\nPhotos By Nick Caito<\/em><\/p>\n
Must a dance concert be presented on a stage? Must a rehearsal be held in a studio?<\/p>\n
With large performance halls on campus shuttered and rehearsal studios converted into classrooms last fall during the COVID-19 pandemic, Trinity College\u2019s Theater and Dance Department confronted the challenge of how to create art and present it to an audience without gathering groups of people in person. <\/p>\n
So exactly where can<\/em> dancing take place? For two faculty members, the answer is simple: everywhere.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s time to think and dance outside of the box!\u201d <\/p>\n That\u2019s how Assistant Professor of Theater and Dance Peter Kyle and Assistant Professor of Theater and Dance Rebecca K. Pappas pitched their idea for \u201cDancing Everywhere,\u201d the yearlong performance project that began in fall 2020 as part of their THDN-309 \u201cStage Production\u201d course.<\/p>\n \u201c \u2018Dancing Everywhere\u2019 is a think tank for movement and performance experiments that began by developing ideas in a creative laboratory,\u201d Kyle says. Students and their professors worked on site-specific performances, dances for the camera and for Zoom, and any other means by which members of the class could dance together while remaining apart. \u201cOur goal was to make a big show, knowing that it would have to likely exist in a variety of different platforms that we wouldn\u2019t otherwise think of as venues,\u201d Kyle says. \u201cWe turned Zoom and all our spaces into rehearsal halls. We have gone beyond the studio and have made the leap to thinking about dance as being able to occur in other places.\u201d<\/p>\n Pappas adds, \u201c \u2018Dancing Everywhere\u2019 refers to site-specific, nontraditional spaces, but it also means dancing together in digital space, in virtual ways, and in analogue spaces that digital portals take us to\u2014in our homes, dorm rooms, the lobbies of buildings.\u201d <\/p>\n The uncertainty of whether any kind of live performance would be possible during the pandemic turned the focus away from the final product and inward toward the process. \u201cIt was really just about dancing all the time, no matter where,\u201d she says. \u201cYou\u2019re not in rehearsal for something else, you\u2019re just doing it now, and we\u2019re all doing it together. That\u2019s a different way to think about what a performance is and what a rehearsal is.\u201d <\/p>\n The class met in person outdoors and remotely via Zoom to work on student- and faculty-designed performance pieces. An open rehearsal held on the Main Quad and online in November showcased the work in progress, followed by a final performance in the spring. Working collectively on pieces allowed the parallel development of dances that took different formats, including short films, projection, and live outdoor performances. \u201cNormally a concert would have six pieces in a program on the stage,\u201d Pappas says. \u201cThis year, the pieces are all different.\u201d Kyle\u2019s piece involving slow-tempo movement used the Main Quad as its venue, while Pappas filmed memory-inspired dances in the Crescent Center for Arts and Neuroscience. <\/p>\n Associate Professor of Theater and Dance Michael Preston, chair of the department, says that he appreciates the adaptability of Pappas and Kyle\u2019s project, which adjusted to changing weather conditions and to heightened campus alert levels that occasionally precluded any in-person work. \u201cRebecca and Peter had a great concept because we wanted to do some type of performance, but we needed to stay nimble,\u201d Preston says. \u201cI think they came up with a nice approach to still do dance at this time without putting the pressure on having to be in person. We are all learning to embrace flexibility.\u201d<\/p>\n The unique approach to this course also offered a structure like no other. It met for four hours on Friday afternoons, giving class members time to warm up and become deeply immersed. Ugn\u0117 Tumonyt\u0117 \u201924 says, \u201cI would always look forward to Fridays. It was my last class of the week, and it would feel so good and so freeing after being confined to my computer space all week. Everybody in \u2018Dancing Everywhere\u2019 was just so happy to be there and was willing to experiment with what dancing is. I think of it as a kind of escape, like a safe place and a happy place to go to.