rural dance revolution

Morning in the Woods

2011-07-30T09:26:00.000-07:00

Summer has been dance-filled and joyous, with kids making movement in trees, Aurora learning the walk, and some sweet lady-folk and myself making modern dance. Claire, Ally, and I have been improvising and choreographing together, gently bringing to life an intimate duet that I'm posting the beginnings of right here. We've been sharing and making memories, finding voice in our bodies, writing, reading, playing, and building with the intention of making work to share while feeding our artistic hunger for meaning and movement. Jon will be bringing some sound into the mix soon, so stay updated for more dance and music.

We made this mini-video in Ally's backyard where her family has built a small platform for moving, camping, and gathering. It was good for the heart to be moving outside in late July in Vermont, embracing summer fully. I'm excited about the space as a performance location and have been sitting with many dreams of presenting more dance outside. Perhaps a fall dance exhibition? Happy summer dancing...

Fitness is Fun - Girl Style

2011-06-24T05:29:00.000-07:00

Thursday afternoons usually include me gasping for some much-needed end-of-the-week energy to push through to what will undoubtedly be a packed weekend. However, Thursday afternoons in May and June included a slew of elementary school girls bursting with more energy than you can imagine... unless you've hosted a slumber party for a sweet posse of fourth grade female child-monkeys.

These lovely ladies were participating in Fitness is Fun, known nationally as Girls on the Run, at their elementary school in my hometown Chester with the daring and darling Anne Lamb as their fearless leader. I would see the ladies walking, running, and sometimes eating popsicles on Tuesday afternoons as they circled town, gearing up for a race later in June, I met up with them in the elementary school gymnasium on Thursdays to dance, dance, dance. We worked hard in a cardio-heavy dance class and spent a good chunk of time building a dance, included in this post. The girls choreographed practically the whole dance in six classes, working together to create fun, partner-inspired movement that I believe highlights their love of each other, moving, and joy. I was able to party with my local girls and feel blessed that such awesome future babysitters are right around the corner...

Making Friction Move

2011-06-07T05:49:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you get a chance to move at school. I remember counting minutes until recess when we could finally use our pent up energy to whack big dodge balls at each other in overly competitive games of four square. The kids at Under Mountain Elementary School in Sheffield, MA and New Marlborough Elementary School in New Marlborough, MA didn't have to wait until recess on the sunny April, May, and June days I visited their school. Instead we started moving during math and science classes, exploring fractions, number sentences, friction, simple machines, animal movement, telling time, number recognition, 2- and 3-D shapes, area, perimeter, and skip counting all while dancing.

I've traveled to the Berkshires to teach for a few years now, working with teachers and students on how our bodies and how dancing as an art form can help better inform our learning and comprehension of math and science at the elementary school level. This year, Aurora and her grandmother joined me for the early drives south on I-91 through recovery-funded construction to spend long, dance-filled days in a variety of pre-K through 4th grade classrooms.

These pictures are from Jennifer DeAngelo's 2nd grade classroom at Under Mountain. The students were studying friction and together we tried sliding and rolling across bumpy and smooth surfaces in attempt to better understand where we feel more or less friction. We created a human wheel to feel how the wheel takes more of the work when rolling across a surface, while the object being wheeled around can relax some. There were raised hands, excited questions and answers, and moments of genius where an idea clicked.. "I feel myself sticking to the bumpy surface," said one kid. Another shared, "It's easy to roll because the part of my body connected to the floor keeps changing."

The kids pushed, pulled, and rolled each other, thinking about forces and gravity and how this would affect our next lesson on simple machines. I found myself more curious about what the big deal with friction is than I can ever remember, grateful that these active, engaged kids were asking me to step up and keep on learning as well.

It is a gift to have teachers who are willing to risk the insanity of students dancing to funky music in their classrooms in order to access information in different ways. Perhaps a few more of adults need more time to just move during the day as well? I remember tapping my foot wildly at my desk in graduate school, grateful for my one class that allowed me to stand and walk around the room when offering my two cents to the conversation. I hand over the dry erase marker to kids during these classes, giving them a chance to write the words or numbers on the board that we are attempting to make sense of with out bodies and I find myself shivering with excitement because it means something. We are making something come to life by moving it, writing it, speaking it, and sharing it. This is multiple intelligences in action. This is different perspectives coming head to head.

Let's commit ourselves to making sure our kids have multiple ways of learning and sharing what they know. Let's commit ourselves to not resting easy in our own learning experiences and being open to empathetic responses to our kids. But let's also share what we know and encourage kids to develop their own ability to empathize. Let's model kindness, engagement, and curiosity by seeing the limitlessness of what there is to experience and learn. Sometimes we'll get stuck -the human wheel won't be able to get started and our moving object slides off before it has a chance to make it across the floor - but we can try again and again and again. And hopefully, it will feel worth it.

Many, many thanks to Jane Burke at Flying Cloud Institute for making this work possible year after year and to sweet, wonderful Jennifer DeAngelo to being the best cheerleader and picture-taker a 2nd grade classroom can have.

Images: spring dancing...

2011-06-05T19:11:00.000-07:00

The kiddos wait and wait for their big weekend of stage-time bliss where they get to run around under the bright lights shouting with their limbs bits of who they are and it feels to be them. It is my last moment to show them my thanks... gratitude I feel deep down in the innermost part of myself... filled with love because some lovely folks chose to stick it out with me all school year and dance.

Moms and dads, grandparents and close friends, even some community members with no little ones (or big ones) dancing come to see dance. Hip hoppers in neon shoelaces, barefooted modernistas, teenage tappers, and pointe-clad ballerinas put it out there and let the audience decide what to do with it.

I watch between quick costume changes as my students step up and meet themselves in that place where they can rock out and be proud. And I hold my breath until they find stillness and I can rush to them with waterfalls of enthusiasm.

