Cumberland Falls, local dancers featured in award-winning book, Dance Across the USA

Dancer, Sydney Hall from Corbin, is shown striking a dance pose at Cumberland Falls. Hall appears in the magnificent new award-winning coffee table book, Dance Across the USA by master photographer, Jonathan Givens.

Cumberland Falls and two area dancers—Jennifer Ferguson and Sydney Hall—are featured in an extraordinary new book, Dance Across the USA. A magnificent book that celebrates America, Dance Across the USA recently won top honors in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards (Photography/Coffee Table Book Category).

In the summer of 2016, Master Photographer Jonathan Givens embarked on an epic journey spanning 50 states in 90 days with the sole purpose of photographing dancers in national parks and beloved and well-known settings in each state. After all, the possibilities for splendid settings abounded—a dancer on top of an active volcano, in the middle of the ocean, on a sand dune in Death Valley, in a glacier-fed lake—and Givens, undeterred by the Herculean task, jumped in feet first. During that 90-day journey, Givens racked up some unimaginable statistics: 22,264 miles driven; 22,160 photographs created; 163 dancers photographed; 56 locations; 50 states; and one Mighty Buford, the van that served as the vehicle—literally and figuratively—for Givens’s odyssey.

Jennifer Ferguson dances in a natural setting at Cumberland Falls. She appears in the award-winning coffee table book, Dance Across the USA.

The magnificent result is Dance Across the USA, a brilliant, coffee table style book featuring images from the journey. Part epic photo diary, part love letter to America, part celebration of dance, Dance Across the USA is completely awe-inspiring. Brimming with gorgeous, full color photographs, Dance Across the USA is filled with breathtaking images, swoon-worthy settings, and amazing subjects.

A passion project born of Givens’s desire to showcase the fabric of America, shine a spotlight on the importance of dance, and highlight the diversity that exists in both the physical landscape and in the dancers who make America their home, Dance Across the USA is an extraordinary—and extraordinarily real—book. Resplendent with real photographs of real dancers in real locations—the skies are real, the landscape is real, even the dirty feet are real — the photos within this incredible book involve no digital compositing, no trampolines, no wires or strings attached. Real dancers. Real photos. Real settings.

A book that is awe-inspiring in its sheer beauty and magnitude, Dance Across the USA features a wide range of dancers—from ages 5 to 61, professionals and amateurs, students and teachers, male and female, boys and girls, cat lovers and dog lovers. Moreover, Dance Across the USA provides an exquisite, eye-opening look at America—from sandy Florida beaches to the rugged Washington coast, from the glaciers of Alaska to Death Valley in California and all points in between.

Jennifer Ferguson, a dancer from Corbin, dances in a natural setting at Cumberland Falls. Ferguson is one of many dancers appearing in the award-winning coffee table book, Dance Across the USA.

Jonathan Givens is a photographer specializing in the entertainment industry. Beginning as a performer, and then a technician, choreographer, director, and designer, Jonathan later became the Master Carpenter for the Oprah Winfrey Show. Oprah suggested Jonathan pick up a camera…and the rest, as they say, is history. Jonathan is founder of EPS—Entertainment Photography Specialists.

Dance Across the USA is published in a trade paper edition (ISBN: 9780692953709, 306 pages) and now available nationwide.

For more information about Dance Across the USA, visit: http://www.danceatusa.com/. Find us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EPSpecialists. Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/eps_photo/.

A portion of the proceeds from Dance Across the USA will be donated to benefit America’s parks and the National Endowment for the Arts.