Janiya Miller has received one of two scholarships and will study dance for three weeks this summer at the American Dance Festival, held on the campus of Duke University in Durham. She has been dancing since the age of 4 at L’ Academie De Danse under the direction of Nora Parker.
The American Dance Festival, formerly known as The Bennington School of Dance, began in 1934 in Bennington, Vermont. At the time, four of its leaders — Martha Graham, Hanya Holm, Doris Humphrey and Charles Weidman — were known only to a small number of devoted and partisan modern dance fans. Their art was in its infancy. Money was scarce; there was no government and little private support.
Regardless, Bennington College became the laboratory in which four of the five great modern dance second-generation pioneers — Helen Tamiris being the fifth — could experiment, train students and create the early works that made modern dance one of the cultural triumphs of the 20th century.
The festival, directed by Martha Hill and Mary Josephine Shelly, remained in Bennington until 1942, and saw new homes in California and Connecticut before landing in Durham.
Today the ADF has grown to more than 400 students from all over the world and a faculty of 50. The curriculum has expanded to include classes in dance medicine and the body therapies, as well as repertory, composition and all the major dance techniques. There also are professional workshops offered in teaching and performance, plus a special program for younger dance students. In 1996, ADF expanded its programs to include a series of classes and choreographic workshops in New York City.
Miller, a Kinston High School ninth-grader, is the daughter of Perry Miller and the granddaughter of Perry L. Miller.