I love that these moments are fleeting. I love that we work so hard, play so good, fill up a year with moving and only at the end of that year do we step on stage and shake our sweet, sweaty bodies in the presence of others. I tell the kiddos, "You've gotta love them work." Do I feel lucky... I love the work.

Thank you Amy Anderson and Anna Jonynas for your steal-worthy images.

Chester Vermont Flash Mob

2011-05-31T08:18:00.000-07:00

Halloween in Chester includes a costume parade from the elementary school, a trunk-or-treat candy-fest at one of the town's soccer fields, and last year, a small-town flash mob with members ranging in age from almost 3 months to grandmas (Aurora, my wee one, is strapped to her father's chest). I spent a few mornings with this likely bunch dancing around to the Black Eyed Peas for the fun of it, but also as a way to advocate for our little town. The video is included on a website promoting the town - Chester United. I felt that making this dance with this motley crew was partly an invitation to me as well, to settle and make moving roots in this funky, spirited place where the groovers will surprise and delight you with their enthusiasm.

Upside down and kicking...

2011-05-23T13:16:00.000-07:00

I can blame my long absence from the blog on the addition of a baby to the family or my desire to play in the garden during my downtime rather than sit in front of the computer, but Aurora is napping and it's been raining for weeks... and my desire to believe in and feel the power of dance around here in this little corner of the woods is powerful and pulling me off center in a crazy excited kind of way.

We've been moving nonstop here in small town Vermont. The kid climbs on my back as we dance in schools, asking kids to let go, even for a moment, of all the stuff they carry with them and to instead move. Last week we were at Floodbrook School in Londonderry, VT working with every student in the public K-8 school on improvising and choreographing (as well as listening and sharing and trying to be kind). Music teacher Mike and PE teacher Mark made the residency possible and helped create a positive space for exploring dance.

The littles sculpted each other into imaginary still creatures, granting each other permission to come alive and move like wild creatures of the day. Those a little older explored opposition, creating duets, trios, and quartets full of tension and release. The fifth and sixth graders told narratives in stillness and movement, using only three words to convey their stories through text and movement. The middle schoolers created phrases and manipulated them by playing with elements of time, shape, space and effort. Included below is a clip from some seventh grade boys. Oh, how I'd like to share more, but it's hard to get permission to share the faces of some kids via the internet, and it's okay with me to protect their souls some from too much overexposure.

I find myself asking big questions after working with these kiddos for the week. How do we create environments where kids feel safe to share? Where sharing their work is the celebration? How do we create environments where editing and revision is as exciting as dancing on the stage? Where we crave feedback and time to digest each other's responses?

I pushed the kids to critique, asking them to describe what they wanted to see more of, what didn't work for them, what excited them, and what they noticed. This can be scary stuff in the presence of folks you don't necessarily want to bare your soul to and for... It is work. Let us ask kids to see the fun in the work, to see the work in the fun.

Building Community - Park Street Style

2009-11-15T16:56:00.000-08:00

I've been blessed to dance and play with the young folks and their teachers at Park Street School in Springfield, VT this past week and will continue moving with them through this week. Jan Rounds, the school's best-ever guidance counselor who has a massage chair in her office, helped to bring me in the dance with all the students while exploring the this month's theme: RESPECT. I go from kindergarten to 5th grade making sculptures, leading through space with different body parts, and calming our bodies down with deep breaths.

The kids are awake and ready to rock when I come into class, often surprising me with their willingness to take risks. Enthusiastic responses make me want to hunker down and stay with these groups the whole year, exploring what we could do if we had the opportunity to dance every week, but I hold these precious weeks close to me heart, breathing in life at this sweet school.

The Rutland Herald featured the residency on this Saturday's front page. Check it out here.

And because inspiration comes in many forms...

2009-10-21T15:31:00.000-07:00

Keeping Things Whole

by Mark Strand

In a field

I am the absence

of field.

This is

always the case.

Wherever I am

I am what is missing.

When I walk

I part the air

and always

the air moves in

to fill the spaces

where my body’s been.

We all have reasons

for moving.

I move

to keep things whole.

Year 2: Life without internet...

2009-10-21T15:17:00.000-07:00

Mmm... How sweet it is to settle in at the public library for a few minutes and update a sorry little blog that barely reflects just how much dancing is happening in southern Vermont. My home in Springfield is occupied by a great family that includes a young dancer at the Dance Factory and I have made my way over to Chester - ten minutes from the still up-and-coming metropolis that is Springfield - to live on a town farm with sheep, pigs, chickens, a turkey, Tasha the cat, and Sean the tall teacher farmer man. Although we have a slew of animals that this little vegetarian gets a kick out of, we are without internet, and I miss the opportunity to write regularly. I do relish the limited access to my overwhelming e-mail inbox.

But fall brings back paper-writing for the kids and I find myself craving written reflection of all the movement that is carrying me through my days, months, and apparently years in this country home of mine.

So far... fall has been full of yoga dance with Ms. Rebecca. We danced in Cavendish and are about to start a new session in Chester. The Dance Factory welcomes middle school modern and cradles me practically every day with teaching, taking class, and Nutcracker rehearsals. Family Dance continues regularly and the libraries are dancing as well. School residencies are up and running, including working with Springfield High School's Performance class on a site-specific dance in the lobby of the school and folk dancing with Russian and German classes. And... gulp... dance team? Who knew varsity coaching would be in my future... More soon, hopefully with pictures and video too.

