Dance Company Research Articles

Audience/performer re-action: an investigation into audience/performer reciprocity via a touring site-specific performance in Lebanon

ABSTRACT In the past a typical performance situation consisted of a proscenium stage, performers on the stage and audience seated somewhere in the front. In today’s technological age, audiences are prone to watching performance on their smart devices. This live-disconnect between the audience and performer/performance has affected the industry on multiple levels. The live connection between the performer and the audience was previously a primary motivator to enhance the continuation of the art but this is not the case now. Since 1970 when performers such as Trisha Brown (Rosenberg, 2017) began to move performance into the public space, the idea of the typical proscenium stage lost its dominance and highlighted the need for investigation into alternative means of reaching audiences. One of the ways we (as performing artists) are acknowledging this void in practice pedagogy is studying how site performance engages with different environments, practices and social/cultural systems. In August 2017, Nadra Assaf and Amr Selim along with Al-Sarab Dance Company performed a series of site-specific performances in Lebanon. Investigation of the outcome through use of improvisation as methodology (McLeod, 2010), the lived experience, study of videos of the performance and analysis of interviews (individual and group) is the focus of this paper.

The Reach of Bella Lewitzky

ABSTRACTBella Lewitzky made important contributions to the advancement of modern dance as an art form through her teaching, performance, and movement explorations. In this article, I relate my experiences dancing in the final days of the Bella Lewitzky Dance Company, examine Lewitzky’s professional relationship with Lester Horton, and discuss aspects of Lewitzky’s technique. I end by describing how Lewitzky’s legacy is extended through my teaching practice and call for renewed examination of her career and contributions to the dance field.

Dancing in Place

Reviewed by: Dancing in Place Jay Rogoff (bio) Dancing in Place Although the dance world shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic, my last article's pronouncement that dancers had become wallflowers has proven short-sighted. On the contrary, these extraordinary athletes have worked vigorously while sheltering in place, keeping fit in small apartments, taking company class via Zoom, rallying comrades to help the sick and preserve dancers' careers and companies' lives, and supporting the struggle for social justice. Toward these goals, dancers and choreographers have created and posted new work designed for video, an entirely different swan from live choreography. Next issue's article will discuss some of the new political choreography just beginning to emerge on video in response to the murders of George Floyd and others; here I'll examine new dance videos that imaginatively defy the pandemic by virtually reassembling performers restricted to quarters into a community. American Ballet Theatre principal Misty Copeland and former ABT dancer Joseph Phillips convened 32 ballerinas, sheltering all over the world, for the six-minute Swans for Relief, a fundraiser for dancers thrown out of work or off health insurance while almost every dance company on the planet suspended operations. Cellist Wade Davis plays, twice, "The Swan," from Saint-Säens's Carnival of the Animals, as ballerina after ballerina dances The Dying Swan, Mikhail Fokine's 1905 solo for Anna Pavlova. Except for two or three recorded in a studio, each woman dances in decidedly non-theatrical surroundings—sparse apartments, living rooms hung with family mementos, backyards—employing balletic vocabulary whose artifice, paradoxically, projects feelings that mirror the rhythms of life. Copeland begins the number solidly in a furnished living room. The camera starts on her feet but then, inexcusably, travels up her body, depriving us of key information and pleasure. We never even see the feet of the Paris Opera Ballet's Hannah O'Neill or the Royal's Francesca Hayward; as if aware of this gaffe, the video cuts to Royal Danish ballerina Ida Praetorius, shot from floor level to display her entire regal form. (Editing is uncredited; the dancers were recorded by themselves or family members.) Although we never stay with any ballerina longer than a couple of measures, the shifting angles offer continual fascination. After a three-quarter angle shot of Ballet Philippines' Denise Parunga on a concrete terrace, folding herself deeply to the ground, wing-arms swept behind her, we dissolve to Norwegian National Ballet's Whitney Jensen, also deeply folded, but in profile in a white studio. She brings those arms forward, bends backward, then dissolves into ABT's Skylar Brandt, framed by a rustic arched building entrance. Some unusual angles work handsomely: New York City Ballet's Sara Mearns, for example, shown from the back in a bare city apartment, stretches to her full height, then flutters arms whose muscles evoke wings. Shelter, a five-minute video work by Alexander and Valentina Reneff-Olson, uses a similar strategy—many soloists in succession montaged [End Page 619]into a complete dance—to showcase not classic but new choreography by Danielle Rowe and Garen Scribner, collaborating with San Francisco Ballet principal Joseph Walsh. We again see dancers performing alone in their homes, but unlike Swans for Relief, Shelterexpresses their urgency, anxiety, and anomie while sheltering in place, the balletic imagination hemmed in by walls. More than half of Shelter's 26 performers are men, and many are modern dancers. As with Swans, the dancers or their families videoed their performances. Unlike Swans, however, the choreography, while linear, keeps returning to its performers at different stages of the dance, creating a recursive continuity. Walsh appears several times, establishing a template for the choreography. He begins the work by walking away from the camera, hunched slightly (it's not a dancer's walk), shirtless, in track slacks, down a narrow hallway in his home. Piano music begins, Beethoven sonata excerpts, played by Thomas Lauderdale and Jacob Van. Walsh continues walking away, but now, in a stunning spatial contrast, at center stage of San Francisco's empty War Memorial Opera House, where his company performs. He moves to his left, extends his left arm, and we...

