Thursday, March 25, 2010

CORE's week

CORE has a bunch of great stuff in Houston this week. (So no class till Apr. 5 those of you in ATL who like to come take it with them here.)
Tonight, Mar. 25, 5-10 p.m. is Cultured Cocktails, presented by Spacetaker at Boheme with proceeds going to CORE. The dancers will be present around 5:30-7:30 p.m. so please come out to meet them and support the company!
This weekend on Friday through Sunday they perform at the Bayou City Art Festival "Point, well taken..." a new site-specific piece created for several sites on the festival grounds at Memorial Park. They begin just before 2 p.m. in front of the HAA stage and move on from there. And if you want to take photos of the dancers or with them as they move between sites, we'd love to see them on our Facebook fan page! You can post them to our wall and the ones we like a lot will be used in upcoming e-news or emails!

Monday, March 22, 2010

today

hello.
today corian gave a fantastic class complete with killer tunes, new movement ideas, and ......... choreography from the new lady gaga video, telephone!!!! so much fun! we will be heading to houston tomorrow (no atlanta class until april 5th) for bayou city art festival performances. today we have been polishing up our performance plans for bcaf and doing some costume scheming. so if you are around the houston area, come out to bcaf to check us out! happy spring and snow...oh atlanta.

Friday, March 19, 2010

formally introducing

Here we have former CPC company member, now artistic associate, passing on her knowledge to new affiliate, Joanna Futral.



so i mentioned earlier this week that we have welcomed two artistic affiliates into the company to take kim's roles in some rep. without further adieu we have some pictures of the affiliates in the studio doin what they do...breathing new life into an already established piece.




here we have Sharon C. Sibley taking on kim's paper dress solo for Tus Pasos Encontrados. Sharon has just started working the solo in high heels...that is some treacherous, but fierce work!















then we have Joanna Futral who is taking on kim's role in Cumulus, and you can see her in one of the following pictures being lifted by blake.

and now a word from....

and now, a word from Teresa Chapman on her dance "Caught"


"I'm thrilled to put this piece back together with it's original cast! Some dances are easily reconstructed on new dancers while others are fun to rework for different performers. But THIS piece was built for these particular dancers with their strengths and personalities in mind. Alex, Corian and Kristi create these totally unique characters on stage that no one else could possibly duplicate! "

this dance is definately a fun task to undertake! it is more than a dance, it is a performance! it was created about 2 years ago for three dancers and a chair. what is most interesting is that as a performer, and we (teresa, kristi, corian and i) have all talked about it, we don't know what the dance is about. there are definately dark undertones to this dance that force the audience to think and come up with a story for them. told in a very non-linear fashion...i refer to the dance as a traditional "who done it?" that is where the chair comes into play. all of the performers make reference, and even dance with, on, in, above, etc. this ominous chair that sits on stage left (to use technical terms) throughout the dance.

another fun undertaking is trying to recapture the energy and vigor with which we move throughout the piece. even though it was only 2 years ago, i feel like a very different dancer. in discussion with corian about this whole phenomenon, we have let go of the sharp attack of our early years of dancing for a more luscious, almost indulgent way of moving. however, just because i choose not to move like that anymore, i know that i am still capable; if i was able to do it once, i can do it again.

besides the physical challenges of the dance, teresa touched on how we each created characters for this piece. each section highlights a particular performer technically and theatrically. we each have our individual story that influences our role (as a character) in the dance. to this day we each have different interpretations as to what the chair means, and who is the person who belongs there. this is definately a dance that has to be fully lived in and fleshed out in order for the audience to get the full scope of how you can be affected by things you are caught by personally.

so come out to miller outdoor theater april 30th to see this piece and many others!

Our Dynamic Lunchtime

wow...already it is friday! what a week?!? yesterday we had our lunchtime in the studio and salon performances. lunchtime this week was focusing on our dynamic exchange program. Ms. Annette from Good Moves brought the young ladies that she has been working with to show us what they have been doing in the dynamic exchange program. i was inspired and filled with happiness watching these young women move because despite obvious language barriers (some of the newer girls to the program are refugees from various countries) they looked and performed with such consideration and joy. i was pleasantly surprised so see some of the girls exude such confidence and maturity, and i think that can be contributed to dancing.

