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In Memoriam
Mel Wong
By Scott Rappaport
Renowned choreographer, dancer, and visual artist Mel Wong died
of a heart attack on Thursday, July 17, in Santa Cruz. He was
64. Wong established an international reputation, first as a
performer with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, and then
as a choreographer, teacher, and performer with the Mel Wong
Dance Company. He had been a professor of dance in the Theater
Arts Department at UC Santa Cruz since 1989.
Wong's paintings and sculpture have been exhibited in galleries
and museums throughout the country. His dance background included
professional training in ballet and modern dance in California
and New York. He received a Ford Foundation Scholarship to Balanchine's
School of American Ballet in 1964 and 1965, and toured internationally
with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (1968-72). He choreographed
and performed his own work since 1970, and formed the Mel Wong
Dance Company in 1975.
Wong's company performed throughout the United States and in
most of the major dance festivals in New York City, as well
as at the Asian Arts Festival in Hong Kong (1983) and in Japan.
He choreographed more than 180 dances, and his works can be
seen in the repertoires of companies in Canada, the United States,
Hong Kong, Japan, and Europe.
In 1983-84, Wong became the first Chinese-American to receive
a Guggenheim Fellowship in choreography. He also received grants
and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the
New York State Council on the Arts, the Foundation for Contemporary
Performing Arts, the Cultural Council of Santa Cruz County,
and the Ford Foundation.
Wong's educational background includes a B.A. from San Francisco
State University and graduate work at the University of California,
Los Angeles, and at Mills College, where he received an M.F.A.
in visual arts, as well as the Catherine Morgan Trefethen Fellowship
in Art.
Wong is survived by his wife, UCSC lecturer in dance Constance
Kreemer, and daughters Anika, Kira, and Suzanna Kreemer Wong,
all of Santa Cruz; his mother, Louise Wong of Alameda; his brother,
Maurice Wong of Oakland, and two nieces and two nephews.
A public celebration of Mel Wong's life in Santa Cruz-including
music and dance-will be held in September on a date to be determined.
In lieu of flowers, tax-deductible contributions toward a college
fund for his children can be made to the Mel Wong Dance Foundation,
Inc., 201 Dickens Way, Santa Cruz, CA 95064.
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Mel Wong was a choreographer/visual
artist who was uniquely involved in exploring the relationship
between visual arts and dance in the environment. Concerned
with the interaction between the two, he combined elements of
both in his mixed-media choreographic works.
His educational background included undergraduate work at San
Francisco State University and graduate work at the University
of California, Los Angeles and at Mills College, where he received
an MFA in the Visual Arts and the Catherine Morgan Trefethen
Fellowship in Art.
In 1983-84, he became the first Chinese-American to receive
a Guggenheim Fellowship in choreography. He also received grants
and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts (Choreography,
Dance Company, and Inter-Arts), the New York State Council on
the Arts (Visual and Dance), Foundation for Contemporary Performing
Arts, Inc., the Cultural Council
of Santa Cruz, and the Ford Foundation.
Mel established an international reputation, first as a performer
with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, and secondly as a choreographer,
teacher, and performer with the Mel Wong Dance Company.
For the past several years, Mel toured his solo
work, Growing Up Asian-American in the '50's, in
Hong Kong, Boston, Hawaii, Colorado, San Francisco, Oklahoma,
Wisconsin and Connecticut.
His paintings and sculpture have been exhibited in galleries
and museums throughout the nation. His dance background included
professional training in ballet and modern dance in California
and New York. He received a Ford Foundation Scholarship to Balanchine's
School of American Ballet in 1964 and 1965, and toured internationally
with the Merce Cunningham Dance Company (1968-72). He had been
choreographing and performing his own work since 1970, and formed
the Mel Wong Dance Company in 1975. Since then he choreographed
over one hundred dances.
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