey the concept of cataclysmic change, overturning of order, and upheaval. In Hawaiʻi upheaval was foretold in…

Hawai‘i Public Radio: ‘The show must go on’

May 13, 2025May 13, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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On the loss of a $25,000 grant from the NEA for this year's festival: “We are definitely prioritizing paying our artists. They have to get paid. We’ve already signed contracts with them, so if anything, we’ll eat the cost and go into the red ourselves, or have to pull from…

“We’re not canceling—we’re coming together”

May 12, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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The 2025 Asia Pacific Dance Festival (APDF) is moving ahead—despite a last-minute loss of major funding. Just two weeks before its May 19 return to the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, the National Endowment for the Arts withdrew its $25,000 grant to support the festival’s programming. “While this loss poses…

Honolulu Star-Advertiser: Festival returns with award-winning halau

May 8, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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From APDF 25 resident artistic director Kumu Vicky Holt Takamine:“I think that’s what is so important about hula, is that it encompasses so much. The protection and the love for our aina. Aloha aina is embedded in all of the mele, all of the songs and the chants, so when…

The Capacity of Dance across Oceania: Expressive Movements for Social Action

May 1, 2025May 2, 2025 by oc-asiapacdance

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by Brian Diettrich In November 2024 New Zealand representative Hana-Rāwhiti Maipi-Clarke rose in parliament to haka (perform a posture dance) in protest to the contentious Treaty Principles Bill being pushed forward by the country’s conservative coalition government. Joined by members of Te Pāti Māori (The Māori Party) and others, and with expressive and…