Dance on Camera Journal
March-April, 2009

DFA is pleased to announce a major expansion of its Board of Directors with 5 new board members: Harry Streep, Chris Henderson, Brenda Joyce Robinson, Linda Lewett and Zach Morris. With this expansion, the board is also re-examining its by-laws, the formality of the duties and term limits for its board. The resumes of the new members follow. May a new era begin!

Harry Streep was a choreographer and director of two dance companies: the Third Dance Theater and Harry Streep and Human Arms. In addition to being known for works that mixed set choreography with improvisation, and theater and text with dance, Streep founded the "Creativity Project" - a program of residencies to involve public school children in dance composition and performance which toured throughout the USA. In 1993, Streep helped co-found the Beacon School, a public high school in New York City known for its high quality portfolio-based education and exemplary arts programs. He is currently the Assistant Principal at Beacon where students are offered two levels of film classes, animation and after school programs run in conjunction with the Lincoln Center Film Society. Streep leads the after-school dance program, as assisted by Doug Elkins, who is currently creating a piece for students based on Parkour. He has a B.A. from Tufts, and an M.A. from Columbia Teachers College. Before coming to Beacon, he taught at the Fieldston School, in the dance program, and then in the history department, teaching both world history and American history.

Chris Henderson is the creative director of Moviehouse a popular monthly screening series of local filmmakers at 3rd Ward arts facility in Bushwick, Each show opens with a casual salon-style party enhanced by the visual rhythms of a VJ, who splices together found and live footage, old movie clips and music. The night concludes with a dynamic conversation between the filmmakers and the audience. In 2008, Chris served as the Arts Services Director for the Queens Council on the Arts organizing the Queens Art Express, a multi-day multi-venue art event in 26 locations throughout the borough. At QCA, Chris curated and organized Live at the Gantries, a summer concert series and facilitated professional development workshops. Prior to his work at QCA, he covered politics, arts and entertainment for community newspapers in Queens and the Hamptons.He graduated from Sarah Lawrence (BA) with concentrations in photography and history and from Columbia Journalism School (MJ).

Brenda Joyce Robinson, a native of Chicago, is a lawyer currently working as a Litigation Associate at Otterbourg, Steindler, Houston & Rosen, P.C. in New York. Previously she wored for Pugh, Jones, Johnson & Quandt, P.C. in Chicago. A graduate of the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor with a degree in English with honors and a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and a Certificate in Business and Public Policy from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Brenda is also an avid fan on dance. She began her formal dance training at the Beverly Arts Center under Marylee Sinopoli. While in law school, Brenda took ballet classes at The Rock School in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She has accumulated over 20 years of training in a variety of dance styles, including ballet training in the French, Italian Cecchetti and Russian Vaganova methods, as well as in tap and jazz dance, with various instructors across the country.

Linda Lewett is an award winning Producer/Director with over 20 years of experience producing cultural documentary programs, directing multi-camera concert and event productions, and creating projections for theater and gallery exhibition. After graduating with honors from American University in Film & Video in 1984, she was on staff of Channel 16 in Fairfax,Virginia. She produced and directed Metro Dance/Arts, a live-switch multicamera concert series. Awarded a PEW Charitable Trusts Dance/Media Fellowship followed by a production grant from the National Institute to Preserve America’s Dance, she produced a documentation project for the Martha Graham Dance Company and the Library of Congress. On PBS contracts for WETA-TV she produced: Woven by the Grandmothers: 19th Century Navajo Textiles, and Legacy of Generations: Pottery by American Indian Women; public service announcements for WNET’s DANCING serie. She also field-produced From Renoir to Rothko: The Eye of Duncan Phillips and rehearsal segments for In Performance at the White House. For The Kennedy Center, ARTtv produced Dance Theatre of Harlem Community Dance Residency narrated by Ruby Dee; From Page to Stage - a series of documentaries and talk shows ; and the National Symphony Orchestra American Residency in Alaska. . She has served on the boards of Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts, and Washington Project for the Arts. She is currently completing a Master of Arts degree from the innovative European Graduate School.