Ms. Annette was a hoot, and reminded me of the "old-fashioned" dance teachers that give the kind of "tough love" and structure that most kids need...and is given to people through the arts. i was inspired because i have a personal connection to youth outreach through the arts. most of my early training didn't come from fancy studios, or world-renown schools...it came from a community arts center in houston. there i learned all the fundamentals of what i know today, paired with structure, passion, and nurturing. all it took was someone with a vision of providing art to kids who wouldn't necessarily have an outlet...and that gift is irreplaceable!

i especially think about the refugee girls, and what their personal stories are...and then i think about how healing art (especially dancing) can be. to put it simply, it is liberating. it provides kids with the ability to feel at ease with who they are becoming. i mentioned in my last blog about how some kids think it is uncool to be passionate about things like art, etc. i was once in that position...it is easy to adopt the "herd mentality" and not stray from the status quo. so to see these young women have such self confidence, at their age, in the way they move makes me wonder how that will carry into other areas of their lives; even if they don't pursue anything artistic.

art can change lives, art can change the world...for the better. think about it...these young women who know nothing about one another (it was also their first time dancing together) personally and culturally, but they danced and laughed together as if they had known each other all their lives. also, they danced together...they took the time to connect with one another. that is what art can do...and to help change the world through art, to heal the world, and themselves...and maybe in the process, also change you and bring you joy!

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

full house

recently, we've had a very full house here at Core. not only are there lots of people here, and all of us are working...but we are all working on different things. we have a little bit of everything...some veterans have come by (and will continue to come by) to help some of our newer members (that's right, i said NEWER members) learn some of the works in our current rep.

having said that i would like to give a big welcome to our new artistic affiliates: Sharon C. Sibley and Joanna Futral, both of whom are taking on Kim Kleiber's role in Alicia Sanchez's Tus Pasos and Beppie Blankert Cumulus, respectively. it is always nice to have new energy in the rehearsal space because it keeps us all on our toes, and both dancers bring a fresh approach and perspective to roles that we are pretty familiar with, from seeing them so much. also, the process of watching new people tackle these roles with such vigor and excitement is very refreshing, it adds a newness to both of those pieces.

because they are taking kim's roles, she (kim) spent this past friday with us, and will do the same this week. her return always makes me feel like home because all the old dynamics fall right back into place...as if she never left. in addition to her visit friday, juana also spent some time with us with her baby boy (who is OH SO ADORABLE) Luke. so it is all kinds of good times in the studio...old and new faces, babies, and of course lots of dancing.

while everyone is working on those things, alicia and beppie's works, corian and i are working on remounting a trio choreographed by Teresa Chapman titled "Caught." this piece will be in our miller performance in april along with Blankert's Cumulus, and other work by various houston artists (including chapman). so stay tuned to find out what other stuff my go down in the studio...it's like a revolving door in here...even i don't know what will happen next. however, that's nothing new with me!

happy wednesday!

Monday, March 15, 2010

ATL Fieldwork begins http://bit.ly/dgjiKL and Lunchtime http://bit.ly/cNXoIS and Salon http://bit.ly/9zFKDG are both this Thursday!

Cores Adventures in North Carolina

Hey CPC blog readers...happy Monday to you all! So much has happened since the last time I blogged. I even lose blogger points because I was supposed to be the blogger for our time in Fayetteville, North Carolina...sorry. It was a really fun trip...it started off on a cold note because our flight was rescheduled for the evening (instead of the early 8 o'clock flight) due to possible snowy conditions; however, there was no snow, and it was a beautiful sunny morning that day, but the flight was already rescheduled.

So we ended up in North Carolina a day later, but we made the most of the trip. We did a lecture/demonstration performance twice a day for two different schools in the town. Our audience were kids from gifted and talented high school program in Fayetteville. Performing for high school students is a different challenge than performing for elementary kids because even if a high school kid likes the performance, sometimes liking art isn't exactly "cool."

On the whole, most of the kids (and schools) we performed for seemed to really enjoy everything, and they asked thoughtful, and appropriate questions. It is always refreshing to regain faith in the next generation. I remember being in school and choosing not to like certain presentations just because it was cool to seem so disinterested. So, I was pleasantly surprised when the students had a genuine interest in what our stories were (as dancers) and asked very articulate (and thoughtful) questions in regards to the work that we did. We took, and performed, an eclectic mix of work from our rep: Nature from Corazon, two sections from Alicia Sanchez's Tus Pasos, an excerpt from Polly Motley's Charmed Romantics, and lastly we showed what material we had from Sue Schroeder's newest work The Point.

Personally, I thought the lecture/demo performances were meant to not only show kids dance, but to teach them about the various aspects of modern (or contemporary dance) and then to encourage critical thinking of art. One of my favorite moments of the program came at the end when we would have our question and answer session. When the kids would ask what a particular dance meant, or asked if we could explain any of the dances to them; I would flip the questions and toss it back at them asking what they got from it all. I believe it was Corian that said it the best, "the beauty of modern (contemporary) dance is that it makes you use your brain...as an audience member, but also (and even more importantly) as a dancer." It forces us to be thinking, conscious performers...because if we don't bring something to the table, when the audience sits down they can just hop on the ride with us and experience something worthwhile...and not just check out. It is all about perspective anyway...and at the end of the day, it teaches the kids to sit up, pay attention, and eventually (hopefully) think for themselves.