“As the saying goes, all you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people,” noted DAC Artistic Director Jamie Hook. “The same goes for an arts center, and we’re thrilled to be able to provide that room for Hio Ridge Dance.”

The collaboration has thus far borne further fruit, as the DAC has secured the support of the Maine Arts Commission and the Maine Humanities Council, to extend a commission to Hio Ridge Dance for a full-length work about the town itself. Comprising film, performance, historical research, and dance, “Placeholders,” as the piece is called, will premiere in late August at the DAC, before embarking on a tour of the state.

The work of creating “Placeholders” is already well under way, with the dancers active at the DAC throughout the week. The project will receive a significant boost when Hio Ridge Dance hosts a generative dance workshop for kids, starting July 7. Exploring through doing, this workshop will expose kids ages 10-17 to the introductory mechanics of dance while simultaneously creating an original dance film, which will then become an element of “Placeholders.”

“As we began brainstorming how a dance might represent Denmark … we looked to find commonalities between towns and dances,” noted Harrist. “Time is the first and clearest we’ve found: towns and dances offer experiences of time. Dances, on the one hand, present information quickly — movements flying out, audience members grasping at flickers of thoughts, opinions, ideas and identities. A town, however, reveals itself to the audience of neighbors and visitors on a slow and tender learning curve.”

While performing forays into Boston, New York, and the Maine coast have punctuated time spent deep in the woods on the slopes of Pleasant Mountain, Hio Ridge Dance insists that it is their residency in Denmark that provides the bulk of the creative space and fuel for their aesthetic exploration. “The lakes region has been our summer home for most of our lives which always brought clarity, curiosity, and joy,” noted Harrist. “So it only makes sense that we want to launch our creative careers here. ”

“Basing ourselves in Denmark has been remarkably fruitful,” McDonough said. “The community has been unbelievably supportive, with things like free rehearsal space (pretty much unheard of in major cities). We’ve worked for local schools, including Fryeburg Academy; performed at several local arts and community centers, including Nurture through Nature; and even take local yoga and Zumba classes for ridiculously low prices!”

For more information, visit www.hioridgedance.com and ww.denmarkarts.org.