UTP Won “The Best Team Award for Street Parade Dance” in the 9th Cheonan World Dance Festival in Korea (27 September to 5 October 2011)
Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS (UTP) representing Malaysia won the Best Team Award for Street Parade Dance and received a cash prize of USD1000 in the 9th Cheonan World Dance Festival. The festival with its theme ‘Let’s dance in Cheonan’ at Cheonan Samgeori Park, Cheonan City, Korea was held from 27 September – 5 October 2011. It was organised by Cheonan-si Cheonan Culture Enhancement Committee and supported by Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism Korea. 20 members of UTP Performing Arts Group took part in this prestigious annual cultural arts festival.
The objective of this festival was to encourage and educate the international community to appreciate international folk dance cultures. This festival was participated by professional groups from 22 countries around the globe. The participating countries included Estonia, Thailand, Poland, Singapore, Russia, Indonesia, Guam, Korea, Italy, Mexico, Kosovo, China (Wendeng), Uzbekistan, Slovakia, Tuva, Bulgaria, China (Shijiazhung), Kazakhstan, Philippines and Brazil.
All groups were required to compete in the series of performances during the festival including the opening night dance (4 minutes performance), semi finals (15 minutes performance), street parade dance (two nights, 2 minutes performance, distance of 2.2 km and 6 stations), outdoor stage performance (10 minutes) and other activities such as country night and games. The performances from the 11 countries which received award had the opportunity to perform during the closing night. This 9th Cheonan World Dance Festival will be telecast on RTM soon.
The UTP Performing Arts Group has benefited greatly from participation in this festival. The group managed to establish smart relationship and networking with professional cultural groups especially in the dance arena and they managed to successfully promote Malaysia traditional cultural performance at an international level. Their experience and exposure would certainly support UTP’s vision and mission to produce well-rounded and competitive graduates.
