June 29, 2006

Universal Dance Movement Vocabulary

I cam across this interesting post on TechCrunch about a new Israeli start-up, Zlango, that has created an icon-based language for exchanging messages via SMS.

SMS is essentially text messaging for cell phones. In the case of Zlango, their new application is not text messaging but two-dimensional icon messaging where each graphic icon conveys a specific meaning. So to send a graphic message to a friend, you select a series of graphic icons.

Here's a screen shot of how a mobile phone looks like running Zlango:

And here's a sample graphic message created by a user on the Zlango site. I turned on the text below each icon so you could see what the meaning of this message was:

Maybe not the best expressed thought in the world, but it did get me thinking about a universal dance vocabulary.

Say instead of a two-dimensional icon-based visual language, you were asked to create a 3D video-based language library that anybody could use as an alternative to written words? The goal would be to covey any idea, thought or action to others who may or may not speak the same language as you.

Would it be possible to create this universal dance vocabulary? Do certain movements cut across cultural borders and express universal emotions and reactions? Or is dance tied too much to the culture and society in which it is created? And if dance is culturally-based, how would different societies express common emotions and reactions through movement?

I realize that my project may not be that practical. With the visual icons from Zlango, you simply view a series of small graphic images to discern the meaning. With a video language, a recipient of a message would have to watch an entire video clip - even if just a few seconds - in order to understand the meaning of the message. But then again maybe the greater depth of meaning and nuance that can be conveyed by dance is worth taking the extra time to watch the video clips?

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June 28, 2006

What Moves You?

Move-Me is a traveling booth touring the UK that records informal videos of participants moving to the audio instructions of choreographers.

Once a participant has had one of their dance masterpieces recorded in the Move-Me both, the video is put in an online gallery with all of the other clips. On the Move-Me website you can watch these clips, rate them and add them to your favorites.

The creators of Move-Me have also invited a group of users to create their own curated sets of their favorite videos, which you can access. Select "Curated Dances" from top left-side menu bar.

Move-me.com is co-produced by Ricochet Dance Productions and Goat Media Ltd, from an original idea by Simon Fildes and Katrina McPherson.

Simon Fildes is also the organizer of the Video Dance Forum, which took place two weeks ago. I would have written about Move-Me earlier but I was confused by how it worked until Simon emailed me a description yesterday. I was under the wrong impression that the dancers in the booth were watching a video clip of different choreographers who were offering instructions on a series of moves. And I was wondering why the Move-Me website didn't include these videos so that online visitors could actually see what the dancers inside the booth were watching. But that's not how the system works. The dancers inside the booth listen to a pre-recorded audio messages from the choreographers walking participants through a series of moves - there's no video to watch. With some of the videos on Move-Me, you can clearly hear the choreographers in the background.

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June 26, 2006

Watch Avatars Dancing in SecondLife

On June 9th, I wrote a post, "Dancing in the Second Life Virtual World." In this post, I wrote about Rik Panganiban's thoughts about the limitations of avatar dancing in such virtual environments. He followed-up with a comment where he provided a link to a few video clips that show you exactly what it looks like to dance in SL - I encourage you to watch these clips.

Even though these animated dance videos are rudimentary at this point, I think that SL and other virtual worlds should be taken seriously by dancers. As Phoenix Psaltery, who also posted a comment to my post about dancing in SL, wrote:

Yes, Second Life has shortcomings when it comes to things like dance and other activities that use a lot of personal expression, but please understand that SL is really in its infancy as far as what will someday be possible. It's come a long way in just three years; imagine what it will be like in three more, or ten more.

Already SL is a real cash economy where users are buying products with the virtual world's Linden Dollars that can be exchange for real money. In addition, a post in B2Day blog links to story about how Amazon is exploring how to link the SL virtual world to its web services so that physical products can be sold from within SecondLife.

Imagine visiting a dance clothing boutique in SL, trying on shoes and clothing and then purchasing the real merchandise from within this store? Or watching a SL-based performance by a dance company and being able to purchase video clips of the "real world" performance by the same group.

There are many possibilities and as the ability to control dancing avatars continues to improve in this parallel universe, many new doors will be opened for dancers.

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June 22, 2006

And the Best Dance Video on the Web is...

Now for the announcement of the first and only Great Dance Award for excellence in online dance video.

The winner is:

Article19

They are the winner, the runner-up and the second runner-up. Nobody else was considered for this prestigious prize.

You can visit the video page on Article19 to link to their dance videos, interviews and accompanying articles.

These are the reasons why I enjoy the dance videos on Article19:

1) The video quality of the stage performances and interviews is very good.

2) The video window is large enough to enjoy the dances without having to squint your eyes.

3) The video loads quickly.

