happy international women's day

                                            

now, any time a song comes on she starts to bounce to the beat.
now, any time a song ends she asks for "más" while doing the sign language gesture for "more"

its as if she learned to love dance while still in utero; learned to move with the music when i danced around a room and her infant body, in fetal position, thus danced inside of me

now sometimes she calls me over to the dance floor.
bending down to the ground she touches it with her index finger as if to say "dance right here"

other times she is oblivious to her surroundings; makes no request for any dancing partners.
she just gets lost in the rhythm and in her body's own movement.

i love witnessing those moments even more than i love dancing with her

it's funny to have a daughter that looks so unlike me.... her light eyes, light hair, pale skin....her colors are all from her father; making me look like a beloved babysitter.

there are few things that one can point to and say "she gets that from her mom".

i like to think her love of dance is one of them though

for now i am so proud of this little person, and am in awe of the idea that she will one day be a woman.

in recognition of international women's day i honor all women, the women in those women's lives and the women who are yet to be.

improv - dance- life

in school i loved improvising but found it to be terrifying at times. there was something so vulnerable about putting yourself out there, unrehearsed.

the other day i took little m to a improvisational dance workshop. and again, i was terrified:

1. to be improvising again after so much time away from it 

2. to have no guarantees about how it would go (with m as a spectator). 

at first, all the things i could have imagined going wrong did. we got there late because i had written down the wrong address and don't have a smart phone to quickly look anything up. when we finally did arrive, the group was deep into a quiet and meditative warm up - everyone with their eyes closed and the second i put m's car seat down she started screaming. 

whoops. 

there was a lot of whining and crying during that first half of the class as i made attempts to participate in the various exercises. finally at one point m suddenly suspended her separation anxiety complex and got interested in exploring the space and checking out the people. i was finally free to fully participate in the class' culminating exercise: a group improvisation. 

this group format i find most scary because there is no way of anticipating what will happen; you are forced to be very much in the moment. and of course, this is the dance/life/child rearing lesson - the most valuable moments are happening in the present. you just have to show up, pay attention, tell the truth and be open to the outcome. it's scary and rewarding. 

dance again

so glad i had that ugly experience a couple of weeks ago at koresh, otherwise i would have never found my new favorite dance class.

for half the price, half the number of students and a half of an hour longer, i found a class that is monumentally superior to the class i was taking earlier this year. no disrespect to my former teacher, but she was not a dance educator. my new teacher is. she teaches at temple. in fact, a couple of her students were taking this non-temple class last night in an old church (which made me feel a bit like an old woman, but that's ok/true in the dance world). it made me miss my college dance classes; miss this more comprehensive approach to dance.

the language of a dance educator to describe movement is at times technical, and other times a series of comical analogies. this is the way i have grown to appreciate and understand movement; both in my own body and in other people's. i didn't realize that this was such a basic and fundamental part of what was missing from the classes at koresh.

this new class also kicked my ass- both physically and mentally (it's been a while since i have been asked to, "now try that whole combination on your left side" - so good for your brain and your body!)

hoping this is the first of many steps toward having dance become a more significant part of my life again.

hard head

after taking dance class for months at koresh i went in for class last week and was stopped at the front desk.

"you are 15 minutes late... we're not supposed to let you in after ten past"
"really?! i didn't know that"
"well...ugh...do you need to change or can you go right in?
"i can go right in!" (i can change in the corner of the room)
"ok but hurry up because we're not supposed to let you in...go fast! go!"

this was after months of always arriving at least 10 minutes late to class. i get out of work at six, and class starts at six...so i've never been on time

during class i apologized to the teacher for being late. she said,
"no big deal"
"oh, because the people at the front desk gave me a really hard time"
"oh, don't worry about it! it's fine"

fast forward to yesterday. it was raining, so i drove to work/class. parked right outside the studio for $5 to get there as quickly as possible. i had two classes left on my ten-class-card that was due to expire that very same day. i was considering the idea of staying for two classes just to make good use of the card - but the truth was that i was exhausted and my body hurt from work done over the weekend. one class would be enough.

