Everybody Dance Now
In addition to choreography and dance performance, the work that I do for Synaesthetic is primarily based around working to engage with the larger dance community near Elon, North Carolina. As a company, Synaesthetic decided that we wanted to share our love of dance and our passion for utilizing different mediums for dance with a wider community. Throughout the year I have worked to establish relationships with dance studios, dance teachers in local high schools, and other Elon Dance Organizations in order to work with them and engage with their participants and students on the dance floor. Synaesthetic has held several master classes for students in these other programs throughout the year, teaching about combining dance with other artistic ideas and concepts in their performance. In addition to these classes, the biggest of all of our community projects was to create a dance film highlighting all kinds of different dancers from the area.
The purpose of this film was to show love for dance in many different capacities. In this film there are young students who are just starting out, dance majors showcasing their technique, students in a hip-hop club, dancer’s whose movements is limited to special events like parties and weddings, self-taught dancers, several people with over 50 years of dancing, dancers who teach, dancers who tap or break dance, and dancers who may have a history of technical study but now dance for the simple joy of it. This film will be one of the many films shown in Synaesthetic’s final film screening.
This film was very rewarding to create because I worked with dancers whose love for movement was obvious, and this love and passion for this art form really shined through. Each person was very eager and willing to participate and show what dance meant to each of them. I met incredible people while filming this project and saw many, many talented dancers. Some were at the beginning of their careers and some were nearing the end but there was adoration of movement across all age groups and styles. It was an incredible experience to learn from these people and I am so excited to present this conglomeration of styles, experience, age and purpose in this film. There’s a little bit of everybody in this film and will certainly be one that all kinds of people can relate to.
