About Dana M. Luebke
Dana has danced professionally since he was 10 years old and performed and taught in 25 countries. Well versed in ballet and modern dance, he began his career with the Minnesota Dance Theatre in Minneapolis, he danced in New York City with Sara Sugihara and the Family, then in Canada and the United States with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet and the Washington Ballet.
In 1977, Dana and Actor/Director Robert founded Sun.Ergos, A Company of Theatre and Dance. Dana has danced, acted, and choreographed over 60 productions, performing across Canada, the United States and in 23 other countries. He has written and created some 10 shows which have had world premieres at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, the Swansea Festival Fringe and the Međunarodni Djecji Festival Šibenik, Croatia, winning awards in USA, Canada, England, Croatia, Poland and Iran. In 2004, he received the highest cultural honour given by Croatia, the REDOM DANICA HRVATSKE S LIKOM MARKA MARULICA, from the President of Croatia.
Dana studied dance in the United States, Italy, France, England and at the Banff School of Fine Arts in Canada and taught both adults and children at the community, college and university levels. The recipient of two Gulbenkian Fellowships in Dance, he studied at the Laban Centre in London and the International Course for Professional Choreographers and Composers in Surrey. He worked with Murray Louis, Nina Weiner and Glen Tetley in choreography and Gisela Reber in folk-dance.
Dana has taught workshops and worked as an Artist in Residence with Sun.Ergos in Canada and 13 other countries and has developed work exploring the relationship between words, images and movement to create choral/movement pieces from poetry. His focus has been to help children develop physical dance/movement literacy and now includes the Motif Notation and the Language of Dance and Curriculum In Motion frameworks.
Always fascinated by the connection between the brain and the body, Dana was introduced to Brain Gym® in 1989, and drawn in by the power of movement and simple, elegant balancing processes to transform the way we function in the world. He won an award for Outstanding Service to the Educational Kinesiology Foundation for overseeing the translation of Brain Gym® into Croatian and bringing the work to Croatia during its war for independence.
Dana first studied Movement Exploration with Carol Ann Erickson in 1999. He was excited to discover that the developmental movement patterns on which it is based were a common foundation and link between dance and Educational Kinesiology, changing his practice as a dancer and the way he taught both dance and Brain Gym®.
Dana is fascinated by the evolutionary patterns and life metaphors embodied in developmental movements. His passion is bringing movement literacy to people of all ages, integrating his experience as a dancer and choreographer with his training in Movement Exploration, Educational and Developmental Kinesiology, Rhythmic Movement Training, and Reflex Integration.
Beginning in 2001, Dana taught workshops at pre-schools. He developed a workshop to train early childhood educators in the work called Joy of Movement.
Concerned by the way declining balance, coordination and mobility was affecting the quality of life of elderly friends, Dana created a program called Brain Body Fitness to assist people in improving awareness, balance, coordination, and regain ease and joy in moving.
Dana is a licensed Brain Gym® and Movement Exploration Instructor/Consultant. His training in Educational Kinesthetics and Movement Literacy includes:
- Edu-K in Depth
- Vision Circles
- Creative Vision
- Dominance Profiles
- Optimal Brain Organization
- Total-Core Re-patterning
- Movement Exploration Levels 1-4
- Integration of Birth and Change
- Integrations of Dynamic and Postural Reflexes
- Rhythmic Movement Training: Levels 1-3
- Fear Paralysis Reflex, Facial Reflexes/Language and Bonding
- Language of Dance Foundations, Parts 1 and 2
- Elementary Labanotation