Zach Morris works in a variety of media that includes contemporary dance, site-specific performance, film, visual art, and large-scale installations. His work has been seen internationally, at several theaters around the US. He is the recipient of a New York Dance and Performance (BESSIE) Award for Creation/Choreography, the Henry Boettcher Award for Excellence in Directing, the NYC Fringe Fest Award for Excellence in Choreography, and has been granted residencies or commissions from Arts>World Financial Center, Danspace Project, The Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation, Dance Theater Workshop, Topaz Arts, La Mama, LMCC, the Swarthmore Project, Epiphany Theatre Company, and others. He has taught master classes and workshops at Florida State University, Swarthmore College, and for The Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation among others. Zach is Co-Director of Third Rail Projects and organizer and moderator of the NYC Dance Film Lab. He has also served as the Co-Creator and Co-Director of the Westbeth New Works Program; the National and International Programs Associate at Dance Theater Workshop; the Bartender at a number of questionable establishments; and most recently as the Dance Coordinator at LEVELS, a teen-center in Long Island. Zach has a BFA in Directing from Carnegie Mellon University.

Hippo in a Tutu: Dancing in Disney Animation
Book review by Mary Hodges

If your dance book shelf is looking stale, consider Mindy Aloff’s Hippo In a Tutu: Dancing in Disney Animation a beautiful remedy. Though thoughtfully written, it is the stunning images—on nearly every page—that make this book such a trophy. Once you have your hands on it, it’s hard to stop flipping and cooing. Stills from Disney features and shorts mingle with images plucked from live reference footage, rough artist sketches, and relevant photos of concert dance artists who may have influenced the Disney output—or been under its influence.

The written content is sweeping. A brisk tour of dancing in Disney’s history, the use of dancers as reference models, an explanation of how taped footage is converted to animated art, and a detailed look at the making of FANTASIA. There are a few close analyses of dance passages, memorably the “I Wan’na Be Like You” song in THE JUNGLE BOOK and the 1953 Goofy short HOW TO DANCE. Aloff zooms in on the relationship of movement to storytelling, a good angle since this was also Disney’s focus.

Her introduction sets us up for an even, praising tone, outlining the delight Aloff has found in Disney films throughout different stages of her life. And of course! Who hasn’t gotten hours of merriment from SLEEPING BEAUTY, PETER PAN, or the charming LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW? I had nearly forgotten the last one, screened in elementary schools every Halloween, until I opened the stunning two page spread of Ichabod Crane and Katrina Van Tassel dancing a minuet. It’s beautiful, but I’m also distracted by the size of Katrina’s waist—about the same as her neck—and her visible cleavage. The author notes approvingly that she looks a lot like a cartoon Marilyn Monroe, but refuses to comment further. If we’re talking about dance, we’re talking about bodies after all, and Disney’s role in promoting impossible standards of beauty for women (and in reinforcing racial caricatures as well) is the elephant in the room.

In the last ten or fifteen pages, however, Aloff addresses some of the representations that today might be offensive. Her delicate treatment of Hattie Noel, the large black woman who served as a reference for the titular Hyacinth Hippo in Fantasia, is disarmingly graceful. Disney’s aims, Noel’s career, and the racial attitudes of the studio and the culture are all carefully probed for context. I wish more of the book had tackled such material, but it is a topic for other venues. Hippo In a Tutu is an authorized publication by Disney Enterprises, so any real criticism must be delivered with utmost care. And besides, Aloff keeps us focused on the dancing itself, finding plenty of material to explore.

Mark Morris’s eloquent Forward: Where I Come From opens the volume. He conveys the wonder Disney instilled in him, and the direct ties between Morris’s own distinct musicality and optimism, and their seeds in Disney animation. Tucked in there is a poignant acknowledgement of the disappointment the real world can be when compared against Disney’s filter. ?But art is not life, fantasy is not reality, and for all its gloss, the world of Walt is unquestionably rich with treasures for the imagination.