when i walked through the front door at 6:13 i was reminded that i was late
"you can't go in, class already started"
"oh, i asked the teacher and she said she didn't mind"
"who?"
"the teacher"
"well, it's our policy that you can't come in once the class is ten minutes in - and last time i was just being nice so... i can't let you in"
"but it's my last day to use my class card"
"well if i let you in then i have to let everyone in"
that's a dumb and not true (didn't say it, just thought it)
after a bit more of the same the lady at the front desk suggested that i go out and have dinner and take the later class. even though i had considered taking that class, and even though i had just seconds before paid for parking anyway, and even though i could never again use the two classes i had left on the card...i was so annoyed and thought the policy to be so stupid and unfair that on principle i left. and i'm pretty sure i will never go back.

architecture of loss

is the name of a new stephen petronio dance
i haven't seen it, but i like the name

my dance teacher

today said:
you learn more from failing than from getting it right all the time

fat ballerina

this was the name my older siblings gave me when we were younger. i am not sure where the nickname came from considering that i was neither fat, nor a ballerina, but the name stuck. today, i was reminded of this term of endearment.

for the first time in maybe....8 years?! i went to a dance class. the only one i could find at the time i could go was an "intermediate" ballet class. i was unsure what intermediate meant although i was 95% sure it was above my more appropriately titled "basic" level. when i walked through the door my eyes were greeted by limber thin women each with a leg occupying a more impossible space then the next.

needless to say that the class proceeded (at least for me) like a scene from a comedic movie.  despite that - it was nice to dance again (even if at a level and style that is physically impossible for me).

resolutions

  

despite the fact that last year's resolutions didn't come to fruition (running the nyc marathon and starting to learn russian), i think there is something meaningful about setting goals and articulating them. it is the first step of many in getting something done. i couldn't think of any resolutions this new year's eve, but i have not given up on the idea, even if it comes late. i just saw this video and it felt like the beginning of an idea. what idea? not sure. a dance, a project, a field of study, a hobby of reposting youtube videos...all of the above.

field trip

last night i took my 7th grade spanish class out to see danza contemporánea de cuba at the joyce. we had to leave before the last piece because there was some partial nudity in it. a shame, because i went back in after all my students got picked up and it was the best dance of the evening. not to mention the fact that my students had seen sulkary (first dance of the evening...from the 70s) and while the dancers were clothed during that one, it was so provocative, that a little nipple seemed like no big deal in comparison. despite missing the last dance i think the kids really enjoyed themselves. i liked doing something special/fun with the group. they are awesome kids. i also (like every time i go see a show) forgot how much i love dance.

caught

last night i went to the joyce to see david parsons. the company performed one of its most well-known pieces: caught.

this solo dance utilizes a strobe light impeccably times with the dancer's jumping and leaping to create the illusion that the he is floating in the air. the effect in person is sort of amazing. the video does it no justice because anyone can edit film to look like all kinds of things. believe me when i say this clip has not been edited to trick you (however, it has shortened a 6 minute dance into one minute) but this link is actually what the dance looks like in person.

the timing of the light and the dancer's movement is in fact incredible, but there is a trick. while watching last night i leaned over and told my friend what it was. i think she was pretty annoyed that i gave it away. the power of illusion is strong

return to sasha/return to BAM

the image above is from sasha waltz's new piece entitled tides (gezeiten). unlike her piece entitled bodies (korper) which i saw in college, this one didn't change my life.

perhaps it was due to the fact that in my older age i find it harder to stay completely awake past a certain hour; or maybe it was the gin and tonic before the show that did me in; but it might have just been the way the piece spiraled a little off course that inspired me to nap at 8:30pm in the gilman opera house.

it was a shame. the opening of the dance was so incredibly beautiful and original, and then it became predictably abstract and chaotic. and it made me think - this is why no one comes to see modern dance....

