Emily Navarra currently resides in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. She shares her experience navigating the world of Vietnamese art and culture through dance.

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What does your current dance practice look like?

I’ve performed solos mostly since living in Southeast Asia. I did a few in Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, but in Vietnam it’s a bit trickier. There are not many places for modern dancers to perform in Vietnam and, in order to perform in a theater, there are many hoops to jump through. Even when you’ve jumped through those hoops, you’re not entirely promised that you’ll actually get to perform. I rarely take class because no one offers modern dance classes here, so I spend four to five days a week training myself in my second bedroom, which I turned into a creative space. This has gone on since I moved here in 2011. To be honest, it’s really challenging to keep myself motivated, but I have no other choice.

How do you fund your practice?

When I was living in Tunisia, I took on a lot of freelance projects in the UK and Europe. All of them covered my transport, accommodation and salary. I’ve done a few larger performances and events in Saigon. I created a festival called The Melting Pot in 2012 which brought art, music and dance together because most of the arts were happening separately when I first arrived. I’m a big fan of collaboration and I wanted to meet like-minded artists and create a platform for people to showcase their talents, as well as myself. This was mostly funded through corporate sponsorship and all of the proceeds went to local orphanages to buy art supplies and musical instruments.

In 2013, I created a collaborative project called Standpoint Theories. The first installment was purely funded by myself. My personal funding comes from teaching movement workshops and teaching English as a second language. The second installment of Standpoint Theories, titled Legends of Vietnam, was funded by a civil society grant I was given from the American Consulate of Ho Chi Minh City for the U.S. Mission to Vietnam’s Small Grants Program to celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Normalization of U.S. – Vietnam Relations in 2015.  I also received donations from family and friends as well as through other artists involved. However, the third and final installment was again funded by myself and, unfortunately, I had to take out a loan to cover the expenses.

What are the benefits and drawbacks to working the way you do?

Everything I’ve set up for myself in Vietnam has been complicated. I discovered that being an American in a foreign country doesn’t lend a great deal of opportunities to find a grant. Illinois is my home state and, in order to get a state grant, the work needs to benefit the state of Illinois to some degree, as well as include a performance there. National grants tend to follow similar guidelines. To find a grant in Vietnam, you need to create work that exhibits benefits to the country as well as cultural exchange. If you want to get corporate sponsorship, expect your show to be branded. That never was appealing to me.

As a foreign artist in Vietnam, it’s crucial to learn about the laws and expect some hidden rules. There are licenses that must be applied for before you can produce any performance or event. This means you have to submit all content of the program, provide lyrics of the music that will be used, submit the music itself, send in passports and home country information of any foreign artist involved, and pay a fee which is expected to be much higher than a local would have to pay. If it’s approved, you make the payment for the license fee and then the cultural police come the night before the opening of your performance. Depending on the content of your performance, they may just watch 10 to 15 minutes and leave, which means everything is okay and your performance can actually happen. However, the final installment of Legends of Vietnam was censored and highly criticized. Was it because I no longer had the support from the American Consulate and was solely on my own again? I don’t know. I was given several ultimatums but chose not to accept any of them, so I had to close Legends of Vietnam.

Freedom of expression is yet to be fully honored in Vietnam (not only for foreign artists but for locals as well). This has been the hardest obstacle to overcome and accept. In Legends of Vietnam, I retold six Vietnamese legends through illustration, animation, original live music and dance. The first legend was the origin of the Vietnamese people and truly embodies the essence of the country’s culture. Legends two through five were known as the Four Immortals. Before major religions were present in Vietnam, the people had developed their own beliefs. As well as worshiping their ancestors, famous craftsmen and heroes, they also worshiped the Four Immortals: Son Tinh, Saint Giong, Chu Dong Tu and the Mother Goddess Lieu Hanh. Son Tinh embodies triumph over natural disasters, especially floods; Saint Giong represents the will to fight off foreign invaders; Chu Dong Tu symbolizes love; and Mother Goddess Lieu Hanh signifies a rich spiritual life. The final legend was about Ba Chua Xu, who represents the power of women and helps them achieve a successful and prosperous life.

In the five years I’ve lived in Ho Chi Minh City, I’ve watched it change immensely. There’s been a massive economic boom, but sadly that means that many old buildings have been torn down, so the city looks like many other modern cities. I’ve seen the culture get lost a bit and that makes me sad. I also want to show my fellow Americans there is much more to Vietnam than the American War. Despite the artistic challenges, I will say I have learned more than I ever expected from the artists involved in Standpoint Theories. Although we came from different artistic backgrounds and cultures, the project allowed us to have a deeper commitment to the arts and to experience cultural exchange. For that, I am forever grateful, but the rest has been a difficult pill to swallow. When I leave Vietnam next year, I hope to not make the same mistakes again wherever I end up.

How do you personally measure success? When do you feel most successful?

