In this studio course open to anyone with a body, we will explore power, structure, and human bodies through personal, political, anatomical, kinesthetic, and aesthetic lenses. We will delve into these issues as artists do: by reading, thinking, talking, moving, and making performances, actions, sense, and change.
Dance Courses
Dance
A studio course introducing students to American dance aesthetics and practices, with a focus on how its evolution has been influenced by African American choreographers and dancers.
Designed for students with minimal dance experience who are curious about contemporary dance techniques and choreography.
Using an interdisciplinary visual and performance studies approach to explore various sites of contemporary art practices, this course will provide an introduction to radical performance practices through which artists consider the gendered and racialized body that circulates in the public domain, both onstage and off.
Students in VIS300/DAN301 will create sculptures that relate directly to the body and compel performance, interaction, and movement. Students will also create dances that are informed by garments, portable objects, and props. Works will be designed for unconventional spaces, challenge viewer/performer/object relationships, augment and constrain the body, and trace the body's actions and form. The class will consider how context informs perceptions of the borders between performance, bodies, and objects. A lecture series of prominent choreographers and artists will accompany the course. This studio course is open enrollment.
Choreography Workshop I exposes students to diverse methods of dance-making by tracing the evolution of choreographic thought.
Technique and repertory course that focuses on developing technical expertise, expressive range, and stylistic clarity. In technique, students will examine concepts such as skeletal support, sequential movement, rhythm, and momentum to emphasize efficiency in motion.
Dance choreography, with a focus on contemporary practices and performance. Classes will workshop compositional tasks that set limitations to spark creativity.
Technique and repertory course that focuses on developing technical expertise, expressive range, and stylistic clarity. In technique, students will examine concepts such as skeletal support, sequential movement, rhythm, and momentum to emphasize efficiency in motion.
Choreography Workshop III extends students’ approaches to choreographic research by asking them to create complete works on dancers other than themselves.
Technique and repertory course that focuses on developing technical expertise, expressive range, and stylistic clarity. In technique, students will examine concepts such as skeletal support, sequential movement, rhythm, and momentum to emphasize efficiency in motion.
Students workshop their senior thesis projects either creating a choreographic production or enhancing their artistry as a performer. Classes workshop varying approaches to dance making, including examining practices from modern and post-modern dance, as well as diverse genres and cultural forms.
Technique and repertory course that focuses on developing technical expertise, expressive range, and stylistic clarity. In technique, students will examine concepts such as skeletal support, sequential movement, rhythm, and momentum to emphasize efficiency in motion.