4) There are clear instructions about the software you need to watch the videos along with a link to the Apple QuickTime download page.

5) Descriptions are provided below the video window so that you know what you're watching.

6) There are accompanying articles that provide reviews and backgrounds about the videos and dance companies.

7) The page design and layout is appealing and navigation is intuitive.

8) Clear information about copyright ownership is provided.

Congratulations to Article19 for their presentation of excellent online dance videos.

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June 21, 2006

New "Evolution of Dance" Websites

Judson Laipply's "Evolution of Dance" video clip has been watched more than 25 million times on YouTube since it was uploaded on April 6th of this year. This dance clip celebrates popular dance crazes over the past fifty years.

To capitalize on his mega-success on YouTube and other sites, "inspirational comic" and now dancer Judson Laipply has set-up an "Evolution of Dance" website to promote his speaking programs. A sequel to "Evolution of Dance" is in the works and will be called "The Evolution of Dance Revisited."

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June 20, 2006

Where Are the Dance Video Previews?

This morning in Rojo - my newsfeed aggregator and reader - I came across an article "Feats (and follies) of technology: Two exhibits illustrate how it can either elevate or obfuscate works" from the Boston Globe. (I subscribe to the dance feeds from Topix.net, which is how I found this article.)

So I visit this article on Boston Globe since anything that combines dance and technology is usually something I'm interested in learning more about. This article is, in part, about "Choreographic Turn," a dance film exhibit that "explores new ways to film dance." This work is the result of a collaboration between filmmaker Peter Welz and dancer and choreographer William Forsythe who is the former director of the Frankfurt Ballet and the founder of the Forsythe Company.

Now to what baffles me:

Here is a dance exhibit that not only incorporates dance film, but actually explores new approaches to filming dance. My question is if you are already working with film or video and you are intrigued by the possibilities of this medium, how is it not possible to think about creating a video preview of this exhibit for online distribution? I did a search for additional information about "Choreographic Turn," and all I find is text. I don't want to just read about this exhibit when one minute of video would provide me with a wealth of insight about this work.

So what I'm really addressing is what I continue to see as a huge disconnect between choreographers and filmmakers who work with video and the world of the Internet. These artists pretty much have everything they need to create a video trailer. They can upload a video and then encourage writers, bloggers and everybody else to link to this promotional video clip.

The end result is that more people would see their exhibits, their dance films and their dances. And the extra work involved in creating this video trailer is just not that great.

I could have used any of thousands of examples to make my point. There are many dance videographers and choreographers using video but who are not making promotional videos available online. But in the case of "Choreographic Turn," the missed opportunity seems so blatant to me that I had to write about it.

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June 16, 2006

Dance Exchange Video Tour

Takoma Park, Maryland-based Liz Lerman Dance Exchange recently opened their renovated dance studios just outside of DC.

At a press conference I shot some video of John Borstel, the company's humanities director, giving a tour of the new space.

Watch video clip (Microsoft Windows Media - 4.56 MB - 1:46 min)

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June 14, 2006

Global Historical Dance Video Project

I'd like to propose a global, non-propriety, collaborative dance video project for dancers and educators:

One of the online resources that I think would be invaluable would be a huge video library with thousands upon thousands of clips that included demonstrations of a massive range of dance styles throughout history.

Anybody could contribute their own videos to this project. Upon uploading your video, you would tag it to indicate the style and period of dance along with a text description.

Then in a centralized wiki devoted to this project, you could add a listing and link to your video in the appropriate section. For example, in Wikipedia there is a "History of Dance" section. We could create a new wiki along these lines, but in our case the main objective would be to categorize thousands of videos by style and other elements.

The end result of such a collaborative project is that by harnessing the collective strength of dance enthusiasts around the world, we could build a great resource that would be an invaluable educational tool.

Personally I'd like it because I'm very curious to learn more about the interconnections among different dance styles and how different genres evolved over time based on a range of influences.

Lately I've been reading a lot of history books the cover the period of the conquest (after 1492), the revolutionary period in the Americas (about 1750-1850) and slavery (I list some of the recent books I've read below). There are quite a few references to dance in most of the books I've read. One of the things I'd like to understand is how the dance forms that are danced today throughout the Americas evolved over time and how different cultures and traditions contributed to each of these dances.

Salsa, for instance, has a rich tradition with multiple influences. What, for example, were the actual dance forms and styles over the past centuries that contributed to and became part of the way Salsa is danced today in different parts of the world? A video library like the one I describe above could provide a great visual gallery to help provide answers to this question about the origins of Salsa.

My Recent History Reading List

- "Brutal Journey: The Epic Story of the First Crossing of North America" by Paul Schneider.

