Embrace, Give, Heal

Choreography by V.S. Kemanis with artistic direction and choreographic contribution by Teresa Perez-Ceccon

Dancer-Story Teller V.S. Kemanis

Photographs by Eric Bandieros

Notes from the Dancer

The title, “Embrace, Give, Heal,” outlines the three stages of my caregiving story. At a time when my two children were still in grade school, I was unexpectedly called to fly across country to care for an ailing parent. “Embrace” signifies both the physical embrace of beloved family members and acceptance of the role of sandwich-generation caregiver, in order to move on to the next two stages, “Give” and “Heal.” The act of giving brought emotional healing to our relationship.

As lawyer and fiction writer, I work with oral and written communication, intellectual activities a layer removed from the emotional plane. Writers, I among them, agonize to find the right words to evoke the desired mood or feeling. Dance speaks from the core of the physical and emotional life. For this reason, dance promises to be purer, and maybe an easier, medium for communicating the caregiving experience and to spur discussion and sharing of caregiving stories.

Choreographer-Dancer  V.S. Kemanis is a novelist and attorney for whom dance has been essential from the age of seven. With The Caregivers’ Project, Ms. Kemanis is expressing through dance-story an experience as a sandwich-generation caregiver, responsible for the care of her young children and an ailing parent.

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Corporate Sponsors

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V.S. Kemanis

Big Thanks

Dena Malarek, Jayne Miller, Rhea Greenberg, Kathryn Weill, Lucas Jazz, Kevin Stamey, Rochelle Rice,  Anonymous, John Zeleznik, Sarah Curtis, Jomarie Zeleznik, Carol Dikman, Wendy Stark, Penelope Boehm, Hans Wolf

It's all about relationship