A few months ago I was nominated to be a speaker for TED Talks, and I was really confused as to why I was chosen, but that would have to be a moment when I did feel some form of success. It was a chance to share my experience in dance working with the many others I’ve met around the world. When I collaborate with others and I can help them to bring out their strengths, I feel successful. There’s a saying I often think of when I collaborate which is “The only person your ego is appealing to is yourself.” I feel success can only really come when you’re willing to put your ego aside. It makes me happy to watch others grow and become better people because, in return, they have actually done the same for me.

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Emily Navarra has a BA in dance studies from the University of South Florida. Her work as a freelance artist has been presented in the United States, Europe, Southeast Asia, North Africa and the United Kingdom. She formed Standpoint Theories – Legends of Vietnam in 2013 as a collaborative project retelling Vietnamese legends through dance, visual art and live music. In 2015, she founded The Movement Kitchen, which aims to create an environment to encourage further understanding of the art of movement, both mentally and physically. She currently resides in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.

The post Lessons from Vietnam appeared first on Stance on Dance.

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What does your current dance practice look like?

My dance practice is a little funky at the moment. I am a fulltime dance teacher, so regular moving and grooving is plentiful. However, daytime adult dance classes are limited in Asheville, so it can be tricky to fit taking class into my schedule. Currently, I teach three adult morning classes, two modern and one ballet, in which I try to demonstrate and dance as much as possible throughout. Executing my own movement vocabulary for personal practice and keeping my dancing body in check is always a good thing. I am able to take ballet barre twice a week, which is vital to maintaining some technique. I hold rehearsals for my company twice weekly, both at local studios I teach for. I aim for performing monthly, but of course that varies throughout the year. LKD had its company season last March, plus performances in April, August, October and November. On top of company performances, I freelance various times during the year, rounding out an average of two to three performances per month. These performances consist of presenting work at dance festivals, performance and teaching residencies, and collaborations with other artists.

How do you fund your practice?

Funding comes from teaching and, more recently, grants. Teaching dance is my main source of income, which also serves as most of my dance company funding.

What are the benefits to working on your own (as opposed to working within a company or institution)?

I have always enjoyed creating my own work and have felt strongly about my independent artistic vision for some time now. Having my own dance company has provided me with opportunities to self-produce complete productions, which is absolutely a benefit. The work, the process, the product, and the performance are all in my own hands. I really love this fact and could not image having it any other way now. As a choreographer, I experience the freedom to create what I want, and that is a really wonderful feeling. It is empowering but, most importantly, it is a display of who I am and what I stand for as an artist. Throughout my dance education and career, I have worked with several companies and choreographers whose material was not an ideal fit. I am certain all dancers have experienced this at some point. Creating and performing mostly my own choreography ensures that I feel completely in my own dancing body and extremely connected to the material. It feels natural and honest, which I really enjoy.

What are the drawbacks?

Being in charge does have its downfalls. Remaining prompt, organized and being responsible for others is exhausting at times. Well worth it, of course, but exhausting. The financial aspect of running a dance company can be stressful too. As opposed to showing up, performing, and getting a paycheck, that happens more seldom with having my own company.

What do you find are the hardest obstacles to overcome in making your work?

I think that making sense of a piece and creating a through line for the work as a whole can be difficult sometimes. Movement always comes first for me; many times a concept follows the movement. I do like movement for movement’s sake, but when making work, an order must be obtained throughout the process to present something complete. Finalizing a piece can take some time and does not always come most natural to me. I guess one could say I like beginnings and middles; endings are tough. I think my movement vocabulary is becoming more and more fine-tuned, and I like the movement itself to be the strongest element in my choreography. I am picky about the way in which my movement is executed, which can be time-consuming during a rehearsal process. Setting work on dancers whose bodies respond naturally to the movement is always a plus and something I desire as a choreographer.

How do you personally measure success? When do you feel most successful?

Success to me is measured internally. It is a feeling I get every so often after a particular performance or after a really productive rehearsal. I do care a great deal about how others view my work, but I try not to let that be everything. I know that when I have succeeded, it is a clear feeling within. I feel most successful as a performer when I dance with honest intention. I feel most successful as a choreographer when the work feels well-rounded, my vision is strongly represented, and the dancers involved have had a positive experience. I feel most successful as a director when I have presented a cohesive production to my audiences and hopefully have provided a positive escape from life’s norm.

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Lindsey Kelley Brewer is the founder and artistic director of the modern dance company Lindsey Kelley Dance, based in Asheville, NC. A Florida native, she began training with the Northwest Florida Ballet Company, and received a BFA in dance performance from the University of South Florida in 2007.  While living in NYC, Lindsey performed with Contemporary Dance Theatre, Michiyo and Dancers, Naganuma Dance, The Human Institution, Steps on Broadway’s Repertory Ensemble, and presented work at Food for Thought/Danspace Project, PMT Dance Festival and Triskelion Arts Festival. Her choreography has also been presented at the American Dance Festival, Asheville Fringe Festival, Goucher College, Meredith College, North Carolina Dance Festival, ReHappening and the University of North Carolina Asheville. Lindsey has self-produced two evening-length LKD productions, “Legend of the Shim Sham” and “Ladle Weiss,” plus hosted a modern dance festival in Asheville last August. For more information, please visit lindseykelleydance.com.

