What is the Virtual Artistic Challenge?

The Virtual Artistic Challenge is an online, artistic, livestream skating competition and fundraiser open to skaters – or groups of skaters – of all ages, backgrounds, and levels. Each age group’s video submissions will be live streamed the weekend of March 27-28, 2021 on Facebook and YouTube. The age groups will be: 5-8, 9-12, 13-17, and 18+.

“Celebrity Judges” including Mirai Nagasu, Vanessa James, Jeremy Abbott, Rachael Flatt, Maé-Bérénice Méité, Mariyah Gerber, Jason Brown, Lorna Brown and more – will select 3 awards from the performances in each age group and send a feedback video for the recipients to view. The awards we will announce are “The Creative Genius,” “The Dazzling Entertainer,” and “The Complete Skater.” The award recipients in each age group will receive a Virtual Artistic Challenge medal, and their performances will be highlighted on AIT’s YouTube Channel.

During the live stream of the event in March, an active fundraiser for the Figure Skating Diversity & Inclusion Alliance will be available. All donations during the live stream – as well as a portion of our event’s sponsorship donations – will go directly to supporting this international, non-profit organization working to increase diversity in figure skating.

Registration Information:

The registration form and video submission are due by Friday, March 12th at 11:59 PM Eastern Time. All videos must be submitted via a downloadable format: Google Drive, Dropbox, File Transfer are all acceptable options. YouTube or Vimeo links will not be accepted. Please email info@americanicetheatre.org with any questions, concerns or issues.

Registrants must be a minimum of 5 years of age by March 27, 2021. The cost is $40 per video submission – regardless if it is a group or an individual.

All video submissions will be live streamed back-to-back throughout the weekend of March 27-28, 2021; the live streams will be divided into four age groups: 5-8, 9-12, 13-17, 18+. We will notify all registrants of the specific day and time of their group’s live stream ahead of time.

The video must be prepared ahead of registration in order to send the video link in at the same time as payment. We have approximately 25 slots available per age group for individuals/groups.

Film / Video Rules:

Your video MUST be filmed at ice level – inside the hockey boxes, on the ice, or anywhere on the same level as the ice. The videographer CAN move around the skaters – they do not need to be standing in one place. Please do not submit a video filmed from the bleachers or high above as it is too difficult to see the artistic nuance in the performer’s choreography.

Film must be in landscape / horizontal view. Do not film vertically.

No video clip editing allowed or transitions between videos allowed. Your video must be one full run-through of the piece.

If your duet, trio, or group of skaters are not able to skate in person together due to Covid, it IS permitted to send an edited video in with the skaters images side-by-side. You ARE permitted to have a split-screen of video images of the participants. All other videography rules still apply: the video must be taken at ice level and the filmed performance must be a full run-through.

Please OVERLAY the music if possible. Music playing over the rink speaker system is often very difficult to hear in a video. We HIGHLY encourage your music to be overlaid on top of your video footage so the musicality can be more clear.

No filters permitted on the video. They must be in color as originally filmed.

Choreography Rules:

Must be 1:30 (+/- 10 seconds) MINIMUM or 2:30 (+/- 10 seconds) MAXIMUM. Music with or without lyrics is allowed libido-portugal.com. Spoken word is allowed. No music at all is also allowed.

Props are allowed but not required. Costumes are allowed but not required. If you do not have a costume, wearing all black is recommended for easier viewing of the performer’s movements. Trick skating, jumps, spins, slides of any kind are all permitted. Use of the ice space, wall space, glass, and benches are allowed. However, please do not have video footage outside the immediate rink space.

Groups and ensembles are permitted to submit a video as long as ALL the ensemble skaters are in ONE of the four age groups: 5-8, 9-12, 13-17, and 18+. Please do not have your ensemble’s skaters overlap between age groups.

All performers must be have at least 1 ice skate on their feet, and the performance cannot be fully off the ice.

If you have any questions regarding the Virtual Artistic Challenge, please email info@americanicetheatre.org.

Sponsors of VAC

A big thank you to our Sponsors for the VAC: Graf Skates, Ballet For Figure Skaters, XSkateFit, and Spinergy.