5th Annual Temple of Poi Fire Dancing Expo - Free Performances in Union Square!

What: Temple of Poi 2010 Fire Dancing Expo
Where: Union Square (Geary and Post)
When: April 24, 2010 at 7:50-10:10 pm
Cost: Free!!

Bring a chair and a blanket and join us April 24, 2010 at 7:50 pm for our fifth annual free fire dancing show in San Francisco's legendary Union Square (Geary and Post) for the fourth annual Temple of Poi Fire Dancing Expo.

This year's show is a veritable who's who of internationally renowned fire dancing performers hailing from 3 continents including:

• MCP (Edinburgh, Scotland) - dragon staff solo
• Redox (Temple of Poi) - poi solo
• Aileen Lawlor (Oakland, CA) - wand and contact staff
• Memory Elena & Corey White (Bay Area) - fans
• Alien Jon (Currently residing somewhere on planet Earth) - poi solo
• Dyami & Wryly (Santa Cruz, Ca) - single poi duet
• Bradley Allbee (West Los Angeles, CA) - poi solo
• Sarah Starlight (Temple of Poi) - hoop solo
• Ian Boyd, Anthony 'Broadway' Rutland, Ayala Kalisher, Russ Megowan, Dyami Kaplan
  & Sara Huntley are Kinetica! (Santa Cruz, CA) - fans, staff, double staff
• Corey Just (Oakland, CA) - fan solo
• Erin Shredder of Shredder Hoops (San Francisco, CA) - hoop solo
• Celsius Maximus (Monterey, CA) - fans, swords
• Vin DeLuca & Solenne Alexa (San Francisco, CA) - staff poi duet
• Vatra (San Francisco) - poi solo
• Russ Megowan & Jake Yoshioka are Hybridz R Us (Santa Cruz, CA) - poi duet
• Zan & Aurora Moore of Instruments of the Now (Portland, OR) - poi duet
• GlitterGirl & Kahunahula (San Francisco, CA) - poi hoop duet
• Colleen Sullivan, Krista Borst, Emily Port, Don Keenan & Michael Henninger of Firish (Bay Area, CA) - hoop, fan, staff, poi
• Erik Aylen, Shaina Dyani Johnson, Bridget Harrison, Alysia Hook and Oliver Pavick are Copper Lantern Fire Theater (Oakland, CA) - wand, fan, poi, hoop and staff
• Miss Rosie (San Francisco, CA) - hoop solo
• Rob Horner of PYRODYNAMICS Fire Dance Productions (Cairns, Australia) - 7 staves solo
• Adam Herscheid of Flames Of the Phoenix (Cairns, Australia) - double staff solo

• Adam Herscheid & Rob Horner are Flames of the Phoenix & Pyrodynamics (Cairns, Australia) - double staff duet
• Luis Chavez, Gatamala, Juicy Jess and Luna Del Fuego of Fire Euphoria (Santa Cruz, CA)
• The Amazing Baz & Drex are Ouroboros (Boston & Washington DC) - poi duet
• Mike Icon & Jenni van Tassel of Cirque d'Optique (Philadelphia, PA) - poi hoop fan duet
• Kyle Ford of Pyrotechniq (Iowa City, IA) - umbrella, torches, poi
• Yuta (Tokyo, Japan) - poi solo
• Chryseph of Obsidian Moon (Seattle, WA) - rope dart, staff solo
• Madelaine "Wolf" Bukiet & Lauren "Madamn Burnz" Picheney of Las Piratas Del Fuego (Brooklyn, New York) - contact
• D. "Mac" Kaul, Dave "O.D."  Kaul, Dave King (founder of Controlled Burn), Carlyn "Wrangler" Perona, Angel "Fire Angel" Schultz, Barbara "Dr. Soos" Slaughter, Brenda Ashworth, Evonne "Shelly" George, Katrina "Glitter Bee" Whitten, Kelin Whitten, Kurt "Titwi" George,  Mark "Lucky" Ashworth, Roger "Rogeman" Stimson, Sage "Safire" Ashworth, Shane "Saul Goode" Peterson, Tom "Moon Penguin" Fougner & Bill "Dammit Bill" Schultz from Controlled Burn (Reno, NV) - poi, fan, staff
• Banyan (Chicago, IL) - s staves
• Jaden Rose of Solar Flare (San Francisco, CA) - double hoop
• Black or White (Temple of Poi) - 6 person poi choreography

The 2010 Expo also marks the 5th Anniversary of Temple of Poi Fire Dancing Expo and this show is once again on the City of San Francisco and Union Square's Jewels in the Square Program. Jeweles in the Square is an ongoing series of culturally significant presentations made in San Francisco's Union Square in an effort to make diverse entertainment available to the public for free.

The creation of this event – selected in 2010 for the 4th consecutive year as one of Bay Area Dance week’s Cornerstone events – is a tremendous leap in the efforts to legitimize fire dancing as an art form by taking it out of parking lots and putting it on landmark stages like Union Square. The Expo celebrates safe, legally permitted, public fire dancing performance in honor of National Dance Week, an annual 10-day week of free public dance events in the Bay Area designed to showcase the dynamic diversity and critically acclaimed quality of Bay Area dance.

Temple of Poi supports this vision by creating an unprecedented opportunity to celebrate fire dancing at no cost to the artists or audience. This event is a not for profit event created with the intention of:

• offering more performance opportunities for fire dancers
• giving novice artists who might otherwise not have an opportunity to perform in a public setting an opportunity where they can invite friends and family to see them express their art
• increased exposure to the flow fire art forms by creating a legally permitted public event at a San Francisco landmark location
• raise the awareness of fire dancing as a prestigious dance form by holding this event on the opening night of National Dance Week

This $5000 event is being financed by Isa "GlitterGirl" Isaacs, Temple of Poi and Union Square Park and San Francisco and you!

Due to the economic challenges of the current economy, we are requesting fiscal support in funding this event. If you're moved by our cause to legitimize flow and fire arts, use the Chip-In link on this page to help defray the costs of the event which include fire permits (almost $800 for the fire permit) travel stipends for out of state artists ($1000), programs, marketing and more.