Photo Credit: Natasha Meduri

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Photo by Yvonne M. Portra

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What does your current dance practice look like?

My practice varies depending on if I am in creation, preparing existing work for a tour, or am in between cycles. In terms of training, I have many mini-systems I like to repeat and continuously tweak, visiting each of them at least once a week. These routines exist in the areas of somatic/physical therapy, Pilates reformer, yoga, cardio/weights, and contemporary center technique. Once a week I savor taking ballet with Summer Lee Rhatigan at the San Francisco Conservatory of Dance and, if I am able to, yoga with Wes Linch at the Clayton Yoga Shala. Most open classes, with these as the exception, take me outside of my body for various reasons. I crave deep mind-body connection and often find that the only way I can achieve it is to be alone where I can listen at the micro level and move at my own pace.

When it comes to creation or rehearsal, I like to work in three hour blocks with frequency depending on what I am building. Without an outside choreographer or rehearsal director to structure the time, I have found working with natural desire and something called time boxing really helpful. For example, if I am feeling disconnected, I’ll put on my timer for 45 minutes and tell myself to do whatever I want during that time with zero expectations, not even to build heat. Desire and ideas, eventually, always show up. Or, if I am reconstructing a solo for a performance, I’ll time box an hour and a half to just be with the material. Sometimes I’ll take the full time to rediscover the movement as if I am learning it for the first time. Other times, I’ll put on pop music and sing out loud as I jam with the movement. As I near performances, I like to invite guests to watch, mainly to observe myself being witnessed and how this shifts my decision-making process and energetic/emotional output within the work. I never really know what a work is or where it stands on its scale of development until it goes through the witnessing process. Using the opportunity to receive feedback is equally a plus.

For the most part, all of the spaces I have performed my solo evenings in thus far have been “dance studios by day/ performance spaces by night” with DIY systems for lighting. I have come to really appreciate performing in these intimate spaces where eye contact can be made and subtle choices read. Locally, I enjoy performing a couple of times per year on mixed programs such as sjDANCEco’s ChoreoProject and LEVYdance’s The Salon. Internationally, I have been fortunate to find different residency programs that include both time for creation and support for public presentations of my work. In November, I soaked in every second at the Derida Dance Center in Sofia, Bulgaria, where I worked on and performed the first iteration of my new solo show Would_She, set to premiere May 6-7 at the Joe Goode Annex in San Francisco.

How do you fund your practice?

Cost avoidance; I do as much as I can artistically and administratively on my own and rehearse as often as possible where I teach and have access to free studio space. Exchanges and collaborations – whether with organizations or individuals. Fundraising; as a fiscally sponsored project of Dancer’s Group, I am able to receive tax-deductible donations and apply for grants to support my work. Of course, even with cost avoidances, exchanges, collaborations and fundraising, a lot of time is required, and time, in one way or another, equals money. Beyond the income that my teaching and small choreography commissions bring in, I have an extraordinarily supportive husband who has made it possible for me to dedicate such an enormous amount of time to my craft.

Photo by Yvonne M. Portra

What are the benefits to working on your own (as opposed to working within a company or institution)?

In 2012, when I launched L i n s d a n s as the platform for my solo performance work, I was flooded with an inner sense of autonomy and freedom I had never experienced before. Up until then, everything I did dance-wise depended on other people and organizations’ making opportunities available, from scheduled time in the studio and touring to the creation of fulfilling work for me to dance. When I took on the full responsibility for the experience I wanted to have with my dancing, I felt instantly happier. When the companies I worked with had less work one season or when I was rejected at auditions, I used to get really down. I still hear “no” a lot, way more, in fact, but through L i n s d a n s I have an outlet through which I can be more proactive, whether it’s investing more time in the studio, getting extra applications off, etc.

What are the drawbacks?

Though L i n s d a n s is the platform of one dancer, it requires the same rigor as any dance company in regards to administration, marketing, fundraising, producing and so on. While I have loved developing many new skills in these areas, they are unbelievably time consuming and pull me out of the studio way more than I would ever like to admit. There is a certain rise of energy and excitement, added stimulus and inspiration in a studio when working with others that’s more difficult to generate alone. Humor too. To satisfy my cravings and needs for this, I consciously seek group experiences, right now through dancing with Hope Mohr Dance, teaching at Santa Clara University, and engaging in collaborations.

What do you find are the hardest obstacles to overcome in making your work?

My unending quest to perfect my surrounding circumstances. I will spend over three hours warming up my body, and by the time I start rehearsing and creating, the quality of my focus and energy begins declining, or, though I have a home yoga/Pilates studio, I won’t use it unless my entire house is clutter free. Ridiculous, I know. My need to have everything in an ideal condition, whether it’s my inbox or body, can prevent me from just diving it. My fixation with details can make starting a new process or continuing on a project very overwhelming. I find residencies especially helpful because when I am away from home, I allow myself to escape the details of daily life and fully embrace the creative process. Beyond my personal obstacles, there is self-producing, which I find strenuous and most draining. Ideally, I would love to find an organization who would be willing to co-produce my work and share a portion of the overall responsibilities, freeing me up to stay more in the realm of being an artist, especially in the final weeks leading up to a performance.