Finally, Hippo In A Tutu also acts as a gentle reminder of lesser known work. After reading Aloff’s detailed choreographic analysis of the SILLY SYMPHONIES series, I’ve been desperately tracking them down to take a look for myself. And how long has it been since I watched THE THREE CABALLEROS? Maybe it’s time to revisit DUMBO with fresh eyes, while I’m at it. Aloff reveals the dance art in these cartoons, sending readers hustling to their Netflix queues to marvel at Disney’s choreographic wit.

BALLET RUSSES CENTENNIAL CELEBRATIONS

Photo of MY MADNESS IS MY LOVE - Impressions of Vaslav Nijinsky
Joe Davidow, Finland, 2007, 59min which DFA arranged to be shown as part of Harvard University's Ballet Russes Conference. Also shown Wednesday, Apr 15 5:30p at The Brattle Theater, Cambridge, MA

Choreographed by Jorma Elo, in residence with the Boston Ballet, the film involves a dance group working on a variation of a work by Vaslav Nijinsky. While the Director/Choreographer of the Company reads 'The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky,' his mind drifts, and we find ourselves in the Insane Asylum where Nijinsky spent over 20 years. As Nijinsky's own voice is heard from his 'Diary', computer graphic images and dance movements reflect his words. The director/ choreographer begins to identify with Nijinsky to such an extent that he is overtaken by a fear that he, too, will wind up insane!

Online video re-mash of “Clytemnestra”

The Martha Graham Dance Company is launching a global competition challenging anyone who's cyber-savvy to transform the late choreographer's masterpiece, "Clytemnestra," into an online video. The hitch: picking a "celebrity" from Clytemnestra's Greek mythical life—and creating a four-minute scene linked to today's life. The winning video will premiere during Martha Graham Dance Company’s New York Season in May 2009.

"We are reaching out to contestants globally and showcasing the rich legacy of Graham and its influence on American dance," said Tadej Brdnik, a Martha Graham principal dancer who appears in the current revival of Graham's 1958 masterpiece.

Five videos are posted on a special Web site, www.marthagrahamprojects.com, depicting five characters from the production. Participants are told "to create a modern twist on those ancient characters through current pop culture, news, personalities or events."

Even today's news would be hard-pressed to match the twisted story of "Clytemnestra," a meditation on insanity, vengeance and the murder of a mother based on an ancient Greek tale as recounted by Aeschylus. A married woman runs off with her lover, triggering an international affair—the Trojan War. For revenge, her husband offers their daughter to be sacrificed. When he returns from a military victory that includes raping and pillaging, he brings along an enslaved concubine.
The multimedia contest, which opened online Feb. 1 and ran through March 31, is an effort to reach new audiences, says Janet Eilber, the company's artistic director. "It has the potential to create remarkable hybrid art that connects the ancient and recent past to what is happening today," she said.

Graham, who died in 1991, started the company that gave its first performance in 1926. With a bold new language of movement expressing the searing emotions of human experience, she put American modern dance on the world stage. Her largest-scale work was "Clytemnestra," with music by the Egyptian-born composer Halim El-Dabh.

A panel of experts in dance and media will select the winning video clip, which comes with $500 and the world premiere; second and third prizes are awarded $250 each and will also be showcased Here is a direct link for the entries received. clytemnestraproject.com

India Dances
Hoysaleshwar Temple in Halebid, 12th Century

photo essay by Louise Spain

In India, dance is as ancient as its culture.  While traveling in the state of Karnataka in southern India, Louise Spain (DFA’s Treasurer) and her husband Mel photographed numerous images of dance, from ancient stone carvings to movie shoots.  Here are a few of the iconic scenes they encountered.