Little Prince, Crane-Flying, and Bright-my-face please

2009-08-20T12:34:00.001-07:00

Ain't no opera like opera in Vermont come summertime when the church is hot and the singers are sweet. The Little Prince sounds like a ride through the green mountains when each peak leaves you wondering why we drive on anything but dirt roads. Professional drove and flew in from New York and Texas while our kids hailed from Chester, Ludlow, Springfield, and many other little towns to preview Rachel Portman's opera before we rock in full-length come January. The Londonderry Church provided an easy, comforting rehearsal space and the fantastic Saturday farmers' market gave us a full house before we packed up and performed at Grace Congregational in Rutland.

Summer choreographing proved to be kind to me. I found myself enamored with the singers and the children were so playful and ready that often they choreographed for me. After directing the past couple years, I appreciated the opportunity to see the whole production as both a collaborator and audience member, feeling fortunate to learn from master Diana Stugger as she pulled together scenes in quick days.

I am reminded in this time where resources feel limited that when people give a little and put their heart into their work, life can feel pretty gosh darn abundant. Artistic directors Nan and Lise have made a one-of-a-kind creation that many of us are blessed to experience again and again.

Ash and Rebecca do dance and yoga

2009-08-17T11:18:00.000-07:00

I took a yoga class in Peru this week with some snazzy singers and found myself thinking sweet thoughts of our crew of yoga dancers who participated in Yoga/Dance with myself and Ms. Rebecca Salem (check out her blog at http://yogayourself.blogspot.com/). This class was a new adventure in exploring the connection between our internal and external selves in the Chester Andover Elementary School Library, summertime style. What a gift it was to co-teach and feel refreshed and inspired by a woman so dedicated to her craft... as well as spend my mornings walking from the farm downtown to play and move with young folk I grew to deeply adore. We moved from centering exercises to space walks around the room to sun salutations and poses to improvisation across the carpeted well-loved library floor. The kids made choreography every day: creating a group phrase where every child included a movement, linked poses based on secret messages from the animal poses in yoga, and opposite explorations (hot/cold, slow/fast, left/right). Families came of the last day to partner up and learn a little more about their moving young ones.

I swear I did not hurt this dear child...

Families connecting their way across the floor...

More to come thanks to a grant from the Cavendish Community Fund. Rebecca and I will be teaching Tuesdays afternoons, free of charge to the young folks of that community.

Breaking Rules

2009-06-04T09:53:00.001-07:00

Rachel, Jess, Eliza, and I find ourselves making and breaking rules Wednesday evening when we gather to improvise and choreograph. The sun is still bright, the downtown traffic lights starting to work (although the promise of more construction looms in Springfield's future), and it almost feels like summer in the way we enter maybe carefree into the dance studio...

Mirroring with Rules
What's important to think about when mirroring?
slow, eye contact, how are you responding to your partner

Leader:
Cannot move your feet
Do not make eye contact
MUST make eye contact
Cannot move your arms
Much always be changing levels
Eye contact with another person
Don't know who is leading
Pushing away the floor

My partner is breaking rules and making me feel like less of the rebelrouser than I believe I am. And I like her for it.

Pathways
What do you hear and think about when I say pathways?
yellow brink road, getting from one point to another, a straight line, jagged

Start by choosing one pathway and move along it by walking. Explore other forms of locomotion. When you are ready, BREAK, and switch to a new pathway, trying to allow yourself time to explore each pathway and perhaps returning to past pathways.

Break the Rule
Everyone is following the same directions but one person must always be breaking the rule.

Rules:
Start by just walking.
Add arms.
Move in slow motion.
Pick up tempo.
Spin.
Jump.
Move at a low level.
High level.

Come get the bench...

Choreography: Sit Down
Make a dance where no one can leave the bench.

My kiddos are prop-obsessed and tonight I see why as they rediscover a tool I thought I knew well only to be surprised by legs coming down, seeing each other from different heights, and bodies being lifted. This dance is quiet with loud moments and I want them to make it again but different. And they kindly break my rules without alienating me.

Driving home

2009-06-04T09:39:00.000-07:00

My aunt visited Vermont while I was staying at her house in Richmond, MA this week and came home praising the spot where I-91 leaves Massachusetts and finds its way winding through hilly southern Vermont. I feel my shoulder blades sink deep as I pass this spot today, leaving the Berkshires for my Springfield heartspot. I leave something good down here in the rural, picturesque towns of Sheffield and New Marlborough and feel myself smiling thinking of little bodies jumping from one array to the next as 2nd graders dip their toes into multiplication and the challenge of finding the biggest foot in a group of fifth graders to make me the largest possible area to dance in during math.

I have been treated well by these teachers, students, and Jane of Flying Cloud who is so obviously in love with living, breathing, realizing integration of arts and other curricular subjects. I found myself sitting around mini elementary school tables again, debriefing with teachers about their experiences dancing math with me and their students, and talking about how to improve my practice, develop ideas further, and what it means to be 9 and a student these days. You would never know that the end of school is right around the corner the way these folks talk about the learning and doing that is happening in their classrooms. For a moment, it feels like September when the possibilities for what will happen in school this year are rich and overwhelming.

But I cross state lines and look forward to the summer season as the lushness that is my home state envelops me and says, "Welcome home."

Burnin' Up: Sat morning love affairs

2009-06-01T13:45:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning, in a slightly overeager attempt to clean the house, I found myself picking up the stove coils I had just used to make myself tea. The minor blistering was almost immediate and I found myself sighing as I ran cold water over my hot, hot, hot finger and thumb. The burn served multiple purposes - a reminder to slow down and think through my movements a little more as well as inspiration for family dance, which I had avoided planning by cleaning instead.