How do you personally measure success? When do you feel most successful?

I pay attention to the yes’s that show up and less to the no’s. I have observed that often times, the specific goals that motivate me are rarely directly achieved but always, from my effort and devotion towards them, deliver some other indirect reward. In hindsight, I am able to see how severely changed my course would have been should some of my more specific goals been achieved. Would I still be dancing for Paul Taylor should my early college fantasy have become realized? I use rejection as a compass and always deeply consider opportunities when they do show up because I recognize them as energetic matches to what I am putting out there. While I do measure my success by the victories that materialize, like invitations to festivals or other special recognitions, I am, ultimately, chasing after a feeling. I experience it   once or twice a year during performance and when I do, I am left in a euphoric state for about 24 hours. Is it higher consciousness, inspiration, presence, the essence of my own vitality, or simply a mixture of adrenaline and endorphins? Though I cannot pinpoint it, I know it only happens when all my invested efforts – mentally, physically and spiritually – made over many months come together and, because of this, this feeling has become my gauge of personal success.

Would_She premieres May 6-7 at the Joe Goode Annex in San Francisco. For more info, visit linsdans.org.

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Photo by Atanas D. Maev

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What does your current dance practice look like?

I perform in one to three things a year that are not my own work, and I make and present my own work one to two times a year. Last year I made a solo, but this year I made a big group piece. It’s hard to make it sound glamorous; my work is very DIY most of the time. I’m lucky in terms of how I make it happen. For about a year and a half, I have been living at a place in Berkeley called the Finnish Hall. It’s a lodge that looks like a ballroom. My partner and I were hired as managers by a fraternal organization of Finnish immigrants. As a manager, I have access to rehearsal space, and I’m also working on getting it to be a center that supports other artists.

More dancers are turning toward universities for institutional support. I’ve dabbled in it. It can be interesting and lovely, but it’s not the same as a company. It’s a complicated scenario a lot of artists face: where to turn for support. Whether they’re doing ballet, butoh or their own imaginary dance, more and more artists are turning to self-production and a scrappy, “poor theater” style of mounting performance.

How do you fund your practice?

I have applied for grants and residencies, but not as avidly as I used to because of my awesome situation with the Finnish Hall. I practically live in the dance studio, so that takes a lot of pressure off me. For the last project I directed, I paid my dancers an hourly wage because I was tired of asking others who I know are struggling financially to show up and work for free. I applied for a Zellerbach grant but didn’t get it. I also did a small fundraiser, but a lot of their pay ultimately came out of my own pocket.

What are some of the benefits of working on your own?

It’s hard to say; I feel like I’ve never received really major funding or commissions, though I have benefited greatly from residencies at places like CounterPULSE or civic centers in Barcelona. The residencies I’ve participated in haven’t placed very specific demands on the work, though certainly in any institution you’re going to be dealing with the politics of that place. The idea that you can ever be free and not beholden to anyone’s agenda is an illusion. I had that illusion when I was younger. I thought I wanted to go into my cave and make whatever art I wanted to make.

What does success mean to you? When do you feel successful?

That’s the question of our political moment: what is value? Things that used to be of value— degrees, for instance, are no longer a sure bet. So I guess success to me means just continuing on with some kind of questioning that is perennially active. Success also means survival, having shelter, food, etc. In that sense I feel successful and lucky, because I’ve been able to have those things without really compromising my values. I don’t have to get up every day and work at WalMart, and I’m grateful for that.

Beyond that, I’m not overly ambitious. Certainly, success is being part of a community and dialogue, and building relationships. I think I would feel more successful if I felt like was engaged with a greater cross section of the Bay Area. I exist within a very small bubble of artists, which is frustrating. Perhaps that can be a marker of future success: to open my windows in terms of who I’m involved with. I don’t like the idea of catering my art to appeal to certain audiences, but I do want to be in touch with people who aren’t like me. Elitism, in the sense of success being defined by clearly delineated, rarefied aesthetic parameters, isn’t satisfying to me. It’s complicated!

Any other thoughts?

There’s so much displacement happening. In the Bay Area you particularly feel it, the way individuals and art spaces can’t pay rent. I don’t know where it ends. I hear conversations happening in various dance forums about increasing audience attendance or whatnot, but for me they miss the point entirely. How is it ever going to work for an experimental dance artist to participate in a model that demands continuous growth? Art isn’t a product in that way. We need to find new definitions of value that go beyond obvious capitalism. We’re setting ourselves up for failure.

Art is also having to defend itself in terms of its social value, which I’m not sure how you measure. I’m not an artist who claims my art has a specific social value. I believe the value of art is ultimately very mysterious, but you hear this rhetoric about “making a change in this neighborhood” or “do x and y for the kids.” I’m slightly suspicious… how do you know what values you’re instilling? Who’s aesthetic is it and why? Those questions can be paralyzing. It’s good for people to meet, whether the result is considered successful or unsuccessful. But outreach gets confused with grant writing and surviving…. some artists are being pushed into it because they are trying to survive.