Dance images on rock carvings and cave paintings of India date back at least 5,000 years. The oldest on our trip were in four caves or rock cut temples from the 6th to 7th centuries in Badami, the capital of the Chalukyas Dynasty. In one cave--a temple dedicated to Lord Shiva which had been cut out of a red sandstone cliff--there was a remarkable wall carving of Lord Shiva as Nataraj (dancing king/Sanskrit: Lord of Dance) with 18 arms in precise positions of Bharata Natyam dance. In different combinations of two, one on each side, 81 arm positions of the dance form are illustrated.

In another cave, visitors were barred from entering by a dance shoot for a Kannada remake of a Telagu original (two different Indian dialects). The film, called VEER MADAKARI (“The Brave Policeman”) was dubbed a Sandalwood movie, considering that the locality is rich in sandalwood trees and products. Ragine, the heroine, was rehearsing her moves on a sixth-century platform of the temple.

 

The photos next are from the Hoysaleshwar Temple in Halebid, near Hassan, dating from the 12th century. Halebid was then the capital of the Hoysala Kingdom. The Hoysala King Vishnuvardhana, who commissioned the temple for Lord Shiva, dedicated one of the shrines to his queen, Shantala Devi, who was well versed in dance and music. Many of the soapstone carvings of this remarkable temple depict dancing girls, musicians, and dancing Shivas such as the one of Shiva dancing with musicians above the bull Nandi inside the belly of an elephant, and the dancing maid with a drum at the top of a column.

 

This group of photos are from the Vittala Temple dedicated to Lord Vishnu in Hampi, capital of the Vijaynagara empire founded in 1336 and destroyed by Muslim invaders in 1565. The dynasty’s kings were patrons of the arts, and the third queen, daughter of a Devadasi (temple dancer), was herself an accomplished dancer who caught the eye of and was married to King Krishna Devaraya (ruled 1509 to 1529). The temple contains a dancing platform where the queen performed traditional dances (above), surrounded by niches from which the audience could watch. The pillars of the temple emit musical tones when tapped, and were used by musicians as instruments to create music for the queen. Musical and dance motifs appear in carvings throughout the temple.

Note the position of the dancer below. Sixteenth century Michael Jackson anyone?

Dance on Camera on Tour

see dancefilms.org/Touringmain.html for links to actual programs

Feb 6-7 University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Feb 26 DANCEMAKER at Directors Guild, NYC
Feb 27-Mar 1 San Diego Tijuana Dance Film Festival, CA

March 11 Egypt Dance Series, Columbia University, NY
March 12 Environmental Film Festival, Washington, DC
March 13 CARMEN & GEOFFREY at The Quad, NYC
March 17 Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond
March 20-21 University of Rochester, NY

April 2-5 Wisconsin Film Festival, Madison
April 7- 17 Kinodance in Moscow, Russia
April 10 Frameworksdance, Galapagos, Brooklyn, NY
April 14 Amherst College, MA (5 College Mini-fest)
April 16 Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI
April 23 UFT/NYC Dance Educators Festival, NYC
April 24 Florida State University, Tallahassee
April 24-25 Circle Cinema, Tulsa, OK
April 28-29 Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond

May 1 A WINK AND A SMILE, Quad Theatre, NYC

June 1 Dance Screen Sweden, Scandinavian House, NYC
June 25 National Dance Educational Organization, NYC
June 29-July 1 Motion Pictures, Philadelphia, PA

July 11 Danceworks, Milwaukee, WI
July 15 Colorado College Dance Festival
July 25, Aug 1 Contemporary Dance, Modern Art Museum, Fort Worth, TX

July 27-31 Certamen de Coreografia, Burgos, Spain (TP)
August 15 Hong Kong Science Museum, City Contemporary Dance Co.
August TBD Int'l Miami Ballet Festival

October 16-17 University of Nevada
Oct 10-13 EDIT, Budapest, Hungary
Oct 15-Nov 15 Dance Camera Istanbul, Turkey
Oct 15 - Nov 8 The 12th ROMP!, Victoria, British Columbia

THE MYSTERIES OF NATURE
Dahci Ma’s lyrical exploration of the three realms
by Deborah Greenhut, PhD

THE MYSTERIES OF NATURE comprises a diptych portraying human beings’ spiritual relationships with the sky and the earth.  Through beautiful and complex imagery, the film relies on contemporary technology and cinematic capture to illustrate the interdependence of the three realms, sky, earth, and human, which is a core trinity of Korean religion.  In the two parts of the film, the primitive and the modern find their complements in one another. Dahci Ma, the director, collaborated to assemble the essence of yin and yang through a careful progression of mirroring images and repetitions of movement and image in the different realms—cinematic quotes that signify their interrelated, yet mysterious, essences.