Danceageddon

Falun Gong was originally a qigong group that entered into conflict with the Chinese state around the turn of the century. It gradually transformed into both a religious group and a political movement. Exiled to the United States, the founder-leader, Li Hongzhi, acquired property near Cuddebackville, New York, which he subsequently designated Dragon Springs. Dragon Springs, in turn, became the headquarters of Shen Yun Performing Arts, an ambitious touring dance and music company that claims to embody the traditional culture of China prior to its subversion by the Chinese Communist Party. Though Li’s earlier eschatology emphasized that individuals needed to become Falun Gong practitioners in order to survive the imminent apocalypse, the significant success of Shen Yun seems to have prompted Li Hongzhi to rewrite his eschatology, which now emphasizes that all one need do in order to be “saved” is to view live Shen Yun performances.

An unforeseeable career path: concert dance, Broadway, and commercial dance

Author(s): Spaulding, Marc | Abstract: Even when you think you know what kind of dancing you want to do, a veteran professional says, you have to be ready when different doors open. Whether it's a concert dance company of your dreams, Broadway, or commercial gigs, it's all dancing.

A Close Analysis of the Characteristics of Lin Hwai-min’s Dance Works

Lin Hwai-min, one of the most prestigious East Asian choreographers in the world, established the first contemporary dance company in Taiwan, the Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, which created a unique impression of Asian modern dance. Since his earliest dance works, unique balance is struck between literature and dance texts, mainland China and Taiwan, the East and the West, dance and humanities. This thesis begins from the perspectives of literary, eastern symbols, body language and music. It analyzes the artistic characteristics of Lin Hwai-min’s dance works, aiming to reveal the essence of choreographs.

The Construction of Authenticity in the Creative Process: Lessons from Choreographers of Contemporary Dance

The literature on authenticity of cultural production has systematically examined the perceived authenticity of both the producer and the cultural product but not of the creative process. This study aims to address this lacuna, adopting Carroll and Wheaton’s typology of type and moral authenticity to examine how contemporary dance choreographers construct authenticity during the creation of a new choreography. Our analysis of data from 23 contemporary dance companies reveals that the two meanings of authenticity dynamically reconstitute one another in the creative process. First, choreographers construct moral authenticity through transformation of form, deconstructing established artistic dance forms and introducing new movements from a bricolage of techniques. Second, they construct type authenticity through wrapping expression, facilitating the deconstruction of the values attached to the bricolage of techniques into artistic dance aesthetics. Finally, choreographers evoke both moral and type authenticity through a creative process of reconstruction. Our noteworthy finding reveals how the construction of authenticity in the process of creating a new choreography, and the dynamics between the two meanings of authenticity, serve significantly as a means of communication among the involved actors, thereby enabling the creative process.

A Case Study on the Direction of Dramatic Stage Design using Digital Media - Focused on <Glow> of Chunky Move Dance Company -

A Case Study on the Direction of Dramatic Stage Design using Digital Media - Focused on <Glow> of Chunky Move Dance Company -

The Singapore National Dance Company: Reminiscences of an artistic director

These reminiscences of Francis Yeoh, founding artistic director of The Singapore National Dance Company (1970-1985) is to create a tangible record of the Company’s history. Its inaugural overseas performance was launched at the Adelaide Festival in 1972 following an invitation from the South Australian Premier Donald Dunstan. The enormous success of the performances paved the way for the Company to become the island nation’s flagship company: embarking as cultural ambassadors in tours that included performances in the Soviet Union (1973 - Moscow, Kharkov and Kurst), Theran, Iran (1974), Seoul, South Korea (1975), Bangkok, Thailand (1976) and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (1977). Its history marks an important phase in the island nation’s history when it was seeking to establish its national identity and its eventual development as a global city.

Expanding Testimony: Dance Performance as a Mode of Witnessing in Richard Move’s Lamentation Variation

In this article I explore dance’s potential to serve as a form of trauma testimony. I first define trauma and testimony and consider how literature, the favored medium of testimony in trauma studies, offers ways to think about dance as a means of bearing witness. I further suggest that dance as a vehicle of expression provides as yet under-explored possibilities for testimony because its embodied character offers new forms of affective witnessing in our troubled geopolitical moment. Specifically, I study Richard Move’s Lamentation Variation, commissioned by the Martha Graham Dance Company in 2007, and ask how the piece reworks the traumatic dimensions of falling that have so prolifically characterized memories of 9/11.

