When I first saw the syllabus, this was something I definitely looked forward to. I always loved to watch people dance. Whether it was the street performers on the subway or impressive YouTube videos. Despite all of that, I was really exposed to dance by my friend who majored in Dance throughout high school and now a Theater major in Taiwan. She loved to dance and took master classes during her whole entire stay in the U.S. with my family. She is trained in modern, ballet, classical, Chinese opera, lyrical and jazz, and even choreographed many of her dance troupe’s performances. She would take any opportunity to dance. We would walk down the street and turn around to she her pirouette-ing or leaping or just moving her body in anyway that doesn’t resemble normal walking.
She taught me a lot about how disciplined dancers have to be. She would start classes at 7:00am and leave at around 9:00pm, or even later if there was a performance approaching. For the entire performance, even if I didn’t understand what the dancers were trying to portray, I was utterly amazed at what they could do with their bodies and thinking back to what my friend told me. These dancers pushed their bodies past breaking points and have achieved so much to be on the stage.
Dance is very much intertwined with the dances and choreography styles of each performance. The music that left the most impact on me was Lucinda Childs Dance Company’s Concerto performance. It had really jarring music that wasn’t my taste, but I can understand why the choreographers had chosen them. The music I enjoyed the most accompanied Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater’s performance of Minus 16. The music was fun, simple, and soulful.
What I also learned from my friend is the importance of lighting. Her dance troupe would always hire a different lighting designer to come and create the lighting for their specific dance. The way body movements looked in different lightings were extremely important, and even the mood of the dance is partially through the lighting. This was clearly seen in Minus 16, it was bright and well-lighted when they took audience members on-stage to dance with them, creating a really cheerful mood along with their ridiculous body movement. But in the dance when they were chanting, the lighting was from above and cast a shadow over their bodies as they were crouched over, because they wanted to create an intense mood.
The highlight of that night was seeing Sebastian Ramirez and Honji Wang outside the building after their performance. The large crowd was already gone and Sebastian Ramirez and Honji Wang were just talking to their friends. I had to get a picture with them, so I did!
and then the rest of the class decided to photobomb.
And a shoutout to my friend Sarah who came with us to the performance!
Speaking of highlights, it did struck me greatly how human those dancers were. Those silhouettes and flying figures that painted the stage with colors so ephemeral are actual humans. They can smile and speak, and they do beautiful art.
It sounds like you guys had a really good time! Even though I wasn’t able to go with the class, I was looking forward to the Lucinda Child’s Company. What was the actual dancing like? I was really curious after I researched the company.
I know what you mean about the lighting. When I saw the performances on Tuesday the use of lighting seemed to be really significant. The same people were able to look completely different based on the kind of lighting that the set designers used. I never really thought about that before.
I agree with you Jin Won, they are living and breathing art. Just like what we discussed in class today, they defy gravity and highlight the gracefulness in the human body. The transformation of their bodies while doing this art form is also really amazing. I remember another friend, also a dancer, immediately recognizing another dancer through the way her thighs “turned out”. It has to do with the way dancers stand and how the muscles look. They are recognized as dancers off an on the stage, which i find really interesting. Other artists like singers, painters, sculptures, musicians, writers don’t have a really distinctive look to help immediately identify them. Maybe calluses on the fingers for musicians, but nothing as dramatic as a change in your body shape.
The dance for the Lucinda Child’s Company was repetitive just as we learned from your research. The dancers looked really light on their feet, and the choreography was similar to a combination of some sort of skipping, leaping, and lots of turning. She spaced out her dancers really nicely and they were all synchronized in their motions. I did enjoy it since it was so new to me, but after 5 minutes of the same repetitive motions it started to become really tedious to watch.