I nursed my hand with an icy beverage as I unlocked the dance studio Saturday morning, always wondering who will show up for these random gatherings of young folks and their elders every few weeks. The music was playing when I found myself sweetly surprised by a mother/daughter set, a mom with her just walking son and prancing daughter, and a friend with a student from her school. We gathered and met each other, waking up our bodies with gentle tapping and hand rubbing (my blisters just barely survived), exploring shapes at different levels, twisting and stretching. It felt good to move in the company of these folks. I sometimes find my insecurities early in the morning on these family dance days, wondering if I'll find something comforting to offer these folks during the beginning on their weekend together, and yet they always come eager to fill the studio with their own dancing joy.

My burn showed up later in class. I told the young ones my story and they quickly responded with stories of their own burns and we moved like we were hot, hot, hot before feeling the opposite coldness in our fingertips, our tummys, and our legs. And then we found our own opposites, or opposites of sorts - in and out, fast and slow, ocean and sky - and brought them to life, moving with our loved ones and teaching our new friends. I wanted to thank these creatures of movement for welcoming me to class, for inviting me into their moving worlds, and for letting me in some way feel like part of the families they were trying to build and love in their attendance of family dance.

So I do. Thank you.

Berkshires: Moving mathematically

2009-05-26T12:41:00.000-07:00

Am I allowed to write a blog post in a different state if the landscape is still rich with green and hilly attempts at mountains and small towns that disappear into back roads? Hope so because the wifi is good and I'm feeling fully charged after cafe caffeine. I'm in Lenox, the town of Tanglewood fame with nearby Kripalu housing yogis and transformation-seekers, after spending the morning at New Marlborough Central School and the afternoon at Under Mountain Elementary in Sheffield, MA. The Berkshires are pristine, but if you veer off route 7 for long enough you'll find what's left of the milltowns that feel near and dear to downtown Springfield. I drive hard and thorough, using this Mass getaway as an opportunity to put some more miles on the bright red Camry without feeling too guilty about my carbon footprint.

But what a day! In grad school, we have these dreamy classes where we imagine best case scenarios for artists working in schools with luxious amounts of time to co-plan with classroom teachers and walk around the spaces you'll be using before you even breathe in the same room as the children you'll be art-making with. And somehow, I got myself a gig that not only embraces this idea but is wanting to believe it is a necessary first step to good work. I found myself sharing a little table with little chairs (brightly colored and plastic) in the hallways of a rural school with about 80 kids in multi-age classrooms making explicit connections between math concepts and dance-making. Fractions became opportunities to split up classroom spaces while multiplication arrays became moving bodies row by row. All of this is in theory of course. Tomorrow we open the classroom doors and invite the kids in to jump around, think around, and mess it all up for us.

I drove south a wee bit for the afternoon to actually teach, a one-time shot with a fourth grade class whose teacher gave me a rockstar introduction while handing over masking tape we would use to break her classroom into eighths. Teaching felt good after a morning of talking. The kids gave me oxygen and my pumping blood made me a happy mover. We explored 8 counts of music, making movements for 1/8 counts, 2/8 counts, 4/8 counts, and finally an 8/8 count movement. These fractions dances demand more but the time passed so quickly. How sweet it is to be wanting more though, right? And the tape is staying on the floor.

well-(movin')-ness week

2009-05-22T18:11:00.000-07:00

If I had to do it all over again, would I give up my castle on a hill in Spring-a-ling Springfield for the bohemian rhapsody of work and live Exner Block in Bellows Falls? No. Although I imagine different scenarios driving past bright windows full of making-it-now art where I knock on my neighbor's door to find her covered in charcoal and spend my mornings dancing in the street, I find myself happy to return home to makeshift small-town suburbia this evening after a dancing adventure in BF.

Mind you, the Bellows Falls grit is easy to pick out from the fingernails of children who grow up there. I find the comfort of my own struggling town in choppy haircuts and new names like 'Justus' and 'Angel.' I met every child at Bellows Falls Central Elementary, a K-4 school boxed between residential streets, which shares a playground with the town's YMCA. And I fell in love like only teachers who feel they know kids before they know kids really can.

The school nurse, Anita, invited me in to dance with these young ones as part of their Wellness Week and I found myself rolling on the floor, sculpting little bodies, and pulling imaginary strings as I bonded with a new batch of kids in an unknown school. I keep waking up in these small schools: These kids are way less inhibited than I want to believe. I'm ready to talk down the emo-fourth grade boy who preaches dance equals gay in order to start his own mini-revolution and instead find this child showing me new ways to think about moving my elbow through space. I want to watch them grow up into dancers who know their bodies as capable and curious. I want to sit back and let them take over, to remind me how little I know of my form. I find myself craning my neck to see more, stepping on their toes in attempts to guide them, and getting lost in the possibility of limitless movement. But I wake up with so-and-so won't partner with so-and-so and to "I'm bored" becoming a fashion statement. Neither lasts long.

Today I ate my lunch in the sunshine, hoping to burn slightly as I longingly crave the desert. It was quiet. This was my break from children so I read a little after I finished my salad. The fourth graders who started my day with go-go-go talking competitions ran outside to catch the sun too before their own lunch. One stringy-haired, skinny-legged blond child found herself enamoured with my leftover salad bits and I told her to indulge herself. It is this moment, when we talk about the dancing, our families, and school in general that I feel a dull ache deep in my chest... a reminder that this child, these children, this school, and this town aren't mine, but merely holding me as I visit.

This ain't no small town dance recital... except it is.

2009-05-14T14:27:00.001-07:00

Mother's Day is for the the Moms, but in Springfield it is also for the dancers. May 9th and 10th welcomed the Dance Factory's spring recital with epic dance adventures filling both days to the max almost beat by large audiences who say, "Yeah. We'll take this," and cheer, baby cheer.

I take moments in between costume changes backstage at the high school that left me craving new beginnings to notice the kids that let me call them my students own their dancing bodies and claim my naive attempts at choreography for themselves. This is daring. This is confidence. This is a desire to let people in and give them a chance to see what you are all about. And I realize I have much to learn about what these moving', groovin' bodies and minds are all about.