Ballet and Contemporary Dance Injuries When Transitioning to Full-Time Training or Professional Level Dance: A Systematic Review.

This systematic review examines the relationship between injury and two stages of a dancer's career development: when transitioning to full-time training and to a professional dance company. The findings are discussed in relation to managing transitioning loads with regard to injury prevention. Six electronic databases (PubMed, Embase, CINAHL, SPORTDiscus, Scopus, and Performing Arts Periodicals Database) were searched from inception to July 2018, inclusive of English language peer reviewed studies investigating injury in pre-professional and professional ballet and contemporary dancers. Seventeen studies met the inclusion criteria. "Limited" evidence revealed that dancers transitioning to professional ballet had a significantly higher rate of time-loss injuries per exposure hour relative to established professionals, whereas transitioning professional contemporary dancers had a significantly lower rate of both medical-attention and time-loss injuries. "Limited" evidence also showed a decreased rate and trend toward lower prevalence rates for time-loss injuries per exposure hour for transitioning ballet students and an increased rate of medical-attention injury in a combined cohort of transitioning ballet and contemporary dance students. Thus, this review provides some evidence that injuries tend to occur as dancers are transitioning to full-time ballet or contemporary dance training or to professional careers.

Considerações filosóficas sobre o habitar e o visitar no contexto das residências artísticas do Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch

Este artigo, de caráter ensaístico, consiste em uma reflexão acerca do sentido do habitar e do visitar/viajar desde a construção poética de Pina Bausch. Ao tomar como ponto de partida a apreciação de um conjunto de peças apresentadas no período das Olímpiadas de Londres, em 2012, a investigação procura delimitar a produção da artista, de modo a diferenciar três fases poéticas, focalizando especialmente em uma tardia – a qual se caracteriza pela relação dos bailarinos da companhia de Wuppertal com cidades do mundo inteiro; pretende, portanto, ao deslindar o problema do habitar e do visitar/viajar no processo criativo da coreógrafa em questão, demonstrar as potencialidades éticas e estéticas de uma dada forma de composição artística – paradoxalmente singular e plural.

직업무용단원들의 심리적주인의식과 직무몰입, 조직몰입 및 조직시민행동의 구조적 관계

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to analyze the structural relationship among psychological ownership, organizational commitment, job commitment, and organizational citizenship behavior of professional dance company.BR Method: Total 250 questionnaires were distributed and 217 were returned usable. Technique for data analysis was frequency analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, reliability analysis, correlation analysis, and structural equation modeling using SPSS 25.0 and AMOS 21.0 programs.BR Results: The results were as follows. First, psychological ownership had significant effects on job commitment. Second, psychological ownership had significant effects on organizational commitment. Third, psychological ownership had significant effects on organizational citizenship behavior. Fourth, job commitment had significant effects on organizational citizenship behavior. Fifth, organizational commitment had significant effects on organizational citizenship behavior.BR Conclusion: This study conveys the importance of psychological ownership for professional dancers to lead the job commitment, organizational commitment, and organizational citizenship behavior for the professional dance company. It also provides academic and practical implications.

Los inicios de la Compañía Nacional de Danza: Ensayo y error de una errática política cultural estatal

En el cuadragésimo aniversario de la fundación del Ballet Nacional Clásico, institución antecesora de la actual Compañía Nacional de Danza, este artículo indaga en la primera década de existencia de la agrupación, como producto de la transición democrática y de la fundación de la acción cultural tras la dictadura franquista. En su sinuosa trayectoria institucional, inicialmente orientada hacia el ballet académico, se conjugan la lógica artística con la política cultural estatal, entonces inexperta y carente de objetivos concretos. Partiendo de la condición heterónoma del campo artístico de la danza frente al de poder, se indaga textual-contextualmente el grado de afectación de la política sobre la praxis artística y gestora, así como sobre el modelo institucional de la compañía titular de ballet académico en España.

A Resource-Oriented Approach to Performing Arts Organizations: An Ethnographic Study of Dance Companies

This article explores the organizational practices of large dance companies in Europe. To capture intangible and intrinsic aspects, a multi-sited ethnographic study at the Vienna State Ballet and Berlin State Ballet was conducted. By putting artistic processes at the core of the inquiry, the resource-oriented approach to the organization of such work comes to the fore. Following a resource-oriented understanding of organizations, the categories of reconfiguring, coordinating, co-creating, coaching, and preserving are induced. These five categories are understood as capabilities to deploy and develop resources, offering new insights about how such organizations create and sustain artistic achievement.

