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How do holiness and the arts intersect? Presvytera Cally Kordaris answers this question through her work as the founder and Artistic Director of Cold Spring Dance Company.
Cold Spring Dance brings world-class dance to the lower Hudson Valley, using reflecting on cultural history through dance and film.
Presvytera Cally Kordaris sees the arts as inherently spiritual. In her understanding, holiness is not confined to liturgy, but can inhabit rehearsal spaces, shared audience experiences, and the silent discipline of practice.
“Empathy toward our fellow man is at the center of my work,” Pres. Cally says. “It is in the storyline, the music, and the movement. It is always subtly reminding us of why we are here.”
“Having a spiritual and moral center guides us and grounds us. Some individuals see us faithful as foolish, but even plants and trees need roots,” she says. “People are no different. Our faith gives us a foundation for connection, reflection and purpose.”
The Cold Spring Dance studio sits at the top of a Philipstown mountain, where Pres. Cally has lived since 2014. The company presents three performances annually, all free and open to the public; priority is offered to the elderly and adults with disabilities. Artists from leading New York City companies such as Martha Graham, Twyla Tharp, and Dance Theater of Harlem perform with Cold Spring Dance.
Graduating as a dance major from LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts, Pres. Cally’s training was focused on classical ballet, but included modern, flamenco, tap, jazz, and Greek folk dance as well. She later completed an undergraduate degree in art history, and is married to Fr. Jim Kordaris, Director of the Archdiocese’s Department of Stewardship, Outreach, and Evangelism and parish priest at St. George Church of Kingston, New York.
Pres. Cally approaches her work with meticulous care and patience. “My approach to creating a choreography can take a few years,” she says. “I dive deep into research, reading multiple books on the subject and the time period. This helps with music selection and gives me a starting point to create a movement vocabulary for each character.”
“It’s like editing a film–you create more than you need and only keep what feels honest in the moment,” Pres. Cally says.
Her choreography work is also influenced by her gardening experience.
“As a choreographer and gardener, the curiosity to understand how life begins and evolves is what excites me to create. To witness things growing organically takes time,” Pres. Cally says. “The creative process is like a seed, sitting in the dark soil, waiting for germination. One needs to remain patient and faithful,” she states.”
Faith and history are never far from one another in Pres. Cally’s work, either. When she choreographs pieces rooted in Greek struggle or cultural memory, she does not treat the narratives as merely political or historical, but incorporates religious material as well.
“How do you present the history of Greece without incorporating our faith?” Pres. Cally asks.
In The Greek Ballet: Resurrection, more than half the pieces are set to hymns from the Church. For some audience members, the music reads as hauntingly beautiful; for others, particularly those within the Greek Orthodox tradition, it carries the weight of prayer. Both respond, but in different ways.
At the same time, Pres. Cally’s work resists confinement to any single tradition. She speaks of art as something “universal,” reaching beyond labels. Whether centering marginalized voices, exploring women’s restrictions during the Renaissance, or exploring global human rights in a piece like Protest, her choreography insists on a deeper freedom.
Protest unfolds through the voice of an Islamic woman, moving across cultures and historical moments of resistance, until the audience gradually realizes that the thread connecting each protest is the singular voice of this one woman. The performance included the words of Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg; music by Philip Glass and Stamatis Spanoudakis, a modern Greek classical composer; and the artwork of Nicholas Kontaxis as a backdrop.
> Previously: Inside the studio of Nicholas Kontaxis
For Pres. Cally, art and dance are meant to free the human spirit, giving voice, dignity, and space to stories that might otherwise be forgotten.
Over the past five years, Pres. Cally has completed five contemporary dance pieces, rooted in ballet. Cold Spring Dance’s debut performance in May 2022, Byzantium to Pop, was a contemporary piece utilizing documentary film footage from the life of Andy Warhol. In September 2022, Cold Spring Dance presented their second performance, this one set to the music of Tom Waits and also including documentary footage.
Another goal of Cold Spring Dance Company is to create accessibility and opportunity for young people to train at no cost.
“With the Olympics … we hear that figure skating is suffering from a shortage of male skaters. Dance is not different,” Pres. Cally says. “Most of the men with whom I have worked were able to become professional dancers through not-for-profits that offered them scholarships. Without these opportunities, the dance world suffers.”
Simultaneously, non-profits are themselves struggling to survive. A large portion of the past’s dance grants no longer exist; the few now available are geared toward the more established companies with large budgets.
Making dance accessible is an issue dear to Pres. Cally. She views her work as being not only about performance, but about creating a space in which people can move, grow, and belong together. She consistently emphasizes the power of the collective over the individual, believing art reaches its fullest expression not in isolation, but within shared experience.
Pres. Cally highlights her gratitude for the support of Fr. Jim. She share that despite his long hours working with the Archdiocese and St. George Church, he finds time to help with the dance company.
“During rehearsals, Fr. Jim often prepares home-cooked meals, which the dancers love,” Pres. Cally says. “He helps with editing the music and preparing the video clips that are interspersed in the choreography; he even installed the seven-layer sprung dance floor in our studio.”
“He always says that after I worked for years to support his ministry, it’s my turn to pursue my dream of creating a dance company and eventually a scholarship program,” Pres. Cally says.
Pres. Cally and Fr. Jim’s 16-year-old son sings in a non-professional chorale which sings Bach and Mozart requiems. “When you sit in the audience and experience the performance, you realize that the power of the collective is tremendous and sublime,” Pres. Cally says. “Although they bring excellent professional soloists to perform, the solos cannot compete with the collective”
“The power of community is stronger than the power of any individual,” Pres. Cally concludes.
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