A $2 million French-American program to promote contemporary dance was recently announced by Jean-RenØ Gehan, France¡s cultural counselor in New York. The four-year program, known as the France-USA Dance Partnership, will focus on artists and works not yet presented in the partner country. Between 2004 and 2008, five choreographers from each country will be given the opportunity to live and work abroad and meet with their counterparts. This exchange will result in commissions and tours in both the U.S. and France. (New York Times, www.danceusa.org)

Cirque du Soleil will pay $600,000 to end a discrimination case brought by acrobat Matthew Cusick, who the company fired last year because he has HIV. According to Lambda Legal, the national association for the protection of gay civil rights which filed the complaint on Cusick’s behalf, the agreement is the largest public settlement ever for an HIV-discrimination case mediated by the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). Under the settlement agreement, Cirque du Soleil will host annual anti-discrimination training sessions for all of its employees worldwide and will adopt a zero-tolerance policy toward discrimination based on HIV or other disabilities. For two years Cirque du Soleil will also have its records open to the EEOC to ensure that the company remains in compliance with the agreement. Cusick was hired in 2002 to train for the show Mystere. Despite being judged healthy by Cirque’s own doctor, shortly before he was to begin performing Cusick was fired for what the company later claimed were “safety reasons.”(New York Times)

If City Opera does leave its current home at the New York State Theater for ground zero or elsewhere, a new co-tenant will have to be found for New York City Ballet. NYCB ballet master in chief Peter Martins has suggested creating a new modern dance company at Lincoln Center. “It’s the one American art form that is not represented at Lincoln Center,” said Martins, “a company with a mission to present modern dance.” He conceives of a repertory company similar in structure to his own, presenting the works of various modern dance choreographers, such as Merce Cunningham, Martha Graham, Mark Morris, Twyla Tharp, and Paul Taylor. Lincoln Center executives say they are open to the idea but that all considerations must wait for City Opera’s fate to be resolved. But the modern dance world seems unimpressed. Beverly D’Anne, director of the New York State Council on the Arts’s dance program, asked, “Why, when we have so many wonderful companies in New York City already and the creativity is so high, would we want another company to support?” She also said that putting the work of different choreographers on one troupe of dancers did not make sense for modern dance. “The Taylor style is not like the Cunningham style is not like the Trisha Brown style,” she said. “To have dancers encompass all of these, the styles would be in danger of being diluted.” She added that the audience for modern dance is not big enough to fill the 2,700-seat State Theater. But Alvin Ailey executive director Sharon Gersten Luckman said her company would welcome the opportunity to perform beyond its annual five weeks at City Center. “Ailey would like to have a second season at the State Theater,” she said. Paul Taylor also thought replacing City Opera with an existing modern dance company would be more appropriate. “I think they ought to pick the best one,” he said. (New York Times)

Although the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation is still evaluating proposals for the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site, the New York Times has reported that many in the New York dance world favor the Joyce Theater’s proposal to build a 900-seat home for dance over New York City Opera’s proposal to build a 2,200-seat opera house used in part for dance in the off-season. A recent informal survey by Dance/NYC, a service and advocacy organization for professional dancers, found that dance companies favored the Joyce’s proposal over City Opera’s. “To think New York City needs or can fill another 2,200-seat theater is completely unrealistic,” said Dance/NYC director Robert Yesselman. Some suggest that such a theater would hurt the 2,700-seat City Center, which presents dance companies such as Alvin Ailey and Paul Taylor. In addition, in October Jazz at Lincoln Center will open a 1,200-seat theater in the new Time Warner Center on Columbus Circle, where it plans to present dance as well as music. City Opera has proposed an opera house that would present the work of outside dance, theater, and opera companies during the 27 weeks when it is not performing. The company has been in discussion with the American Dance Festival in North Carolina about programming 10 weeks of dance. The real question, some say, is whether such a large theater can be sustained year after year. The LMDC will make its decision by the end of this month or early next. (New York Times)

On May 4 a new set of 37-cent commemorative stamps were issued by the U.S. Post Office honoring four important 20th-century choreographers: Alvin Ailey, George Balanchine, Agnes de Mille, and Martha Graham. The American Choreographers stamps were designed by Ethel Kessler of Bethesda, Md. A first-day-of-issue ceremony was held on May 4 at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark, where the style of each choreographer was illustrated in performances by New York City Ballet, Ailey II, and American Ballet Theatre. (New York Times)

On April 13 Lincoln Center held a press conference to announce the finalized plans for its huge renovation of its 65th Street venues. The project is estimated to cost $325 million; the fundraising campaign, “Bravo Lincoln Center,” was kicked off with the announcement. The project is scheduled to begin construction in 2006 and be completed by 2009. Mayor Michael Bloomberg attended the press conference, saying, “Lincoln Center is a symbol of American creativity and architectural excellenceü. We will turn West 65th Street into a veritable 'Street of the Arts.'” Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio, of Diller Scofidio and Renfro, the design firm leading the transformation, offered their vision of the renovation by way of sketches and animation.

The renovation aims to lighten the dark, uninviting aspect of West 65th Street by Lincoln Center by incorporating elements of transparency and fluidity, covering the outsides of buildings with glass, and increasing public accessibility. The exteriors of the current buildings, including Alice Tully Hall and the Juilliard School, will be expanded and massively renovated. The entrance to the Rose building, the home of School of American Ballet and Juilliard, will be lowered to the ground level from its current location on the second floor, and the entrance to the Lincoln Center Theater, currently located in the garage level, will be transformed into a glassed-in entrance. A low hill with a lawn will be created next to the pool on the North Plaza, next to the Metropolitan Opera House, which will be open to the public; beneath the hill there will be a restaurant with transparent glass walls.