A Collective of Four Cases Illustrating How Educational Partnerships Help Sustain Regional U.S. Nonprofit Dance Companies

ABSTRACT As a result of decades-long dwindling arts funding sources, U.S. nonprofit dance companies struggle to emerge and be sustained. However, mutually beneficial relationships are often developed between nonprofit dance companies and educational institutions such as K–12 schools, universities, and private studios. These relationships enhance students’ education through experiences with dance companies, and companies are, in turn, supported and, in some cases, sustained by these institutions. In this collective of case studies of four artistic directors of regional U.S. dance companies, I feature examples of educational partnerships acting as important support structures for the sustainability of regional nonprofit dance companies. These examples illuminate specific educational visions that some dance companies embrace and use to their advantage. The complex issues emerging for these artistic directors who negotiate a multiplicity of professional needs illustrate how dance professionals work to support nonprofit companies while also valuing and practicing dance education in differing ways.

Stepping Sustainably: The Potential Partnership Between Dance and Sustainable Development

Focusing specifically on dance, this study explores the relationship between the arts and sustainable development. Very little academic work has been conducted about artists’ role in sustainability, a field that is characterized by intersectionality and cross-disciplinary work. This paper seeks to begin to fill that research gap. It determines two ways that dance artists can interact with sustainability: the operations approach and the artistic approach. Highlighting four organizations — Arts Council England, Kidd Pivot, Eiko & Koma, and Vertigo Dance Company — that have made strides in these two approaches, the study concludes that dance could be a tool for sustainability advocates to better communicate material to non-scientific audiences. Introducing environmental material through dance or other artistic mediums is a way of reframing conversations so that they appeal to broader audiences and target different types of solutions. A true shift toward a sustainably minded society will come from many sources, including a shift in cultural values about consumption and humankind’s relationship to the natural world. Art is a driver and creator of culture. If combined effectively, the arts and sustainable development could help to shift our society in a sustainable direction.

“What the Body Can Do”: Creating Space for Critical Hope through Affective Encounters with a Different Kind of Otherness

My aim here is to use the notion of critical hope as a lens for exploring how a dramaturgy of Affect can create spaces for challenging the on-going marginalization resulting from the intersection of disability, race and access in the context of South Africa's much-lauded “inclusive” constitution. Given that the body, especially the black and disabled body, has been seen as a site marked by physical and structural violence, a focus on what the body can do, rather than how it is seen, has particular relevance for exploring the work of Unmute, the first integrated dance company in South Africa to incorporate differently abled dancers. This discussion will take into account the effects generated by the affective performance techniques employed, as well as the discomfort experienced by spectators when familiar perceptions are disrupted. It will be argued that these disruptions have a liberatory dimension in that they can trigger cognitive shifts which are productive for conceptualizing critical hope.

Reflecting on my Assumptions and the Realities of Arts-Based Participatory Research in an Integrated Dance Community

The arts-based research paradigm prioritizes creativity, relationships and the potential of transformative change (Conrad & Beck, 2016). Arts-based research may be useful in disability communities where people may prefer to communicate artistically or through movement, rather than through spoken word (Eales & Peers, 2016). Participatory action research (PAR) involves researchers working with communities to create research critical of dominant power relations and responsive to the needs of communities (McIntyre, 2008). Both arts-based research and PAR value an axiological approach that is responsive to the community’s needs over a dogmatic procedure, meaning that researchers must be reflexive and responsive to the often unexpected realities of the field. Over four months in 2017, eight dancers/researchers from CRIPSiE (Collaborative Radically Integrated Performers Society in Edmonton), an integrated dance company, came together to investigate how integrated dancers practice elements of timing in rehearsal, through an arts-based, participatory process. In this paper I examine the gap between my assumptions of how research should be conducted and the reality of the field, specifically: the tension between university research ethics and the ethics of the CRIPSiE community, the differences between the value of the rehearsal process and the performance as sites of data collection, and the assumptions I had made about the necessity of a singular research question.

Mr. Gaga: Embodying the Exceptionalism of Ohad Naharin

The life and work of Israeli choreographer Ohad Naharin are documented in the 2015 film by Tomer Heymann, Mr. Gaga. With nearly a decade of footage from following Naharin’s work with the Batsheva Dance Company, the documentary celebrates Naharin’s life with abundant footage from his choreographic successes. This article explores the ways in which this film, like many dance documentaries, uses dance footage in strategic ways to present dance artists as exceptional. In Mr. Gaga in particular, the national and cultural specificity of the story and footage portrayed in the film require critical analysis to better understand subtle political undertones and bias embedded in the film’s otherwise primarily aesthetic focus.