vision:
terradance® will further awareness of the varied ways in which dance connects people and the Earth as a comparative strategy to make sense in an increasingly dynamic world. terradance® also will serve as a model for building communities worldwide that embody the terradance® mission and values.

mission:
terradance® facilitates experiences to relate dance and the Earth using inclusive, interdisciplinary creative practices. terradance® classes, workshops, performances, special events, curriculum design, consultation, research, media, and publications promote self-discovery as well as increase participants’ understanding about the world and its people.

history:
terradance® began in 1987 as a vision by artist educator, Pegge Vissicaro while camping in the Mazatzal Mountains in Central Arizona. She realized that nature was a balancing agent, providing orientation and stability to adapt to change. Another awareness was how the natural environment could become a framework within which to explore and observe relationships between diverse elements, linking unfamiliar ideas and information. The word terra means earth in Latin. The planet Earth or Terra is the habitat that all people share. As a dancer, Vissicaro recognized the importance of movement, symbolic of the life force, and the many functions of dance, which exists in every society around the world and throughout history. On the most basic level, terradance® is dance of the Earth, an inclusive model for acknowledging all dance in any context. In creative and movement practices as well as scholarship, the concept of terradance® has continued to evolve over the past 24 years into a methodology for connecting people to the Earth through preK-20 integrated curricula, movement classes, publications, audiovisual media, and site-specific performances.

director:
Pegge Vissicaro is a dancer, drummer, dance maker, community dance practitioner, ethnologist, scholar, and educator. Originally from Michigan, Vissicaro moved to Arizona in 1982 and joined the School of Dance faculty at Arizona State University where she has been working for nearly 30 years. Some of the experiences that have shaped the development of terradance® include extended camping in Utah’s Canyonlands wilderness and throughout the Southwest United States, attending Hopi, Zuni, and Yaqui dance events with Dr. Joann Keali’inohomoku, Executive Director of Cross-Cultural Dance Resources, participating in the Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Carnaval, learning from master drummer/dancer C.K. Ganyo, former director of the Ghanaian National Folkloric Company, dancing with artist Mel Wong in the Arizona Petrified Forest, performing at the North Carolina Zoological Park, teaching movement classes on Camelback Mountain in Phoenix, celebrating the summer solstice at Stonehenge, England, and studying with Anna Halprin in Northern California. Vissicaro facilitates terradance® classes, workshops, and performances in any context for people of all ages, backgrounds, and skill levels.