I felt community in my dirty toes, my sore lower back, and my searching-for-air chest as I made my way out to greet the people I see in school, in the grocery store, after rehearsal during the quiet time before I close my eyes. I know dance in some ways, but these people tell me about dance in new ways. And I'm a'lis'enin'.

Spring Dance

2009-05-07T09:11:00.001-07:00

Classes at the Dance Factory for movers and groovers interested in all things modern...

Class meet for five weeks and cost $40.

Beginning Wednesday, May 13th from 6-7pm
Choreography/Improvisation
... time for exploration, play, and dance-making ...

Beginning Thursday, May 14th from 7-8pm
Modern
... welcome multiple levels for a reflective and energizing class ...

Mmm. Sweet dancing.

slow dance

2009-05-02T18:57:00.000-07:00

...In the midst of it all I am reminded what it means to move when the deadline is not fast approaching and the children are not waiting for genius.

There is quiet and the floor is malleable and grace is something innate in the way space succumbs to body. The answer comes in following the movement while it leads to the discovery of a new sense. In these moments, the ache of not being enough is cradled by the realization of that being just what one needs.

And this makes it easier, more necessary to love the day to day explorations in the company of ever-changing, ever-questioning young folks who don't let me rest too easy in my own understanding of what it means to move...

Chester Contra Dance

2009-03-31T11:33:00.000-07:00

Don't miss it...

Picturing America: Dance Style

2009-03-31T11:14:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed leading a workshop exploring art through movement at an event in Concord, NH yesterday exploring the possibilities for collaboration and interdisciplinary connections in a project called Picturing America. This event was sponsored by the above organization and it funding by the National Endowment for the Humanities, which the intention of helping students and citizens "gain a deeper appreciation of our country's history and character through the study and understanding of its art."

Check out the project here.

I enjoyed spending time with the following images:

Looking Down at Yosemite Valley, California, 1865
Albert Bierdstadt

American Landscape, 1930
Charles Sheeler

Fallingwater, 1935-1939
Frank Lloyd Wright

Cityscape 1, 1963
Richard Diebenkorn

Brooklyn Bridge, 1919-1920
Joseph Stella

... before leading this eclectic group of teachers, artists, historians, academics, and humanists in the following activity...

Main Activity: Time and Space Tableaux

Break into groups and share images - each group receives one image to focus their work, movement, and conversation on. Begin by asking participants to create a tableaux of some part of their piece of art using their bodies. They can attempt to represent a piece of the image or the whole image. Encourage group members to take turns viewing the tableaux from the outside to get a better idea of what their statues may look like to observers.

The second tableaux will focus on an artist’s earlier version of this image. What happened before the image we see now? Were the lines simpler, the space more open? Did the image start small and become bigger? Did the artist focus on one piece that developed into the image we see now? Did the image start as something completely different?

The third tableaux will focus on reinventing the form. What theme/element of this picture has your group focused the most on? How lines connect? The context of the image or the space the image exists within? Change it. Make it something different. Show us something new.

If time, participants can find ways to move through tableaux to tableaux. If not, each group will share in a sequence of their choice, their 3 tableaux. Allow for questions, comments, conversation after each group or after all groups have shared depending on time constraints.

Debrief: What, if any, nuances to these works of art did you have through playing with them kinesthetically? What did you learn about movement exploring it through the lens of art? What were the major themes that came up for you during these activities?

If only we were encouraged to experience interconnectivity more often...

Moving Opera: Kids invited

2009-03-21T19:36:00.000-07:00

Opera Theatre of Weston's January's performances of "Hansel and Gretel" included local kids as singers in the children's chorus and dancing as Angels and the Witch's cat, Safronia (remember Eliza from an earlier post?).

Check out the review here at the Rutland Herald.

Getting psyched for next year's "The Little Prince." You're invited too, you know.

Family Dancing

2009-03-21T19:15:00.000-07:00

Anneka is 2 1/2 and Aria is 4. The bell sounds of their names are reflected in their whisper running straight to the big girl barres on the far edge of the dance studio, where their little girl bodies dangle, feet pointed, knees in action. Their mother Erica tilts her head and sighs, knowing that bringing them to the center of the room will happen only after they've played the parts of the older kids they find so awe-inspiring.

Today it is spring. We are greeted with sunshine and melting snow, even though the end of March, April, and perhaps even May could snow in store for us in our corner of southern Vermont. We celebrate by sharing our favorite spring things... jumping in mud puddles, pedaling around the airport on bicycles, watching things grow, and playing outside. We sculpt our bodies into flowers, bikers, and puddle-splashers, watching our statues come to life before dizzying ourselves with an extra run around the room.

"Birds they fly and birds they rest.
Which pretty birdy do you like best?"

We practice flight, exploring different wing shapes as we glide through space, and then find ourselves resting in different positions on the dirty marley floor. Our birds quickly morph into other animals as we perch ourselves on a tree to end our poem dance, which we repeat over and over again, finding rhythm in repetition.

As Erica and I rub our hands together and place them on different body parts, quieting our bodies, little Anneka and Aria use their mother as a jungle gym. Erica tells me this is the most practical part of class - learning to find calm in the midst of chaos.

Contra thoughts at 1:14 am

2009-01-31T22:16:00.000-08:00

Although the rest of the 20-something world is perhaps enjoying the peak of their evening at this time, I am returning home, tired and riding a coffee high from my drive back to Springfield, VT from Greenfield, MA, where three teenagers and a 7 year old enjoyed one heck of a contra dance with me. Usually this type of adventure would end with me curling into bed, my deepest thoughts concerning whether the below zero temperatures require me to wear a hat to sleep or not, but tonight my inside's burst not only with the tingling effects of caffeine but also sweet joy.

