Stay updated!
Launched during the start of 2020, Soup of Grace is a collaboration between renowned choreographers and teachers Herbert Alvarez and Ma. Elena Laniog- Alvarez. The two minds hail from Iloilo, Philippines, whose partnership blossomed during their years of working together under the UP Dance Company.
Theirs is a match-made in dance-stage heaven: from dance partners to a married life.
Soup of Grace is their first official project together outside any other institution.
Herbert Alvarez
Husband. Father. Mentor. Choreographer. Director.
Herbert is a master trainer, teacher, and choreographer. He has premiered works for several dance schools and companies in the Philippines. In 2007, he won the 2nd prize for the New Choreographer’s Competition of the Wi-Fi BODY Dance Festival at the Cultural Center of the Philippines. He has premiered works for the TARI International Dance Festival in Kuala Lumpur, the Global Dance Summit in Taipei, and has collaborated with young artists in Indonesia and Taiwan under various choreographic residency programs. He was a visiting artist at various Filipino American Folkloric Groups in the US and Canada and the School for the Arts in Singapore for the yearly post examination Medici program. He led the UP Dance Company through in several dance festivals nationwide and abroad as its Artistic Director since 2008.
Ma. Elena Laniog-Alvarez
Wife. Mother. Mentor. Choreographer. Dancer.
Elena's eventful journey as an artist is realized through affiliation with several dance companies in the Philippines and a number of dance residencies including those in Taiwan and Japan under the auspices of the World Dance Alliance-Asia Pacific, The Japan Foundation- Manila, Dance Box (Kobe), and as a yearly visiting artist at the School of the Arts-Singapore (SOTA). To date, her list of works run amongst UPDCs important repertoire and have premiered in Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Taipei and Kaoshiung in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan and Singapore. She is the recipient of the 2017 Asian Cultural Council grant for an intensive observation of contemporary dance in New York and choreographer in residence at the American Dance Festival.