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Miriam Wolodarski directs, performs and teaches in the San Francisco Bay Area. She holds an MFA in contemporary performance from Naropa University and a Bachelor’s in political science from Uppsala Universitet. She currently makes her own work and dances for Scott Wells & Dancers. She’s previously worked with Barbara Dilley in the improvisational ensemble Desolate Delight, as well as with Karl Frost, Katarina Erikson, Sara Shelton Mann, Rosemary Hannon and Carol Katz. She works as a freelance writer, translator and phonetician, and also serves in the role of arts organizer/manager of the Finnish Brotherhood Hall in Berkeley, California. She co-curates the Con|VERGE Residency at Ponderosa Tanzland in Stolzenhagen, Germany, and the Studio 210 Residency in San Francisco, California. Learn more about Miriam at senseobject.com.

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Across the street from where I used to work was the business headquarters of Johnson & Johnson. The building had a big beautiful lawn with leafy trees and flowers. I would watch the maintenance workers out the window as I did barre. Every day, they would mow the lawn, blow leaves or trim trees. There were so many business suits and coffee breaks. Day after day, I began to grow more and more envious of the outside world, and I think my growing desire to become a lawnmower was telling of two major truths in my life:

One. It was time for change. I can’t live inside a Gingerbread House.

Two. I realized I have some things to say and no one else can say them for me.

We all know art is the expressive language of the person creating it. I felt like I hadn’t said anything for years. I was tired of speaking for other people and, frankly, I was feeling resentful about it.

It’s completely unfair to expect someone else to speak my own creative language. That’s like saying to someone from the South, “Stop talking like that.”

I’ll admit I have this romantic notion that there is a prince out there who will swoop in and take me away to my dream job where I love the choreography, my opinion matters, my time is valued, my body is considered and cared for, the pay is high, the shows are many, etc. Maybe there is a place out there like that. Maybe I’ll find it someday. But even then I wouldn’t be able to rely on that job to say everything I need to say. Plus, I don’t have time to waste.

I have been freelancing in NYC since June 2015. It’s been wonderful. The freedom to say yes to things I really believe in has been liberating. I have also been able to investigate new expressions of my language. So when people ask me,

What do you do?

Well, I don’t really know how to answer that question. It’s kind of like a trick question people say to ask, “How do you make money?” or “How do you get by?” There are a lot of things I do. Not all of them make money consistently.

I dance with trusted friends and am a member of the Steps Repertory Ensemble.

I write for my friend’s photography blog and interview the homeless.

I help my friends in production work for their photoshoots and events.

I spend hours drawing and creating with the kids I babysit.

I make cartoons and spaghetti hats.

I like to make things; I’ve found that creation attracts opportunity. I was asked to hang my cartoons in a café in Brooklyn where they have local art shifting each month. I didn’t know I would be able to hang my stick figure drawings in a café where hundreds of people would see them. I just was having fun illustrating my thoughts.

Something similar happened when I decided to start something new with my friend Malinda LaVelle, artistic director of Project Thrust, who is now based out of Durango, Colorado.

I wanted to create a solo show on myself. I hadn’t really taken a stab at that yet. It seemed scary from the outside. A solo show all comes down to me. But I knew it was time to start creating, so Malinda and I set out to conceptualize. A  week after our first FaceTime call, I got an email inviting me to show up to eight minutes of my own work in a program for the Steps Ensemble. Malinda and I got busy fleshing out our thoughts. I had a couple of FaceTime rehearsals with her in the dance studio. There was absolutely no hesitance as I walked into the room. It was all business. It was all research and it was really, really important. Walking out of the studio that night, I looked at the other classes and rehearsals going on in the studios around me and I felt like I had just discovered a magic portal. My search for where to express myself was over. I found it, thank God. Dance felt important again.

Of course, there are obstacles and financial complications, but I am not worried about those things. Finances (or lack of) cannot halt creation; they can only alter it.

The showing for Steps Ensemble was one of the most rewarding performance experiences I’ve ever had. People saw me and, with that, I’m now ready to continue my work on “Gingerbread House” – my solo show.

Gingerbread House: A place that looks, smells and tastes nice, but is not a sustainable place to live.

If anyone reading this feels like you are stuck in a Gingerbread House, my encouragement to you is that you as a person have a glorious story to share. Let your interests and the things you “do” guide you. And if you have any smart friends, FOR PETE’S SAKE TALK TO THEM. Invite them in and I am sure you too will find yourself knee-deep in research and important work to show.

I would also like to say a special thanks to the people who invited me in on their creative process and taught me to speak their creative language. I am sure my work carries your voice in one form or another, and I wouldn’t be able to do the work I do without you. You are precious.

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Stephanie Salts is a freelance artist based out of Brooklyn, New York. She has danced professionally on the East and West Coasts and is currently a member of the Steps Repertory Ensemble. She looks to inform her crafts by trying new things and researching. Lots and lots of research. 

The post Stephanie Salts: Dance Felt Important Again appeared first on Stance on Dance.

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How often and in what kind of situations do you perform?