You see, tonight I watched three girls emerge from their existences as mill-town observers to find themselves surrounded by and active participants in a world where men wear skirts to feel air rush between their legs when they turn and no one says no when asked to dance unless there is a bathroom emergency. I messied myself in attempts to remember steps and follow after months of leading, feeling very much a peer to these teenagers I may have eyed at a distance even recently. There is comfort in this western MA world for me - this is where I spent my undergraduate years and I know these people - and yet being here is a good reminder of how quickly we adapt to the places we live in. The sparkle in my eyes matched Eliza, Shena, Kamryn, and little Shanikwa.

I danced with my lady friends and with another child, El, who at 8 could have taught most people there how to dance in lines, changing partners, twirling and coming together. I also sat and held the head of the child I brought with me, the rest of her body bundled up in a sleeping bag as the night grew late, and I imagined what it would be like to have a child grow up with such comfort in this social, free space. Eliza, Shena, and Kamryn bring a little of this dance home with them, which may be seen in sparkley shoes and vocal attempts to convince their male counterparts to join the party next go around. And I bring home another reminder of happiness found in the firm hand of another pressing against my lower back, relaxed and smiling.

Springfield High School: Making dance moves...

2008-12-17T14:39:00.000-08:00

I am slightly behind on blog posts after the recent purchase of a video camera has kept me from writing. I have instead been focusing more on filming and learning, once again, everything I still don't know about my computer. Or perhaps I am responding to the recent ice and snowstorms that are causing school delays and cancellations by writing on paper with a pen, a comforting act often neglected because of the ease e-mail and internet search engines provide.

The media you will see here is documenting my fall residency at Springfield High School in my lovely hometown. I worked with P.E. classes, a chorus class, and Russian and German students teaching and learning modern dance, choreography, social dance a la Lawrence Welk, and native folk dances. Between helping kids take weight in their arms and wooing students with images of lederhosen, we managed to both learn choreography and create new choreography, helping students see themselves as movers and dance-makers. I was blessed with overwhelming support from staff who welcomed me into their classrooms and often participated with their students, which created environments rich with play, laughter, and sometimes confusion.

Earlier in this blog, I posted a link to an edition of the Green Horn, the high school's newspaper with an article on this particular residency. In this post, I include an interview from the school's production of Green Horn Live, a news broadcast produced by students every Friday. I am indebted to students Hanna Reeves and Tom Benton for this interview, all video clips, and their stellar behind-the-scenes tech work. Also for their cheerfulness and and enthusiasm. Note Ashley in ballet class, something I do more than any of my urban modern dance friends may have ever imagined possible for this barefoot goddess.

Also included are clips from the school's recent Empty Bowl Dinner, an evening to raise funds for Springfield's Family Center. The event included a student-cooked meal (made by culinary arts tech students), beautiful student-made pottery, and student performances of music, drama and dance. Here you will see the some of the Russian students performing a Korobushka and some of the German students performing a D'hammerschmledsgselin. Later in the evening P.E. students performed an original piece of choreography based on athletic duets they created together, Eliza Pennell performed a solo she choreographed for our independent study work together, and a few modern dancers from my class at the Dance Factory performed a co-choreographed dance we began in class and completed during a weekend rehearsal together. The night was a sweet treat for me because it allowed me to see the diverse and rich accomplishments of these students and a school that committed to supporting an artist at work for six weeks. I am incredibly grateful to all who made this experience possible, especially the students who opened themselves to trying something that may have felt scary and outside their comfort zone.

I thoroughly enjoy sharing Springfield with these folks.

Vermont State Dance Festival

2008-12-04T12:35:00.001-08:00

I took some of the ladies from the Dance Factory up to the Vermont State Dance Festival on Novemer 22nd, a day of dance organized by Rebecca McGregor to bring high school students from around the state together to take classes, perform dance for a broader audience than they are most likely used to, and have opportunities to talk about choreography. My co-adult Meegan and I met up with five lovely teenagers, Lauren F., Eliza, Lauren S., Holly, and Jalessah, at the Springfield Dunkin' Donuts at 6 am to stock up on nourishment before the long trip north to Lyndon Institute. Despite the early morning Saturday adventure, these girls seemed excited and perhaps a tad nervous, not quite sure what they were getting themselves into.

We were greeted by a bright, smiling Rebecca immediately upon entering the Institute, our crew impressed by the beauty of this school's campus. We were given folders with class schedules and Rebecca quickly noted that she had split up the girls, hoping they would use this experience to get to know students from other high schools and studios. After a killer Pilates warm-up (I don't think I've worked my abs that slowly since I was a high school student), I followed a couple students into Paul Besaw's modern class. How wonderful it was for me to take modern class! After teaching for the past couple months, I had forgotten how luscious it can feel to experience someone else's take on modern dance, even a more classically-minded class than the one I teach. The students who take my modern class were surprised by the similarities and differences in Paul's class. I was thrilled they were able to experience modern with another teacher, to have their concept of what modern dance is expanded some in a very brief period of time.

We continued taking classes, the kids particularly enjoying hip hop, Lauren F. getting a kick out of salsa. We were entertained by a break dancing performance at lunch, with a fantastic crew of b-boys, sparking a conversation about the recent addition of boys to the girls' own dance team back at their high school. They began recognizing other students. Eliza went to a summer program with someone at the festival. There were students from schools their dance team competed with during the school year. I felt some of them start to feel like they were part of dance community broader than just their high school or the Dance Factory. I had a similar experience recognizing teachers I had gone to school with or met at a different dance event. Rebecca organized a post-lunch meeting for all of us to talk about our experiences in our educational institutions, our hopes for the festival experience, and ideas for the future of collaborative work. It is so easy to think of yourself as isolated working as a teacher in rural areas. This time and event was a reminder of the plethora of dance that exists in these small spaces and the creative minds and bodies making those experiences possible.

