Virginia VanLieshout

DANCE 323

Kaufmann

00001410465

Engaged Learning: Annual Dance Concert

The Annual Dance Concert gave me the opportunity to develop my professional and

intellectual knowledge of dance while also bringing up very complex conversations surrounding

social justice. Dances of Death and Light was a two act show in which the complex and

horrible aspects of humanity were revealed and brought to question in the first act. The second

act followed the death with light by presenting beautiful pieces and resulting in the question: Can

beauty redeem the evil of mankind.

The pieces I was cast in, Paquita and Communal Rite, were located in the second act.

Paquita, a ballet about a wedding, presents the most prominent idea of beauty we see in the

world; true love. Communal Rite, on the other hand, centers around a community coming

together to support each other. I personally connected a lot to Communal Rite because of the

relevancy of subject matter. With all the social strife occurring in current events, our cast had a

chance to see this healing in the community in real time. After the election, our Loyola

community was hurting badly; students were confused, scared and felt very unloved. Ultimately,

we had to come together as a community to start healing and find solace in our pain. As the

Loyola community, we found comfort with each other even in the face of pain and managed to

pick each other up which really is the entire concept behind Communal Rite.

Another impactful event that stood out to me was one that occurred during one of the
Communal Rite rehearsals. There was a march of students who were protesting the assault on

Loyolas campus. Brian McGinnis brought us all over to the window and explained how these

protestors were demonstrating exactly what we were presenting in Communal Rite. By studying

the group, we were able to see the nature of movement of a group of people who were coming

together in pain to find comfort and make a difference. This analysis of the protest and their

release of emotion, whether of pain, anger, or fear, was a large source of inspiration for the

movement of Communal Rite.

Beyond the piece I was involved in, I felt very inspired by the pieces in the first act, in

particular No Quarter and Lynchtown. This is probably because I believe that a dancers duty is

to present topics of social justice and I feel so honored to be part of a dance program that honors

that sentiment. Both of these pieces dealt with more serious topics of oppression that can be very

uncomfortable topics for the audience. Its so easy to ignore these topics in daily life but when

dance presents the human and emotional aspect, it becomes much more concentrated and

difficult to ignore. The first time I saw Lynchtown, I was a very emotional experience because I

really experienced and understood the toxicity and blinding rage of a lynch mob. Lynchtown

continues to resurface through out the ages due to its alarming honesty and timeless topic. The

nature of man does not change, at all points in history the horror of mankind is demonstrated

which is a sentiment captured in Lynchtown.

Lynchtown was a piece that connected me to Loyolas mission statement because,

experiencing the piece as an audience member makes you very aware that we, as bystanders, are

no better than participants when the events that inspired this piece occur. This piece makes a

viewer acutely aware of their own complacency. It has also forced me to take a strong look into

my own actions in the face of people with anger and violence toward minority groups. Before,
experiencing this piece I was more willing to sit back because I fear these groups of people,

however now I realized that if this behavior goes unchecked it can accumulate to horrible

actions.

Participating in the Annual Dance Concert impacted not only my personal development

but also my professional and intellectual development by allowing me to improve my ensemble

skills and develop kinesthetic critical thinking.

Being able to work with an ensemble in one of the most important and useful skills for a

dancer. This was a skill taught to me during the Communal Rite rehearsal process. At the

beginning of the process, we didnt have any counts, instead we had to be in nonverbal

communication with the group. We did this by establishing natural breathing rhythms to the

movement that more or less put us on the same timing. In the beginning huddle, it was originally

without timing and it was amazing to see how 18 dancers established a steady rhythm of

movement without any kind of communication. Ive never experienced ensemble work in this

way and it was very new for me to dance without counts and only rely on my peers and the

feeling of the movement in my own body while still being cohesive with the rest of the group.

Another way this engaged learning experience helped me develop professionally was by

forcing me to think critically about my body in motion. Kinesthetic critical thinking is important

because dancers need to have an understanding of their bodies to be able to synthesize

corrections, avoid injury and to execute movement as the choreographer wants. An

understanding of anatomy is important because it is not just enough to know what needs to be

fixed, understanding all the muscles actions that goes into a movement allows a dancer to

problem solve corrections. Fixing a correction isnt just fixing one small part of the movement,

its adapting that one correction into the rest of the body as well. The Annual Dance Concert was
a great opportunity to synthesize concepts we had learnt in dance kinesiology.

Overall the Annual Dance Concert was a great experience that gave unique opportunities

to synthesize concepts learnt throughout the rehearsal process and daily class. This allowed me to

develop my professional and intellectual knowledge of dance and, more importantly, an

understanding into the nature of humanity and the importance of supporting each other in times

of difficulty.