Boy every day of this wild existence is so different, but I seem to have one or two performances/screenings a quarter on average. That being typed, I’ve had three separate performances within the same week before too. In the past, performances mainly occurred in black box theaters, but in recent years I’ve adjusted to performing site-specific work almost entirely (invading streets, piers, parks, museums, bathrooms, bars, etc.). Theater performances are a bit too removed from the guts of my work, which conjures situations and themes experienced in daily life. I’m also transitioning from doing more live work to more film work in order to access a larger online audience.

When and where do you rehearse?

I find myself using the space rental pimp that is SpaceFinder NYC often. In terms of time, I make some concessions based on who’s involved with each project and what their availability is. Evenings tend to be the best time for me to rehearsal. Chez Bushwick and Chrystie Street Ballet Academy tend to be recurring characters in the movie that is my life. Each performance is its own case-study though, each yielding varied results.

Do you take classes or do a personal practice?

Both. Finding a way to deal with this body is a near constant pre-occupation. Do I have a clear regiment? No. Do I wish I had one? Yes. Ultimately, I take some form of both Pilates and yoga two times per week (so four classes total). When I take dance class it’s usually ballet in an attempt to keep some semblance of my “lines” intact. This usually happens at the Mark Morris School or Brooklyn Ballet, but I’m kind of a dance class tourist so I like to mix it up. As a self-absorbed person functioning within a labyrinth-esque schedule, I also turn to YouTube videos to supplement my dance conditioning. A conditioning channel called Fitness-Blender certainly gets some action from me on a near weekly basis too.

How do you fund your work as an individual artist?

What are the benefits to working on your own (as opposed to working within a company or institution)? What are the drawbacks?

You are (terrifyingly) free when working outside of a company or institution. Nothing is diffused. You get all the credit and/or the blame for your creative convictions and how they’re executed.

Brand recognition is a double-edged sword. Working outside of an institution, your individual ideas are liberated from the possibility of being lumped under a more powerful brand identity. You’re less likely to be overly influenced by an iconic technique, like Graham or Cunningham, but you have less cache within the press and dance community. Being associated with an institution gives audiences an immediate understanding of what your identity may be. This is a pro and a con too though since others will most likely have formed opinions about the institution you’re affiliated with. Whether well-received or not, some of your success or failure may be written off as being another byproduct of something that is not uniquely you. In some (if not many) instances, they may be right. Ideally, a choreographer, if they have a unique enough voice, has an opportunity to use the institutions they’re linked with to launch themselves into a new stratosphere creatively.

When working on your own, you’re completely free from both scheduling and paying ridiculously busy, creative people. This also has its pros and cons. It can be tricky to clearly represent the source of whatever emotion one is exploring as a soloist and harder to suss out how it might “read” to an innocent audience-goer. There’s a more immediate response when working in a group. They laugh when it’s funny, look at you cross-eyed when it’s too complicated or awkward, and so on and so forth. As audience members, we’ve all experienced that performance where a soloist goes from poised dancer to insane person in seconds flat. As choreographers we think we know how something looks from the outside because we feel it so deeply. But as an audience member, one can become perplexed and feel alienated really fast if there’s no immediate access point, such as a topical reference, a common emotional gesture, something. Even if we deliberately create space for the audience to make their own choices about what we’re doing, our job is still ultimately to communicate something through movement. Peer review and I have become good friends to counter this issue.

Ultimately, I think most people who go at it alone don’t fit into the standard model of whatever industry is most in line with their compulsions. In a sense, I don’t really feel I have a choice in the matter. I’m compelled to choreograph, trained in ballet, hip hop, jazz and modern dance forms, but not wholly on board with the classic expression of any of those styles. Because of this, I enjoy subverting and perverting the industry. Add in my passion for raunchy stand-up and sketch comedy and you have an alternative performance universe that is not in phase with the one of this world. I live on an alternate plane of dance existence. Please, you reading this now. You are invited to visit me there. Hell, pull up a chair, stay for a while.

What do you find are the hardest obstacles to overcome in making your work?

As a one-man band, conjuring the time to create, fundraise and promote the work, while also invoking inspiration on demand, is exquisitely hard. I use the word “exquisitely” because the satisfaction gained when it all comes together is so much more profound than when acting as a small part of a greater successful thing. And even when you’re able to procure time to nurture your work, you may not strike gold creatively. People fail to understand fully that every aspect of an entrepreneurial pursuit, whether art or business-related, requires imagination, energy and inspiration in order to break away from the clichés of one’s industry. These are fickle and finite abilities. Writing a compelling press release or grant proposal requires just as much imagination as plotting out an entire dance. Just because you managed to squirrel away two hours for each task within one day (yay you), doesn’t mean your connection to the muses is going to stay fresh for that long. In fact, those muses will mostly get sick of dealing with your nagging ass.