Although I performed briefly at the festival (a newly choreographed solo you gotta make it up highlighting my experiences working with high school students in Springfield decked out in cowgirl boots and skinny jeans) it was the student performances that were the most compelling part of the festival for me and for at least some of the students who made the journey north. The afternoon consisted of a facilitated discussion of student-performed and sometimes student-choreographed dance with students offering their opinions about choreographic structure and performance quality of the work. How exciting it was to hear kids talk critically about what they were seeing on stage! And how fantastic it was to see such diverse dances performed by students from all over Vermont. The Dance Factory ladies and I had a very spirited conversation about the work during dinner.

Lauren F. and Eliza were already planning what the Dance Factory would bring to next year's festival on the car ride home. Thank you Rebecca for providing this opportunities for dance students and their teachers in Vermont. A powerful example of a rural dance revolution.

House dances: Inspiration

2008-12-02T18:39:00.000-08:00

In my wallet is a little card I stole from Zoe, my artistic/life-friend partner currently rockin' organic farms in Italy via WOOF, with a little angel reading, "Inspiration." I hold this close to me wherever I go as a reminder that the spaces we exist within are never empty.

My kitchen serves as a makeshift dance studio. I have a key to the Dance Factory, less than a mile from my house, but when I feel like waking up and moving or tumbling from ballet class to a place of improvisation, I open iTunes and find myself falling, rising, risking, leaning, caking the dirty yellow floor with the weight of motion. The door frames become makeshift lovers, the counter tops turn into floor surfaces, and I can't help but wonder what neighbors walking their dogs at night see when they peer into my windows.

I have found a way to keep warm during cold Vermont nights.

Zoe and I had little money to rent a theater in Cambridge so we held shows in our house - open house dance productions. Now home spaces feel so intimately connected to possible dance performances that I find myself sitting in different corners of the living room, watching imaginary dances.

I am ready. And students are ready. I'm looking forward to my home become a performance space again. Keep posted for the next open house dance production in late January 2009. Zoe, when you come home, we'll have another one just for you.

Impov: Fall break

2008-12-01T14:23:00.000-08:00

Although this class occurred a while ago, I wanted to share it with a larger audience, because it was a turning point for my modern class at the Dance Factory. After checking in with the group of students in Friday afternoon modern, I decided to hold an improvisation/choreography class during fall break, an optional dance experience for those who would be around and wanted to get moving. This would be an opportunity to focus less on technique and more on creativity... to encourage participants to see themselves as active dance-makers.

Class:

Cathy Nicoli warm-up - personal favorite that includes shifting weight from one foot to the other and pushing one's arms in all directions

Follow the leader warm-up - alternating leaders, moving through space, self-decided how long one could lead

Moving shape - in groups of 3 or 4 one person makes a shape, another uses the positive space around that person's body to make another shape - continues until everyone has made a shape. First person leaves shape, observes, and comes in to make a new shape.

Space-filling duets - moving with partner, focus is on filling each other's space... two people exploring positive and negative space, focus less on shape and more on movement

Create rise and fall duets - continue thinking about filling/working with positive/negative space

Perhaps the most beautiful moment in this class was participants realizing there were multiple ways of interpreting and creating choreography. Some focused on using movement as a source of inspiration or found specific movements compelling in and of themselves, while others took a more narrative approach to both dance-making and dance-viewing, finding the stories or emotions inherent in their experience with dance. The class encouraged a plethora of choreography ideas for both myself and the participants.

Meet Eliza

2008-11-16T12:37:00.000-08:00

Eliza is bright and so open to the world, I often find myself wanting to reach into the back of her head and climb into her mind, swimming through her adolescent glory to better understand passion, dance, and our ability to share what we see with others. I have known her only for a brief period of time. When she was young, perhaps mid-elementary school years, I assisted her jazz teacher and ran around doing jazz squares and kick-ball-chain's with what I remember as a very serious child. I didn't re-meet her until this school year. She is junior at Springfield High School and frequents the Dance Factory (where I teach modern) every day where she just picked up ballet only a couple of years ago. She is fearless in my modern class and a quirky, innovative improviser.

However, I have learned the most about Eliza through an independent study she designed this year at the high school. I serve as her adviser, but mostly work alongside her, as we explore modern dance history though the choreographers who made it. Together we read, watch clips, and talk. Eliza makes her own choreographic studies in response to, inspired by, or as visions of possibility based on our meandering strolls through the lives and work of these rebel rousers. I, in turn, am given the opportunity to see the past as something fresh, to rediscover what has led to my own evolution as a dance-maker, and to grow as a teacher and student beside one who has an innate gift for both.

Here I share her first writing assignment from earlier this school year: "What do you see when you watch dance?" Keep posted for clips of her choreography. Thoughts?

Watching Dance

by Eliza Pennell

I see the basis for life when I watch dance: I see motion. Dance shows me anything under the sun, anything in life. I see myself, and I recognize people I know. I see betrayal, sexual tension, and exhilaration. I see the monotonous comfort of a physics lesson. I see no rules and I see broken rules. I see fairies and soccer games. I see memories: my favorite place to lie in the grass, my favorite childhood movie, my friend's funeral for her hamster. I see hope and sadness. I see fun. I see familiar motions, magnified and transformed into something beautiful---walking, kicking, turning away, nodding, stretching, falling. Dance can tell me a story; it can show me an image. It can persuade me.

