Re: Nexus Dance Vol 2
Nichelle Gruger
The Threads Dance Nexus is a brand new community hub that not only provides a home for the company but also strengthens the social fabric of our Minneapolis community through the connective power of dance.
The Threads Dance Nexus offers a variety of dance and movement classes including Ballet, Modern, Jazz, Yoga, and Social Dance. Our knowledgeable and diverse staff teaches with an anatomically-based approach to movement that honors the social and historical context of these various dance techniques.
Threads Dance Nexus strives to be an inclusive space where movers of any identity, age, or ability are welcome to participate in our dance classes, yoga practice, community talks and other public events.
Far too many aspiring dance artists have been harmed by abusive, sexist, racist, and ableist schooling. The Threads Dance Nexus seeks to be a place where diverse learners are treated with dignity and respect.
With 15 years of experience in partnership dancing and teaching, Alicia Aragon has opened NEXUS with the intention of creating a space to foster community through dance. Whether there for connection, fitness, or fun, SLO residents will find a new community hotspot at NEXUS.
From the longboard dancer zooming across the Quad to inter-house dance-karaoke competitions, the world of dance inspires fancy footwork within any UChicago student. This fall, we welcome our dance groups back onto campus after a year spent choreographing, filming, and busting a move or two online. With a myriad of dance RSOs to choose from, from tap to hip-hop, contemporary to K-pop, the chances to uninstall Zoom once and for all (fingers crossed) and stretch your legs out are infinite. While we realize this list is not exhaustive, we hope that it encourages you to take a step ball change outside your comfort zone!
Boasting the largest number of dancers, Rhythmic Bodies in Motion (RBIM) embraces the widest range of dance styles in one group, borrowing elements of K-pop, Bollywood, tap, and even musical theater numbers. Auditions start typically in the middle of fall quarter for the annual spring performance at Mandel Hall. RBIM dancers welcome performers of all levels to share their riveting, relentless enthusiasm with their equally excited audiences.
At the heart of the UChicago hip-hop scene, Excolatur Dance Crew (EX Crew) delivers exhilarating urban choreography, hosting dance workshops weekly with professional urban dancers at Bartlett Dining Hall. The group competes at events such as World of Dance Chicago, but for the more lowkey novice, feel free to try out one of its free classes. Groove Theory, whose hip-hop arsenal includes breaking, locking, and waacking, is a competitive yet no-cut group that can typically be found hosting beginner workshops at Bartlett or showcasing its annual Revival show. Auditions are held in early fall and winter. UC Dancers, the oldest dancing RSO at UChicago, specializes in lyrical and contemporary dance and welcomes students from all majors and backgrounds. The group hosts company showcases and no-cut showcases annually, so why not sign up for an audition in October or February?
Every spring, several of these dance troupes compete in WFCTD, hosted by the UChicago Dance Council, the overseer of all dance RSOs on campus. Hype your friends up, vote for your favorites, and, naturally, use your newfound inspiration to join these communities in the upcoming seasons.
Today I want to delve a little deeper into the nexus of the strands of the dance medium. In Unintentional Juxtaposition in Tribal Fusion dance I looked at the nexus of the strands on a macro level. But I'd like to zoom into one aspect of this nexus. I suggest reading this article first to give you a bit more of an overview on this topic, yet it is not necessary in order to understand the content in today's post.
In Valerie Preston-Dunlop's book Dance and The Performative, there are 5 strands that we talk about when we are talking about the dance medium: sound, movement, performer, space and audience. We also talked about the relationship (or nexus) between these strands. This relationship can be juxtaposed, integrated or coexisting.
As tribal fusion dancers, the relationship between the sound and the movement strand is of course very important. In fact, often you will hear teachers say things such as 'embodying the music', 'becoming the music', 'letting the music move you',... These are all terms we are very much familiar of, I am sure. When someone says about a dancer that they have good musicality, they mean that they are embodying the music very well: the music becomes visible through the movements in their bodies.
A good example of a dancer that has good musicality is Violet Scrap. When Violet dances, she brings attention to the music in such a way that I discover layers within the music that I wasn't even aware of. Her use of movement quality and dynamics is so rich that it brings out the different textures that the music holds, and she decides which layer she wants you to listen to. The relationship between sound and movement is completely integrated.
Postmodern dance ideas often happened through rebellion against the norm. In ballet for example, the movement always came after the music. The music was composed and then choreography was set to this music. Dancers felt that dance never stood on its own, that movement could not be its own art, and that movement was therefore slave to the sound strand. So dancers began to explore the idea of movement standing on its own, either by using silence or by creating movement first and bringing sound in later.
I like what Mira Betz has done in this video (it won't let me embed it here for some reason) She has connected the sound of her heartbeat to a speaker to make her audience listen to her heartbeat live, while she is dancing to the beat of her own heart. Sound and Movement strand are therefore still integrated, yet as opposed to what most tribal fusion dancers do (Sound first, Movement later) it is the movement that is controlling the sound (by slowing down her movement she slows down her heartbeat and vice versa) I think this is a very interesting concept on the relationship between sound and movement.