An obstacle I’ve recently overcome is getting influenced by the massive amount of proposal deadlines one must attack in order to unearth a full season of dance, alone. The glorious thing is that there are a plethora of application options for everything from fellowships, residencies, grants, performance opportunities and even more. In order to be competitive within a drop dead gorgeous pool of artists, one must align their experience and goals with that of each specific opportunity. You’ll want to give yourself as many chances as possible to produce, or tour new work and, in doing so, may suggest ideas that you wouldn’t necessarily create on your own. Maybe I wouldn’t have come up with this performance idea that heals veterans or at-risk children if I didn’t have this certain application deadline coming up that asks for it, ya know? Your proposals want to be cohesive with what you’re applying for, of course, but don’t let it veer you off course from the kind of work you’d prefer to do. I have only recently drawn a definitive boundary with regards to this hazard, but it has absolutely been an obstacle. Be more shrewd people (points at own face). When working within institutions, one has a built-in network which can offer a consistent thread of opportunities. This sounds wonderful. I know people that, because they were part of established companies or institutions, don’t even have to really apply for opportunities. That is a remarkable benefit of working in a pre-existing system. That being typed, forging new creative ground can require a lot more proposal writing.

How do you personally measure success? When do you feel most successful?

My ideas around success are morphing and mutating even as I type this. Artists are often paid in prestige, earning greater opportunities to prove themselves in an ever increasing series of tests. This includes building relationships with esteemed schools, festivals, funders, performance venues, galleries, press contacts, etc. Much, if not most, of these relationships are somewhat one-sided. You pay (through the nose) for the schools you attend. OK, that’s common across professions, but fine art forms are steeped in academia. Because of this, the academic model appears to continue for us indefinitely. Meaning, we kill ourselves to innovate content, manifest funding, complete involved proposals, audition work, and build our own audience, only to battle it out with other artists for spots in a limited set of dance events. Many of these events pay very little, or nothing at all, for the work we’ve destroyed ourselves to make. There is an irrational notion that exposure and experience is enough to warrant creating new work. I’ve found that these free, or near free, performances seem to perpetuate to the point of the artist always investing more than they get back. Those festivals, venues and galleries need our work AND our audiences in order to exist but we all accept the current model because we have, in perhaps an unconscious way, agreed that we don’t expect to make a living with our art. Being able to flesh out my CV with reputation-enhancing bullet points used to make me feel successful but that has changed, for good.

Is money all there is? Of course not. I wouldn’t have made most of my life choices if it was enough alone. But, I think many of us make too many concessions in order to pursue the creative goals we have. Ultimately, we want to be recognized for our talent, skill and insight into the mysteries of life. This can come in the form of feedback from our mentors, peers, the press and our audience. That was enough for a while, but now this painstaking work must be matched with some kind of earthly compensation, whether it comes in trade, with in-kind donations, or from commissions. I now need to be able to flourish, both creatively and practically, from the results of my creative work to feel successful.

I’ve recently been thinking about Aristotle’s Virtue Ethics and the question of what makes a good life? As opposed to Deontology or Consequentialism, Aristotle makes the claim that pursuing your individual happiness, by developing personal virtues, is more beneficial to the whole of humanity than relying on societal servitude to define what is moral, or what’s good. I think artists have an innate understanding of this, choosing to pursue our most inner desires versus what our parents or teachers tell us is the proper way to be a productive member of society. But that inclination is often unfinished. Virtue Ethics requires that you establish your own “mean,” or middle ground, with regard to certain virtues, like honesty or fearlessness. I think artists often fail with regard to the notion of generosity, being too generous to the point of giving their work away. This is an unbalanced approach to virtue and, in Aristotle’s terms, decreases the probability of one having a flourishing life. I believe a flourishing life as an artist is one in where you creatively express your most authentic self (however niche it is) in as clear a way as possible, on as many platforms as necessary to find and nurture an audience that resonates with you. To continually receive satisfaction, both emotionally and tangibly, I think remaining a little dissatisfied, ambitious and scared helps to prompt a success response. Overcoming the new art and lifestyle challenges you set for yourself feels like success.

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Jamie Benson is a dancer, choreographer and alumnus of Cornish College. He has danced in LATC’s Shag with a Twist, the film Rent, McDonald’s Mario commercial, TV show Dance360 and Rudy Perez’ Ensemble. Jamie’s choreographic work has been presented at the Luckman Complex, Highways, Bootleg Theater, NY Transit Museum, Triskelion and Dixon Place, featured in the NY and LA Times, Phaidon Press’ Wild Art, and awarded a grant from the Brooklyn Arts Council. His films are official selections of the Cinedans Film Festival, Athens Video Dance Project, Video Danza Havana, and Bucharest Dance Film Festival. Learn more at jamiebenson.com.

The post Jamie Benson Attempts to Make Sense of Himself appeared first on Stance on Dance.

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What does your current dance practice look like?

Right now I mainly take class, usually ballet or gaga, and do a lot of yoga.

I used to have a personal improvisation practice when studio space was not an issue, but it’s a little more difficult to maintain in New York.

When I’m working on a project, I rehearsal at various studios in NYC about once or twice a week.

Lately I have been performing once every month or two.

Many of the shows have been showings of my own work, which include works in progress and shared bills in different presenting series, and some are for projects with other companies.