At one end of the film, the dancers appear to merge with the sky as the climb a minimalist tower; at the other, they build reverential piles of stones. In both sequences of the film, viewers are compelled to strive with the dancers. Ma arranges and shifts perspectives and colors between the blue of the sky and the ochre of the earth. Viewers can easily empathize with the exertions of the dance. That all is interrelated is a point reinforced by Ma’s frequent quotations of the film’s own narrative. A strategic huddle of humans resembles the earth. The frame divides, offering a witty play on parallax view of the sky through the tower. This filmmaker is always thinking; her portrayal of a multi-layered dialectic is fluid and compelling. The ascent to probe the sky is powered by the angles and lines of the dancers’ skeletons, mirrored in the rods of the tower; the corresponding dancers’ delve into the earth is accomplished by burrowing their round parts in the dirt….heads, buttocks, musculature, the ball of a foot echo the hard stones so laboriously lifted into the center.

On first viewing, it may appear that two films have been joined together, linked by brief footage of black on white negative imagery in which the poles reverse from modern to primitive. The first sequence, primarily entailing blue-robed dancers’ ascent to the sky, includes elements of the second, which depicts “grounded,” earth-rubbed dancers probing the earth with every pore. A flock of pigeons, who have access to both sky and earth, seems, at first, to be all that ties the two beautiful halves together. But an attentive look reveals the intense interdependence of the first five minutes on the second. The capture begins with a lingering look at the shadow of a tower on the land, and then the following minute of the film surveys the entire landscape, high and low. The breathing of a single earthbound dancer captures the eye, and the pattern of dirt on his back and shoulders seems to replicate the structural pattern of the tower. One realm is never far from the other; always interrelated. This dancer’s earthbound exertions echo the climbers on the tower just as the percussion of his breathing echoes the wind in that structure. By locating echoes of the sky on the earth, the filmmaker profiles the dancer’s ascent to the sky. The mysteries are linked, and human efforts to understand or be immersed in them run a similar course.  At about two and a half minutes, the film depicts two dancers at the same level of its’ lattice work, presented to appear as a two-way mirror image of one another, revealing an idea that repeats in exciting variations throughout the film. Following this mirror, we see the sky reflected on the earth reflected back into the sky as the tower is captured from a new angle that depicts the dancer as a spider patrolling its web. The cranes and wires that enable these striking images are not visible to the viewer, but the impossible positions are another reminder of humans’ attempts to merge sky and earth. In the fourth minute, we return to the ground, the sky-draped body curled opposite an earth-covered human around a circular pile of stones, and the ochre color is introduced. The two parts of the film are both divided and linked by a brief black and white sequence that comprises a yin and yang-like assembly of birds, rocks, and humans into the previous image. What we see for the next four or so minutes is the humans’ achievement of that circular pile of stones.

In Korean philosophy, a deity can inhabit such a form.  Shaky and intense, these dancers climb about the earth and in the dirt with the same passion of the dancing climbers in the first half of the film. In this primal ooze, the dancers exhibit jerky, uncertain infantile motions, contrasting with the agility of the sky dancers, and the image is often framed by fingers of light in the outer corners as if someone is looking down on and perhaps photographing or capturing the scene. This exhausting merger with the earth parallels the climb in the first half. The dancers complete the pile, rest, and then move to another part of the earth to begin moving rocks again. As they start to merge with another hill, there is a blackout, which concludes the film. We can assume the actions will recycle in time beyond the film.