to be totally honest (not a lot of people know that i think this.....) i believe that for the most part, modern dance is annoying and pretentious. there have been only a handful of choreographers/works that i thought were truly wonderful. typically, i prefer performance that utilizes several parts of the human instrument, like the voice and the intellect. i can't get excited about art unless it is presenting some idea/emotion for me to consider, challenge, experience...

typically, straight up "dance" doesn't do that for me. except when made by people like sasha waltz.

despite not loving the piece as a whole - i thought tides had a gorgeous beginning half hour. i remember thinking, "how is it possible that she can still find these new and beautiful things to do with human bodies on stage? when do we run out of 'new' things to do?"

and then i started thinking about how eventually, won't we run out of new dances? new book titles? new recipes? new movie plots?

it was around that time that i started to nod off

between states

when i was in college i made a dance called "collective unconscious". i was interested in psychology - had considered majoring in it (along with a dozen other things that i didn't pursue) and had been reading a couple of books by jung and freud at the time. i was fascinated by the idea that there were things we didn't know we knew - locked away under a layer of this thing called consciousness. even more fascinated still in this idea that the unconscious state was one we shared with others. connecting with people in a way that we could not do otherwise.

What is equally interesting to me is the transition from dreaming into waking from your dream- straddling the two worlds gives you access to both. the overlap is so brief but feels like a burst of enlightenment or something.

i fell asleep on the train this morning. while i don't remember what it was that i was dreaming about, i remember hearing someone saying "excuse me" to someone (not me) over and over again. i wondered why the words kept being repeated. it wasn't until i opened my eyes that i realized it was in fact precisely at me that the woman one seat over was directing her "excuse me". She was trying to get off the train and i was in her way.

pina bausch

last night i went to b.a.m. with my mother to see vollmond by the late and great pina bausch. we have a tradition of going every fall. this year was particularly special/sad because it was the first since the choreographer's absence.

my mother had said, and i agree with her, that one of the things that marks pina bausch's work is the seamless/dreamlike quality to it. it it is hard to distinguish where one section begins and the other ends. the performers (i like this word better because they do more than dance) enter and exit the space sporadically and frequently overlapping. sometimes performers will have an elaborate "scene" on stage. and other times a single person will walk through the space, pausing only briefly to deliver a single line to the audience. these lines are often witty, funny. but the work overall is filled with different kinds of moments - from tragic to absurd.

another thing that marks pina's work for me is the way she utilizes some magnificent material to create the space for her work to exist (one year it was a mountain of roses on the stage - maybe 15 feet tall?) . in vollmond it was a shallow river of water running accross the stage, straddled by a large bolder. The dancers performed, on, under and around the boulder, as well as through and sometimes submerged in the water.

you can see a clip here. the way water elaborates and punctuates every movement is beautiful.

no pina bausch dance would be complete with out striking women in gorgeous dresses. in fact, i think she was one of my inspirations to do a dance about women last year. i always loved the way she portrayed them. and yet i cannot describe how she portrayed them. they were some brilliant balance of elegant, charming, delicate, delightful and independent. (?) maybe a picture will say it better.

the robber

I just came back from seeing another NYFF flick with my two favorite movie critics. Based on a true story, the robber is about a champion marathon runner who happens to also rob banks.

when the movie started i was very tired and restless. i couldn't stop fidgeting and yawning until i gave in - took a mini nap during a quiet scene. i woke up two minutes later refreshed. (sometimes you just need to take the edge off).

perhaps it was due to the fact that there isn't that much dialogue in the movie that my mind had room to wander - because i ended up thinking about a lot of things over the course of my viewing (once i woke up).

i thought about running and how much it has, in the past, served me in symbolic ways - the lessons it teaches me about myself, about the power of endurance, the ability to push your own limits and the benefits of hard work and perseverance. the protagonist of the film is nothing if not a dedicated runner - even trains when he is in prison. then again, what else is he going to do in prison?

i thought about the lovely contrast between all the quiet/slow scenes and the fast/loud/running from the cops complete-with-drumming-soundtrack scenes. it made me think about dance and how much i miss making it.

