Richard Garlick, Canadian Dance News 1980
Stephanie Ballard's unique and intense PRAIRIE SONG, a dance essay on isolation and loneliness.... danced meticulously by three women and two men. I strongly believe that this moody surreal study of detachment and relationships is an important work.Norma McLain Stoop, Dance Magazine, New York 1981
TIME OUT ...... inspired by the madcap relationship between Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald but it is set in a stark environment consisting of pools of light and the wonderfully dreamlike music of Laraaji. The duet is one of avoidance in which the dancers seem to just miss connecting in almost everything they do. The dance has some powerful moments suggesting self absorption and entrapment and is exceptionally performed by Stephanie Ballard and Tedd Robinson.Stephen Godfrey, The Globe and Mail, Toronto 1982
A more recent work, LITHIUM FOR MEDIA, performed by the dynamic Margie Gillis, uses Gillis's rawness to its best advantage. The movement and expression in this work are well worth watching. Ballard and Gillis form a dynamic team and Ballard is at her creative peak.Sandra Sobko The Winnipeg Free Press May 27, 1986
Spending an evening with Stephanie Ballard and Dancers at Winnipeg's Gas Station Theatre last week meant sharing your seat with isolation, madness and death. But for all its grim themes, Miss Ballard's work is neither morbid nor black. It is a haunting display of movement and form that is wonderful and exhilarating in spite of, or perhaps because of its subject.Sue Matheson Western Report June 9, 1986
"ANNA: an Evening with Stephanie Ballard and Patrick Friesen" joined by Guest Artist Margie Gillis, Ruth Cansfield, Annebruce Falconer, Odette Heyn-Penner, Gaile Petursson-Hiley and Faye Thomson. Choreographer Stephanie Ballard has worked with Patrick Friesen to arrive at an intelligent solution to the problem of uniting two different modes of expression. The result is an intriguing presentation which uses Friesen's poem cycle, "the spirit and the flesh," as a basis for examining the role of woman as muse and artist. This cooperative project was workshopped before an enthusiastic audience.Carol Budnick June 1987
The latest work by Winnipeg based choreographer Stephanie Ballard is a tender, sensual offering from an earth goddess, and the audience acknowledged the gift with shouts of approval Friday night at the Gas Station Theatre. CONTINUUM, promised to explore the journey of women towards equality, but far from being rhetorical, the collection of dances swept the audience into deep waters of feminine mysticism. The reverent, synchronized movement in the finale summed up the power of Continuum.Mary Jane MacLennan The Winnipeg Free Press May 13, 1990
Stephanie Ballard - like Gillis is based in Canada - has brought out another side of this remarkable performer. In MARA , set to the music of Saint-Saens, and lit by Nicholas Cernovitch with a wonderful blend of painterliness and drama, Gillis is a living Mucha poster, a fin-de-siecle siren reincarnated -one of those mythic female creatures created, cherished and feared by the male imagination. When she somersaults backward, the skirt arcs like a mermaids tail, in the wake of her action.Deborah Jowitt, Village Voice, New York November 1990
ONE VOICE ...makes a strong statement about the stylistic and age range of the Columbia City Ballet and about aesthetic fusion's that are current globally in dance and music. The cohesive architecture of this piece commences with a single phrase, mingling ballet with modern elements. Repetitions and elaboration's of the phrase eventually encompass folk motifs and a section of movement with flexed feet that add an Asian sensibility. Ballard used abstract terms to evoke a sense of the world's peoples coming together compatibly, along with a sincere feeling of artistic unity among the company members.Camille Hardy Dance Magazine March 23, 1991
MARGRET OF ROSELAND..the combined creative energies of Ballard and Gillis..packed a wallop of a message with nothing more than some chiffon, silk flowers, a montage of classical and popular music and 60 minutes of imagination. Choreographer Stephanie Ballard and co-creator and performer Margie Gillis couldn't help but be pleased with the spontaneous ovation they received at the Maison de la Culture.Kathryn Greenaway, The Gazette, Montreal November 10, 1991
Margie Gillis appeared for the first time with an ensemble of women in A GATHERING. The solo star performerAngola Minerva, Canada Dance Festival, Ottawa 1992
Contemporary Dancers 30th Anniversary Gala...... Ballard's PRAIRIE SONG and PRAYER were undoubtedly the most pristinely beautiful works of dance. Larry Isacoff's lighting design in the former and dancer Faye Thomson's eloquent, spiritual presence in the latter were uplifting and somehow purifying.