While the film has been related in two parts, there is, finally, little division between the realms apart from the (limited) vocabulary we have to describe them. Ascent. Descent. Exertion. Release. Air. Earth. Birds. Humans. The fluidity of this film is all one verb: Dance. Which is also a noun.

Dr. Deborah S. Greenhut teaches writing at New Jersey City University.
She serves on the board of Jennifer Muller/The Works,
for whom she is developing a film on technique.

Just posted...

Letters to the Editor

Re: Hippo in a Tutu

Dear Deirdre,

I'm crying: the reviewer really understood!

Mary might be interested to learn that since I was a kid, I've enjoyed Marilyn Monroe as a comedienne, and it never, ever occurred to me that I, or anyone else, was supposed to look like any movie star. I realize that this is a flaw in a woman: one is supposed to resent Hollywood, Disney, Mattel, et al for purveying stereotypes of beauty. But I just didn't resent them; I was grateful to them: I wanted to see beautiful people in pictures and on the stage! And when push comes to shove, who doesn't? That's the job of dancers and actresses: to look wonderful so that they can hold our attention for several hours. But it seemed to me that there was a big difference between fantasy life and real life, and I was happy enough with real life. I thought my mother and father looked like movie stars. Guess this is called naivete.

Again, many thanks.
Mindy Aloff

Report from Sans Souci Festival
by Hamel Bloom

HELENKA

The Sans Souci Festival of Dance Cinema held its main event of 2009 in March in Boulder, Colorado. This year our submissions were the most plentiful and enjoyable in our six-year history and we selected about 35 shorts, representing the work of artists from ten countries, for our two-evening program.

The highlight of the evenings were Finnish artist Sini Haapalinna's performances of her "Live Cinematic Trans Flux." Working with light table, props, closed circuit camera, and computer-generated delays and enhancements, Sini produces a combination of live performance, projection, and soundscape that is fascinating and marvelous - a dancing Wizard of Oz on a multimedia battlefield.

The festival included many tender pieces. The audience was moved by OF THE HEART a slow-moving, heartfelt and honest duet performed by David Dorfman and Lisa Race, o-directed by Douglas Rosenberg (USA) and Allen Kaeja (Canada), that unfolds in a windblown field in late fall, with the camera gracefully circling the dancers. THE ENCOUNTER by Fátima Tocornal, beautifully images the movements of a dancer as her shadows are outlined by her mother on the wall behind her - creating a sort of dynamic still-life if there could be such a thing. Canadian Karen Rose's HELENKA is a powerful, beautifully filmed, beautifully danced, yet darkly moving, story of the physical and emotional journeys of five women during the Nazi Regime.

On the light side, TOOTHBRUSH TANGO by Erika Randall and Daniel Beahm features intimate antics of two sisters as they dance through their nightly bathroom routine while LIGHT SPIRITED LAUNDRY by Esmeralda Kundanis-Grow and Gustavo Garcia portrays an over-the-top ego-centric Flamenco dancer taking the boredom out of his laundry chores with movement, poses, and panache. Sergio Cruz's ANIMALZ takes the urban B-Boy skills of sixteen 8-14 year-old dancers into the natural landscapes surrounding Brighton, UK. Together as group, each youth dances, with grace and vigor, the animalism he finds in himself.

Friday evening was capped off by TROLLEY DANCES, Mark Freeman's enjoyable documentary view of theatrical street-dance in San Diego, California.

You can view the complete list of works shown by visiting http://sanssoucifest.org/programDairy2009.php

CALL FOR ENTRIES: Dance on Camera Festival 2010.
Proposal on-line

"'Tis the gift to be simple,'tis the gift to be free,
'tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,
and when we find ourselves in the place just right,
'twill be in the valley of love and delight.
When true simplicity is gained
to bow and to bend we shan't be ashamed,
to turn, turn, will be our delight
till by turning, turning we come round right."

In memory of Shavaun Robinson Towers