When I watch dance, I see the power of the performer. I see adrenaline, thrill and strength; I see the superhuman quality performers possess while they're onstage. I see sinuous limbs and taut muscles. I see careless precision and careful recklessness. I see the mask that is sometimes necessary for performers to hide behind. I also see performers shedding those masks, becoming more themselves onstage than they are backstage. I see what art means to artists; I see the things they can't say but need to release somehow. I see myself. I see the responsibility that comes with creating and showing art, but I also see the freedom of it. I see my own responsibility and freedom as an aspiring artist.

When I watch dance, I see my future. Sometimes I see success, but sometimes I see failure. Sometimes I see myself soaring like an eagle across a brightly lit stage; other times, I see myself crying over broken toenails and broken dreams. Dance shows me my own passion, but it also shows me the risk that comes with that passion, the fear that passion won't be enough.

When I watch dance, I see everything in opposition. I see honesty and truth. I see lies. I see conformity along with rebellion. I see freedom; I see entrapment. I see uniformity and individuality. I see fluidity and rigidity. I see an illustration of failure only with the success of a choreographer and dancer. I see chaos only with the precision and order of a well-planned piece of choreography. I see that sometimes a pause, a moment of stillness, is the most powerful, resonating movement in a dance. I see that dance requires decision---but is only meaningful with intuition. I see how complex dance can be, yet how simple and natural it's always been.

There's something else I see when I watch dance---but I don't really know how to see it. I don't know what it looks like. Does it even look like anything? Everything? It's a sense of fullness, as though my body is simply to small to contain everything swirling around inside of me. I can see the wonder of life, the beauty of the human body. Most importantly, I see the inherent creativity and passion the human race is graced with. I see the emotional trigger one small motion of one small person on one small stage can produce. This trigger could make me cry; it could make me smile. I see the magic with which art brings about change in a person---or even change in the world. I see a gap in the dancer, a space that's usually occupied by a filter between the mind and body. I see the glory of not having to think, of simply moving. I see movement when I watch dance; I therefore see life. I see a celebration of life. I see the pride in being an artist, in being someone who strives to better themselves.

Sometimes when I watch dance, I don't know what I'm seeing. But in any case, I'm seeing.

Student Paper Cover Story

2008-11-12T11:54:00.000-08:00

Times are good when the dancer-at-school gets to share the front page with an Obama win. Check in out:

http://shs.ssdvt.org/Pages/SpringVT_SHSGreen/back/Layout.pdf

This is the school newspaper of one of the high schools I am working at, Springfield High School, of which I am a proud alum. It's an impressive example of quality student work. The paper is overseen by Mike Janiszyn, perhaps the greatest English teacher to grace the planet. Spend some time with it if you can and notice Eliza Pennell's column. More about her to come in the near future...

Seeking Movers and Groovers

2008-11-11T13:39:00.000-08:00

Choreographer and community artist Ashley Hensel-Browning is currently looking for people of all ages and backgrounds to participate in an intergenerational dance group based in Springfield. Participants will take class, learn, and make dances with each other, exploring how movement can be used as a source of expression and connection across generations. Together we will create original works that will be shared in future dance concerts. Dancers of all ages, abilities, and backgrounds are desired.

Ashley has danced with members of the Dance Generators, an intergenerational dance company based in Amherst, MA and currently works as a teaching artist in schools throughout Vermont and Massachusetts. She is co-founder and artistic director of ZoAsh Dance, a modern dance company that explores contemporary dance-making in a variety of venues that encourage audience engagement. Her work is often community-based, attempting to bridge connections between different populations of people. She has performed at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston, MA, Mass MOCA in the Berkshires, and at the International Festival of Art and Ideas in New Haven, CT. She also teaches modern at the Dance Factory in Springfield.

No previous dance experience necessary. But honestly, who really has no dance experience? If you or your loved ones love to move and may be interested in participating, please contact Ashley at dancewithashley@gmail.com for more information.

Westminster Center School: Choreographers in the making

2008-11-09T20:41:00.000-08:00

Meet some of the students of Westminster Center School's choreography class of Fall 2008.These 1st through 4th grade students and I four times over the course of four weeks and explored different elements of dance such as shape, space, time, and effort, encouraging students think like artists and develop their imaginative capacity and ability to see in new ways.

The first and second graders learned about moving at low, middle, and high levels and created cycle dances about leaves, caterpillars and butterflies, and garden plants. The third and fourth graders worked together to create dances which explored different ways of moving over and under each other, as well as choreography based on ecosystems and different kinds of work they learned about during a recent fieldtrip to Fort #4.

They shared these dances with the entire school on November 4th during an all-school meeting. This project was funded in part by the Westminster Center School as well as Extending the Dance Map, a tri-state project in VT, NH, and ME that works to encourage and increase dance opportunities for students in rural schools.

6 Hillcrest Rd: A choreographer's homecoming

2008-11-02T07:19:00.000-08:00

I read blogs of my friends exploring the world in places I have never been: Africa, the Dominican Republic, and soon there will be a farmer in Italy. I live vicariously through their blog posts and imagine myself teaching in Lesotho with Sara, taking pictures of children or dancing in the rain in the DR with Aislinn, or writing music in Alaska with Amy. I am intrigued by these foreign places, but at the same time, am often touched by the similar experiences I share with these folks exploring art with a diversity of people in attempt to understand that which keeps us disconnected and that which connects us. My own entry into the world of blogging is to share my experiences as an arts believer and builder in an unlikely place: Springfield, Vermont, an old mill town supporting around 9,000 residents as well as boasting the title "Home of the Simpsons."

I find myself nestled in a small, one-story home that cradled me for the first three years of my life, working in a studio with a woman who opened me to dance, and a high school that challenged me so much that my only choice was to return. This is not my hometown, Cavendish, a much smaller town 25 minutes up the road, but a community that taught me about art without acknowledging its impact on me. So I return with a sense of commitment and purpose - to learn from the place that so supported me even in its challenges and to be part of that for a new generation.