I also have a practice in dance video work, which includes shooting improvisations in various locations of myself or another dancer. I find that video work is a way to easily share the things I’ve been researching and working on in my personal practice, especially when I’m not performing.

How do you fund your practice?

My practice has been funded by the side work I do such as catering, dog-sitting, and various other part-time jobs I’ve had over the years.

I’m just now starting to enter the realm of applying for and receiving performance opportunities that offer stipends.

What are the benefits to working on your own (as opposed to working within a company or institution)?

I can be more productive working on my own.

I have more freedom to listen to my own thoughts, needs and questions.

I can create what feels most honest to me by really harnessing my own voice.

What are the drawbacks?

It can be difficult to always be motivated.

I don’t always know what I’m working toward.

I can only get so far with just myself. Eventually support and feedback from others is important.

What do you find are the hardest obstacles to overcome in making your own work?

Self-criticism… this can be difficult when creating a solo on myself.

Finding support from others, finding an audience.

I don’t find that making work is difficult – it’s finding ways to put it out there.

How do you personally measure success? When do you feel most successful?

I’m interested in how art exists to make one feel things, this conversation that can be created through performance that leaves us feeling human and un-alone. So I’ve felt successful when people have seen me dance or seen my work and communicated that they felt it was honest and found some type of real feeling or connection toward it.

I think a lot of time success is looked at as what society accepts as successful, such as working for a well-known company or making a lot of money. I find it hard not to fall into that trap of wanting others to understand that I’m doing something pretty great. I try to keep my own goals of success in my mind which include making work/dancing, spending time with loved ones, keeping healthy, being able to travel, and supporting myself comfortably.

Marissa Brown is originally from the San Francisco Bay Area. She graduated from the University of California Irvine with a BFA in dance performance and choreography. Her work has been shown at various venues in Irvine and San Francisco, and she recently made her New York premiere as part of CURRENT SESSIONS, along with showing work in the fall with Movement Research and at Triskelion Arts in Brooklyn. For 2016, Marissa has been selected as a part of the Mare Nostrum Elements Emerging Choreographer Series, along with being selected for the Brooklyn Arts Exchange Upstart Festival. As a performer, she has had the pleasure of working with choreographers and companies such as Donald Mckayle, Benjamin Levy, Brice Mousset, Randy James, Sharp & Fine, and The People Movers. 

The post Marissa Brown: More Freedom appeared first on Stance on Dance.

For as long as I’ve danced (since I was five), I’ve wrestled with a feeling of invalidity when I tell people I’m a dancer. Now that I work fulltime as a writer, I feel even more so like I defend myself against being seen as a devoted hobbyist. I know this is an utterly stupid feeling, and wholly self-enforced. But there’s some sort of unspoken cultural validity that comes from working within the constructs of a well-known institution, and when you don’t have that institution, there’s a lot of explaining that necessarily comes with the simple statement, “I’m a dancer.”

After piecing together the manuscript for the Dancing Over 50 book, I’ve come to question whether that institutional construct is ever an accurate barometer of validity. Although many of the dancers I interviewed had danced in highly regarded companies, a good number hadn’t and, furthermore, even those who had danced in fulltime companies eventually found themselves at a place in their lives when they weren’t interested in auditioning for a conventional dance job, but indeed weren’t done dancing.

I think being a dancer has nothing to do with any badge of employment given by a major institution, but with the quiet work of cultivating a personal practice over the long run. It’s that act of still going through the motions when there is nothing obvious to be gained by it that reinforces one’s devotion to the art form. Granted, economic stability attained in the field of dance is a very rare gift, and certainly something to be proud of. But even in those cases, it never lasts forever, and it seems to me a very narrow definition of “dancer” to equate the title with a contract, especially considering the breadth and depth of dance in the course of human history.

So for the month of January, I’m including on Stance on Dance the voices of artists who are supporting their own dance craft from start to finish. They are their own generators. They produce and perform in their own work, and find ways to subsidize their art through a mixture of ingenuity and frugality.

For my part, I know this feeling of needing to validate my worth as a dancer is (a) stupid, and (b) undermines the validity of other dance artists whom I completely respect and admire but who happen to work outside the parameters of major institutions. So I’m going to get over it.

I’m a dancer. Often, I dance for myself. Other times, I might dance for a choreographer, but only if I respect the work. I pursue what interests me, and don’t pursue what doesn’t interest me. I have ample training and performance experiences from which to draw upon in making those decisions for myself. These days, I spend more money on my dance practice than I make from it. I’m totally fine with that for now. I don’t know what the future holds. It might bring institutional support, or it might not. It doesn’t alter my devotion to the art form. I dance because I can’t not and, since it’s a fairly relegated art form in mainstream media, and a particularly ephemeral art form on top of that, any success or failure I perceive is a little blip in the greater human history of people dancing. I’m honored to be a part of that blip.

For all of us who claim the title of “dancer,” may the motivation to keep the flame lit only waver as we deem necessary, but never because someone higher up gave us validity or, for that matter, took it away.

The post Rethinking “I’m A Dancer” appeared first on Stance on Dance.