Garth Buchholz The Winnipeg Free Press November 12,1993
ONE VOICE (solo choreographed for Peggy Baker).......... is the dance equivalent of a performance by a legendary singer. The opening movements reveal only her unmistakable arms. As Baker emerges fully from the blackness her concentrated movements, again in silence, invoke a soulful music.Susan Walker The Toronto Star March 19, 1997
Stephanie Ballard is a master of facilitation. Her artistry is compatible with the classical oriental attitude......the artist is invisible while her work stands forth, touched by her unseen hands and heart. It is a privilege to be working with this remarkable woman.Jock McKeen April 26, 1998
JUST KEEP MOVING - Later, in a nine-dancer segment, Ballet Jorgen kicked up their heels to the music of Gershwins snappy I Got Rhythm. - a twirling en point black widow (presumably representing the spirit left behind by the great Gershwin) displayed loose limbed, jazzy technique. Capitalizing on the Busby Berkeley style of patterned synchronization, the performance was sharp, witty, upbeat and mesmerizing.Colleen Johnston The Record January 15, 1999
Stephanie Ballard's IN PASSING portrayed the past, present and future of modern dance in general and WCD in particular. The work contained some of the most lively dancing of the evening, alternating between celebratory and somberness. The combination of members from the professional community, students as well as two children, seems to signify Ballard's commitment to the legacy of dance and its continuation as an art form in our community.Adrienne Maurakis Winnipeg Free Press Nov. 2, 1999
IN PASSING - The overall phrasing of the work - with intriguing group formations, engaging stillness, explosions of joyful group dancing, mysterious meaningful gestures, and a masterful build to climax-was inspired.Bill Evans commenting on In Passing Nov. 8, 1999
In some selections, the central meaning is unambiguous and utterly moving. JOURNEY ( by Stephanie Ballard) danced by Jock McKeen, who started dancing when he was 50, captures the human desire to soar with the eagles, while forever being pulled back to earth by the forces of gravity and aging.Shirley Goldberg The Daily News October 17, 2000
EDGELIT, Choreography by Rachel Browne. In one instance, Browne and partners Stephanie Ballard and Odette Heyn-Penner, themselves women of a certain age, assembled in triangular formation, each one supporting in some way the body of the other. The triad image is so reminiscent of the Italian school that you half expect the Holy Spirit to decend................But far from ironic, the visual quotation is an affirmation of the choreographer's discerning eye. Browne is an artist who has transcended all dance trends with a vision that is uncluttered, archetypal and authentic.Deirdre Kelly The Globe and Mail Saturday October 21, 2000
The Columbia City Ballet celebrated its 40th Anniversary Friday night at the Koger Center................. Ms Ballard's group work, by far the most intricate and dynamic of her featured works, had an Eastern feel and was rendered flawlessly by ten of the company's female dancers. The lovely black gowns and the choreography connected to create a piece that exuded dignity, strength, innovation and playfulness.Kara Cox State Newspaper February 5, 2001
Dancing to History: Think of them as the Burton Cummings and Randy Bachman of the Winnipeg dance scene. Rachel Browne and Stephanie Ballard, the city's most accomplished choreographers. "DANCING CHOPIN" marks the first time the pair's choreography has been presented in tandem in a WCD production since the troupe's 35th Anniversary in 1999. More significantly, the show christens the company's Studio Theatre in its new home in the renovated Ashdown Hardware Building, now known as the Crocus Building. WCD artistic director Tom Stroud says he chose Browne and Ballard to baptize the venue because of their long standing commitment to dance and the arts in Winnipeg. "They have inspired so many generations of artists," says Stroud. "But it is also important to me that they present new work. Both are still breaking new ground for themselves." This week's performances are a kind of first run-through for a more substantial production in a bigger venue slated for the company's 40th Anniversary in 2004.Morley Walker The Winnipeg Free Press October 31, 2002
Grand Dames of Dance, Figuring prominently in the works by Rachel Browne and Stephanie Ballard was Chopin. Having seen Marie Chouinard's choreographic interpretation of Chopin's 24 Preludes at a NDH event in February, I appreciated the opportunity to see excerpts from Browne's "SUNSTORM" , which was inspired by the same composition. When Browne began the project, she noted during Saturday's panel, she was convalescing from hip surgery, and several of the preludes, especially those with a slower tempo, do convey a sense of infirmity. With the faster-paced preludes, conversely, she celebrates the vitality of her young dancers. While some of those movements were too exuberant for my taste, I thought Browne, by allowing one "dance" to segue into the next, handled the transitions between the preludes deftly. For "GEORGE" (excerpts), Ballard drew directly on Chopin's life for inspiration, presenting a work meant to "evoke an essence and memory" of George Sand, a novelist/playwright who conducted an eight-year love affair with Chopin, and also scandalized French society by wearing trousers and a top hat. Structured as a series of vignettes, in which a high-backed chair figures prominently, "George " has a strong theatrical sensibility that captures both the unabashed eroticism of Sand's affair with Chopin, and the poignancy of their breakup two years before his death.Gregory C. Beatty The Dance Currant April 26, 2003
Cuppa Jo (Jolene Bailie) MARA - This surreal dance choreographed by award-winning choreographer Stephanie Ballard, moves into some other stratosphere....This is something that will linger in the imagination for a long time.Tamara Bodi Winnipeg Free Press July 22, 2003