Dance Venia is in its fifth year since being formed as a new CCA in 2005. Venia is a Latin word meaning ‘In God’s Grace’. We grew from a mere 20 dancers to our current strength of 48. Unlike other dance groups, we do not specialize in any one form of dance genre. To date, we have tried Hip Hop, Jazz, Contemporary, Modern, Cha-Cha, Jive, Samba, Salsa, Ballet and even Water Ballet.
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2005-2009
In our first year (2006), we performed for the former Minister of Education Tharman Shanmugaratnam, for the Cluster Arts Awareness Day in Crescent Girls’ School. We also performed an original medley piece choreographed by the students themselves to show our appreciation for all our mentors for the Teachers’ Day Concert.
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In our second year (2007), we did 2 performances for school events; a Latin Cha-Cha number for the Chinese New Year Concert and a Jazz piece for the Dr Li Lee Eng Speaker of the Year Award. We also took part in 2 competitions for the very first time; Dance Xplosion 2, where we were finalists, and the Merlion International Dancesport Competition, where our pioneer Latin Ballroom competitive team made their debut in the international scene and gained invaluable experience in terms of paving the way to carving a niche for themselves in future local and international scenes.
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In 2008, we switched our focus fully on the production for our FOA, which is our very own adaptation of the film, Step Up, borrowing elements from other critical works of literature such as Romeo and Juliet. It was the first time we attempted such a massive production, with our dancers doing up to 5 choreographies in the various scenes to exhibit our diversity, flexibility, passion and talent in art of dance. As a closing performance for the year, we performed an encore item as well as an original hip-hop/old school dance item for Teacher’s Day.
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Last year (2009), the club embarked on it inaugural journey in participating the the Singapore Youth Festival (SYF). Under the guidance of our choreographer, Mr. Dan Kwok, and our dance instructor, Ms. Jennifer Pau, we strived to master the choreography and to perform our best public performance yet at UCC, earning the highest honour possible in the SYF competition, Gold with Honours, despite many initial difficulties ranging from the dancers lack of extensive dance background to general miscommunications. On 7th August, we concluded the performance of our milestone Festival of Arts night to a sell-out crowd. This FOA marks several firsts for this budding club: the first time we were given our dedicated night (with a special performance by the Chinese Performing Arts Club); the longest show the club has ever put up (a staggering 10 items, plus 2 guest items, over a high octane 1.5+ hour performance); the first time a full length student choreo was put up. Not resting on our laurels, we strive to always perform to our very best and put up an invigorating item for Teachers’ Day celebration, which marked the closure of our performing year of 2009.
2010
This year 2010 started with an auspicious first prize win for our dancers in the national DanceWorks competition taking place on 17 April. Illustrating the competition’s anti-drug theme, the performance was a spectacular effort which received overwhelming great comments from the judges and rose above other excellent performances from Raffles Junior College, Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts, etc. as the deserving champion of Category 3.
We strove on for the remaining of the year to complete the production of our second full-length FOA themed Dreams = Hope + ?. Truly faithful to the theme, our dancers themselves overcame many obstacles ranging from unfortunate injuries to skin-tight schedules with remarkable passion and perseverance, to once again perform to a packed, roaring audience on the night of 7th August. Featuring 10 items of both youthful virility and sincere poignancy, the show took the audience onto a flight of self-realization, aspiration, and everlasting friendship – core values treasured and advocated by all our members.
We carried on the vibe unabated and jostled through heaps of schoolwork, to deliver our final performance of 2010 for Teachers’ Day – an exotic, celebratory fusion of Bollywood and Latino grooves. Blessings from God are indeed so abundant that we truly wish to continue relying on His strength and love in our upcoming rigorous preparation for Singapore Youth Festivals 2011.
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