i also gave a lot of consideration to the leading character. despite being a bank robber and eventually even killing at least one person, i found myself liking him quite a bit (or at least rooting for him some how). he (seemingly) had no real reason to behave the way he did - he just couldn't help the compulsion. i felt a great deal of empathy/sympathy (don't really understand the difference) for him. he didn't know how to stop what he had started. he also didn't know how to express any emotions (didn't smile once throughout the film - even during the love scenes). and yet, i trusted that he did have feelings, they just weren't readily accessible to him. i believe this was confirmed in the final scene of the movie - which was nothing short of beautiful.

perspective

a friend recently told me that i was responsible for changing the way she looked at dance - for getting her interested in it, developing her facility to approach it, and that the work i made and the way i performed somehow stood out to her.

all i could say in response was: "those are really nice things to say..."
i was embarrassed.
i don't always feel like i can/should identify myself as a dancer or as a choreographer.
in fact, several weeks ago someone came up to me at a party and asked if i was a dancer and i simply said "no".

she continued, "because i thought i saw you in a work last weekend in williamsburg...."
"OH YES, that was me..."

where does this inability to define myself come from? lack of confidence? fear of...something? i'm not sure, but sometimes i think it's not a bad idea to try and see yourself through someone else's eyes; they may have some perspective on you that you are unable to have on yourself.

return to poetry

poetry has been coming up a lot recently.

this past weekend i went to a wedding in which a neruda poem was read in both english and spanish during the service. i had forgotten how much i loved reading neruda's poems as a teenager. certain ones i had read so many times that i had unknowingly committed them to memory - puedo escribir los versos mas tristes esta noche...

it was from that same time that i also remember the poet, billy collins coming to share some of his work at my high school. when a student asked what the meaning behind a particular poem was, collins responded that the meaning of a poem was like the scaffold of a building - only necessary in the construction. once completed, both the building and the poem stood independently. (that was the hope anyway).

i loved that idea and found it to be very meaningful when studying dance several years later. one of the most salient differences i find between the art of making dance and the art of writing poetry, is that while both require study, the dancer learns a whole new vocabulary (movement) to show us something we could not have otherwise seen. the poet, on the other hand, utilizes a vocabulary that all of us know (words) and somehow still manages to show us something we would otherwise not have been able to see.

questions for men

several months ago i presented a work entitled "questions for women". i posed a series of 4 questions to women via email and with their responses i began to choreograph a dance.

i have now posed the same four questions to men and have been gathering their responses. it has been interesting to notice trends in both the women's answers and in the men's.

sometimes i think all the stereotypes about gender are bullshit, and other times they seem to be overwhelmingly accurate. i don't like to make/recognize generalizations, but sometimes...the proof is in the pudding (and chances are, that a woman cooked it).

getting a story

i went to the moth last night. the theme was "dues" like, "paying ones dues". i would say that all the stories were at least engaging/interesting/inspiring for those of us that don't really write/perform. and some were fantastic. one woman that shared a story started off by explaining that she had been in the show de la guarda as one of the women that ran up the wall (a show, and moment, i wanted to be in since i saw it my senior year of high school).

the highlight of her story came later on in the retelling of her audition for tarzan on broadway. she described all the classically trained ballerinas she auditioned alongside/against hunching over and ferociously giving their best monkey impressions, and how she too, was trying to come up with special monkey tricks to impress the committee of people auditioning her.

after humiliating herself, she didn't make it into the show, tarzan. she did, however, make a great story out of it. and sometimes (and for the right people i would say all the time) that's even better.

zooming in

for years i've thought about making a dance in which the audience sees only the dancers' legs and feet.

this blog

several years ago i read a book about art in which there was a description about what occurs when a string instrument is played in a room full of other, quiet, string instruments: resonance. the instrument whose string in plucked creates sound waves, vibrations in the air. the air around the quiet string instruments moves with the same frequencies. this causes those instruments to quietly sing out the same note - thus the expression "it resonates" or it "strikes a chord".