\u201d<\/p>\n As a first-year student, Tumonyt\u0117 says, the project helped her connect with peers at a time when interactions were limited and introduced her to new possibilities in the field of dance. \u201cI had only done dances on a stage with live audiences. With Zoom, you don\u2019t have to think about the stage but about the screen,\u201d she says. \u201cMy project looked into how movement could appear different from different angles of the camera. I would never have thought of that if it wasn\u2019t for COVID. I learned so much from this project\u2014and I had never danced outside before! This changed my perspective of dance, even though I\u2019ve been doing it for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n With only six students in the class, Kyle says, the collaborative atmosphere encouraged student agency and creative inquiry. \u201cI was impressed by the level of ownership they brought to their work and how individual it was. They seemed genuinely free to experiment,\u201d he says. Even though many students had never choreographed anything before, the typical hierarchy of a studio seemed to blur, with community building coming to the forefront and students leading the work on their own pieces.<\/p>\n \u201cEverybody could create their own piece in their own process. There wasn\u2019t a \u2018correct\u2019 process,\u201d says Clare Donohoe \u201922. \u201cMy piece was focusing on the little joys of quarantine, with a film focusing on isolated, specific parts of the body. I gave everyone a framework of what I wanted them to do, but then they could improvise their own dance,\u201d she says. \u201cHaving 10 weeks to create one piece was really freeing. It was a great experience and was helpful to have a way to express myself in these times.\u201d<\/p>\n Instead of dwelling on limitations, the project\u2019s participants embraced new opportunities. \u201cIt\u2019s so easy, during the pandemic, to focus on what we can\u2019t do: we can\u2019t be on a stage, we can\u2019t be together as much as we\u2019d like,\u201d Pappas says. \u201c \u2018Dancing Everywhere\u2019 explored what do<\/em> we have? What is<\/em> possible?\u201d<\/p>\n Adds Kyle, \u201cRebecca and I share a delight in dance as an expression of movement writ large, not limited by what people think qualifies as dance or where it should occur. This project blasts open the notion of where dance is expected to occur. Dancing is living. Maybe the project is asking, when aren\u2019t<\/em> we dancing?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPerforming Hartford\u201d: InterArts Gateway:<\/strong> Quarantine Complex<\/em>:<\/strong> Performance project creatively tackles challenges brought by COVID-19 By Andrew J. Concatelli Photos By Nick Caito Must a dance concert be presented on a stage? Must a rehearsal be held in a studio? With large performance halls on campus shuttered and rehearsal studios converted into classrooms last fall during the COVID-19 pandemic, Trinity College\u2019s Theater … <\/p>\n![\"Aarti](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Trinity-Dance-Rehearsal-Fall-2020-28.jpg\")
![\"Rebecca](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Trinity-Dance-Rehearsal-Fall-2020-20.jpg\")
![\"Ugn\u0117](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Trinity-Dance-Rehearsal-Fall-2020-04.jpg\")
![\"Assistant](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Trinity-Dance-Peter-Kyle-Rehearsal-Fall-2020-38.jpg\")
![\"Caroline](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Trinity-Dance-Rehearsal-Fall-2020-98.jpg\")
OTHER DEPARTMENT PROJECTS<\/h4>\n
![\"Performing](\"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/reporter-spring2021\/files\/2021\/06\/Deborah-Goffe-performance-screen-shot-300x172.jpg\")
\n<\/strong>Pappas partnered this year with Jasmin Agosto \u201910 of SageSeeker Productions to create this Community Learning course and performance series connecting students with Hartford artists through discussions, virtual performances, and question-and-answer sessions. \u201cThis was a great approach to the community building that I think we\u2019re going to need more of going forward,\u201d Preston says.<\/p>\n
\nPreston invited artists from around the world to talk to students in the first-year program about what it is to be an artist. Students met remotely and created their own art. \u201cThey forged this incredible community,\u201d Preston says of the students. \u201cThey encouraged each other to be more honest and more generous as a class than I\u2019ve ever seen.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n\u201cDirector Terrell Sledge\u2019s docu-style performance project looks at the pandemic and its effect on us,\u201d says Preston. \u201cStudents interviewed real people in the fall and are creating a final spring project that\u2019s partly filmed and partly happening live. It\u2019s using the current limitations to see what else we can do and flex some other muscles. I hope the flame that makes me love theater\u2014and makes our students love it\u2014is still flickering, being fanned at times, and will come out even stronger when we get through this.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"