Assis Carreiro
Artist Management 
International Arts & 
Cultural Projects

The Press

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Martinez & Co. have something special on their hands. I would put the strengths of these company dancers against any in Chicago, possibly abroad. Martinez also has a knack for drawing in talented choreographers, and this hors d’ oeuvre of repertory work felt more like a main course—delicious! At only five years old, PARA.MAR Dance Theatre has accomplished amazing things, and makes one interested to see what exciting worlds they’ll be exploring next."

​-- Kathy D Hay, 3CR (third coast review)

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"In Chicago-based choreographer Stephanie Martinez’s Something To Remember You By, virtuosity is front and center, playfully pushing the dancers to their edges...Using classical music, Martinez ranges through many emotional temperatures, juxtaposing solo moments and duets with trios, quartets, and ensemble dances, sometimes overlapping several configurations at once. - Alicia Chesser, Newhaven Independent, Sept 2024

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"The choreography by Stephanie Martinez showed the passion of the people of Seville. This production of Carmen is perfect for opera lovers and those who have not have experienced the opera. Carmen is one of the few operas where most of the score is familiar. Carmen is a classic in every sense of the word. Do not be afraid to see it. Carmen will open your senses to the magnificence of opera. Savor every moment."

Tina St Angelo Wetzel, broadway world.com

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"Opening the program was Para.Mar, a Chicago-based contemporary ballet company formed during the pandemic. It performed Dos Lados (Two Sides),

a richly theatrical, erotically charged work by Para.Mar's founder and director, Stephanie Martinez. An especially seductive and acrobatic spirit was displayed by the male dancers."​

Hedy Weis, WTTW Chicago

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"Director Shana Cooper understands that movement and dance have the ability to help an actor express Shakespeare’s poetic and emotional ideas. So, working together with Stephanie Martinez, the production’s Choreographer and Movement Designer, the two have amplified this production with plenty of delightful, contemporary music and dance."

Chicago Theater & Concert Reviews

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"Stephanie Martinez, who made a vigorous whole of the scenery, costumes, music and choreography, respectively."

Chicago Sun Times

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"Cooper also provides a delightful surprise in her soldiers’ dynamic entrances, exits and marching. Cooper enlisted Stephanie Martinez for movement design and choreography. Martinez has the troops levitating above the stage. They kick their feet and pound their chests with rhythmic perfection. It is full-on bad ass!" 

The Fourth Walsh

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"Speaking of: Cooper and movement designer Stephanie Martinez incorporate a whole lot of saucy, whimsically anachronistic dancing into the production, most notably from the half a dozen “soldier lords” who prance in and out of the story with a delightfully insouciant cheekiness."

Chicago Reader

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"Choreographer Stephanie Martinez’s El Maestro pushed PUSH to a joyous ending... True to her subject, Martinez managed to feature every dancer in the cast. Faster and faster, the women in pointe shoes danced as freely as they were barefoot. When our hero is thrilled by a kite, others bring more kites, and the artist is lifted and flown like a kite. “PUSH” couldn’t have come to a happier end." John Schneider, Shepherd Express  

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"Choreographer Stephanie Martinez’s upbeat world premiere El Maestro closed the evening, coming across the footlights as a joyous, sometimes outright playful, rambunctious, stage-filling celebration of Mexican culture." Elaine Schmidt, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel re: Milwaukee Ballet, March 2022

 

A constantly morphing backdrop of warm tones, along with a small adobe-colored building and ladder leaning to its roof set the stage for a kinetic homage to Zapotec painter, sculptor and graphic artist Francisco Toledo.

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"Stephanie Martinez’s piece, Something to Remember You By, was created for and performed by Tulsa Ballet II, and the company’s relative youth worked well with this predominantly exuberant work, from Giulia Canavese’s boisterous opening solo through the swaggering men’s dance, featuring Jonathan Beloli, Fabian Raschitor, Joshua Binowitz, Edward Truelove and Guillermo Dominguez. There was a playful quality to Martinez’s choreography; the way she seemed to cap off each dance with one extra little expressive fillip, as if the joy inherent in these speedy dances, set to Baroque and classical works by Bach, Handel, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Schumann and Tchaikovsky, simply could not be contained.

But what gave the piece its melancholy, its sense of nostalgia, was the duet between Raschitor and Beloli, a pas de deux fraught with tension and tenderness, longing, loss, memory and desire." 

TulsaWorld,com

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" Purple Skin itself is practically flawless... Martinez’ ability to lean into newly found creative energy since the pandemic began has yielded the best work of her career."

Lauren Warnecke, See Chicago Dance

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"Accompanied by Stravinsky’s sparsely appointed Dumbarton Oaks, Martinez tries to excavate the guts of this multi-layered score which was, unlike the other Stravinsky, not originally intended for dancing. Martinez pulls, as per usual, from a grab bag of styles including ballet, jazz and even hip-hop, with some goofier moments giving the sense of a band of bumbling boys bro-ing out on a bright summer day. Not to be forgotten, the cast’s two women hold their own with a cute and sassy duet and extraordinary partnering as the group of men tangle them up and over themselves."

Lauren Warnecke, Chicago Tribune on Bliss!

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"Furthermore, it is significant that Martinez was the choice for this world premiere, not just for joining a very small list of women who’ve made work for the Joffrey. The list of local choreographers is smaller still: By my count, she’s one of three in the last decade..."

Lauren Warnecke, Chicago Tribune.

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"Utterly deserving of the finale, Dos Lados embraces the spectacular mood of the Spanish guitar and brings us the full power of this extraordinary 13-dancer ensemble. Creating literal toe-curling intensity coupled with a coy connection with the audience, this performance was a stunning showcase of sheer talent..."

Christi Geary, Arts Wave Guide.

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"Stephanie Martinez’s In Close Proximity matched classical and street aesthetics, contrasting loose, shrugged shoulders with stylized gestures in individualized break-out solos and duets that were both intense and gentle."

Libby Hanssen, Kansas City Star.

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"Martinez’ choreographic vocabulary was the highlight of Otra Vez – an intoxicating mélange of ballet, partnered dances like Tango and Pasodoble, even a little formal Fosse-inspired jazz."

Heather Desaulniers, Dance Tabs.

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"The women of the company wear long black dresses, a softer, dancier version of Doc Martens, and huge head-pieces of flowers. They move with angular power, all contraction. Feet seem to dig in, legs wide, as if they are birthing the very ground they walk on. The camera dances along, with powerful sweeps that take in the mural and invite us to enter the magical world."  

Camille Bacon-Smith, Broadstreet Review on Her Blood a Wild River