One of the first dancers ever to use the idea of dance in silence was Mary Wigman in her Witch Dance. (There is no video of this, yet there IS video of a later version of the original Witch Dance, yet this video does have a soundscore) In its time, it was the most contemporary thing anyone had ever done. It was just not done to NOT dance to music, so it was controversial and fresh. But apart from the controversy, what I find interesting is that dancing in silence strips the dance down to just the movement. Sound can sometimes provide distraction that doesn't always add to a performance, sometimes it detracts. I would say that the relationship between sound and movement here is juxtaposed. Because the sound of silence invites stillness as opposed to movement, therefore there is a juxtaposition between the two strands.
Another (perhaps clearer) example of juxtaposition could be when a dancer softly undulates to a song that invites dynamic, strong and large movements. Or vice versa, the song has a continuous, soft quality while the dancer manically shakes and vibrates through the space. There is a clear opposition between sound and movement in that case. Often juxtaposition invites an uneasiness with the audience, something doesn't sit quite right. I believe this can be an excellent tool. Say that I were to make a dance about i.e. being an outcast. the fact that sound and movement are juxtaposed can be related to the idea of feeling like you don't fit in. At the same time, your audience will perhaps feel alienated from you because they cannot relate to the experience, therefore mission is accomplished as the artist is truly bringing the idea of the outcast to the performance.
The best example of a choreographer that uses coexisting strands is of course Merce Cunningham. I saw my first Cunningham piece in 2004. I hated it. I wanted to walk out of the theatre. Why? because I didn't get it. The Kinaesthetic Gap was so big for me that I wasn't getting anything out of the performance. I knew Merce was an important choreographer but I really didn't get why, looking at that performance. But the day after we had a workshop with one of the Cunningham company members and I learnt the process behind the product/performance, I understood why he was one of the most important choreographers of the 20th century. He completely broke the relationship between sound and movement by asking John Cage to write a 90 minute soundscore while he (through the use of chance - i.e. rolling a dice) works with his dancers on a 90 minute movement score. Only during the dress rehearsal would sound and movement be put together. Cunningham was not interested if it worked or didn't work, he was interested in taking away the expectation of what works and what doesn't and that was his reflection of life: nothing means anything, everything is just stuff that happens.
The idea of dancing to silence or to make the sound and music strand juxtaposing or coexisting is clearly not new in contemporary dance, yet in tribal fusion it's a fairly new concept. The question is: if tribal fusion is in definition about embodying the music, will it still be tribal fusion if we were to dance in silence, or if we were to juxtapose the movement and sound strand? Perhaps not, but perhaps the exploration is still worth having. We can figure out what to call it later...
Preston-Dunlop, V. & Sanchez-Colberg, A. (2002) Dance and the Performative: a choreological perspective - Laban and beyond. Hampshire: Verve Publishing.
UPDATE:
There was quite a bit of discussion regarding this post on social media. I find it great when discussion is happening, and I've really enjoyed reading people's different viewpoints on the topic. I'm in no way an advocate of 'the truth', I just like to share my points of view. Not all feedback has been that helpful. For me, comments like: 'yes, I agree! I don't like Tribal Fusion for this exact reason!' or comments like: 'Urgh! I am so bored with people trying to criticise what I do!' I don't see how this is in any way creating an interesting debate on the topics touched on in this article. In fact, it creates yet again an 'us and them' culture, even within our own community.
As a reaction to one of the comments on this post (which was on facebook, not on this blog page) that was in the tone of the above comment, I posted a reply. I wanted to share it here too, because I think it has some valid points that need to be addressed also. My mind is never static, in fact, I change my opinions quite frequently when new info, new thought becomes available. I find this fascinating and I love people's views on what I write, however different of mine it may be. If we openly discuss each other's differences with an interest in what each of us has to say and why, we are really onto something here...
Here is the response about the 'I am tired of people criticising my dance' comment. I decided not to post the original comment that I am responding to, because I didn't see it as relevant to the response below. It was a comment that I have heard more than once in the tribal fusion community and therefore my response was more a general response to these kind of comments.
''If the tribal fusion community is about community and inclusion would that not mean that there can also be a place for people to have questions about the art form, respectfully, without feeling that they cannot share their views on an art form they dedicated their life to? If inclusion and community is only towards those that share the same views of 'everything is wonderful all the time', then I believe that is a big alarm bell. As it turns out, many tribal fusion artists do want to have these conversations. I believe there is a place for everyone. If discussion of the art is not someone's thing, that is of course totally ok. However that doesn't mean this discussion is not worth having. I have written this article not because of an isolated view I have, but because of talking to many artists. In the 15 years I've been in the fusion dance world these questions came up on a regular basis from within the community. People that have dedicated their lives and dance careers to tribal fusion, not outsiders that know nothing about this art. So it is not a phenomenon of outside dancers dissing this art, as it is people that care and love the art that are having questions. A phenomenon I often notice within tribal fusion is that people that have any form of criticism get a backlash of others trying to defend the current state of the art and basically silencing people's valuable thoughts and feelings. So much so that they don't dare to speak up publicly and go with the flow of 'everything is amazing' just because they are worried of being shunned from their very own community. I believe it is important to be kind and respectful to the artists in our community, yes, but we can have critique without cattiness, name calling, finger pointing, backstabbing and other unfavourable behaviour. But it goes both ways. As I think there is room for everyone.''