- "Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community and War" by Nathaniel Philbrick.

- "Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and American Revolution" by Simon Schama.

- "Many Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North America" by Ira Berlin.

- "Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution" by Laurent Dubois.

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June 13, 2006

Step Up Movie's Online Audition Call on MySpace

The official site for the upcoming dance movie "Step Up" is on MySpace. An interesting twist is that the public is invited to audition for the film's music video, "Get Up."

On the movie's MySpace page there are now 20 finalists for the "Get Up" video. You can watch these video auditions and choose your favorite five.

This movie promotion combines many of the important online trends in a single package: social networking sites, user-generated content and empowering audiences to determine outcomes.

Thanks to Jo-Anne Green at Networked Performance blog for pointing me to this story.

[Via Step Up to dance on MySpace in Smart Mobs blog.]

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June 12, 2006

Open Source Event for Video Dance Makers

Bodysurf Scotland and videodance.org.uk are hosting "Open Source: {Video-Dance}," an event for video-dance makers that will take place later this week in Scotland (June 15-18th).

In the words of the presenters:

Opensource:{video-dance} is a gathering of artists, coming together to discuss ideas and issues around their own practice in the context of making dance for the screen. We are planning to travel lightly. There will be a structure, but no fixed agenda...Our vision is to create an exciting and supportive place for people to engage, talk, hang out, relax, think, listen and to enable the spontaneous and dynamic unfolding of events.

With the aim of encouraging debate and discussion, the organizers have created a list of 20 questions that are intended to make video dance makers uncomfortable. I think these are good questions and I include them in their entirety:

1. How can we justify having our own genre – is video dance any different than short-film making?
2. How is it that there rarely seems to be any dance in video dance?
3. Why is it that I still find ‘Roseland’, which was made over 20yrs ago, more exciting that most current works?
4. How is it that most video dance soundtracks seem to be added on as an afterthought?
5. How can you get your work seen when there are very few opportunities?
6. How can we make people care about video dance?
7. How do most video dances have deeply suspect gender politics?
8. How can video dance makers recognise the web as a future distribution channel?
9. How can you justify look over substance?
10. Does it matter what sort of images are created and represented in our work?
11. How can we talk about our work honestly?
12. How can we generate a true critical discourse about video dance work?
13.What excites us as video dance makers if anything?
14. How can we step outside our comfort zone?
15. How about beauty?
16. How about ideas?
17 How can we continue to evolve longer works or are we destined to be the makers of 10 minute films?
18. How can we avoid constant re-inventing the wheel and lack of awareness of what has gone before or is happening in other related art forms?
19. Is your work worth watching?
20. If so/not, then why?

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June 9, 2006

Dancing in the Second Life Virtual World

I keep meaning to experiment with the Second Life virtual world.

Now with the growth in dancing in this alternative reality, I have more of an incentive to make an avatar for myself and start wondering around and going to clubs, get-togethers and, even, dance studio. This notice caught my attention:

This past Tuesday, the Takeshi's Dance Studio in Second Life held an event to teach people how to dance. Plus, they will soon be building a theater and they need dancers.

Since I haven't used Second Life, I only have a vague idea what it means to dance in SL. My guess is that users who went to Takeshi's Dance Studio learned how to write scripts so that their avatars could automatically perform a series of pre-programmed moves. I'm going to follow-up with Takeshi's Dance Studio to find out more.

In the meantime, I came across some interesting stories and pictures that offer a glimpse of the type of dancing that is now taking place in SL:

- Here are some pictures on Flickr that show examples of Second Life dancing:

- In Linden Lifestyles (Linden is the creator of Second Life), there is an article, "Concert Tips and Etiquette," that explains how to participate in SL music concerts - how, for instance, to listen to musicians and not be bothered by extraneous sounds. If you scroll down this article, you'll find a section that explains the concept of dance animators and dance balls. If an avatar couple steps on a dance ball and then activates the dance animator, their avatars will then be taken through a pre-determined series of dance steps. Here's a screen shot of a dance floor in an SL nightclub:

- Dancing doesn't just take place in virtual clubs. Events on private islands also feature music and dancing. Earlier this year, Creative Commons hosted a party. There are more pictures available with the write-up about this event:

- In "Get That Out of Your Mouth #24 - The Show Must Go Online," Chris Dahlen describes the experience of listening to music in Second Life, how indie bands take virtual tours and make money, and the limitations of gestures and dance in this virtual world:

Players also can't control their avatars with any spontaneity or nuance; if you want to dance at a show, you can trigger an animation that runs your avatar through the steps, but you can't personally step in to make the arm rest on your partner's back just so. The same problem applies for performers. If you look closely at Few as he's playing guitar, you'll see that he can't strum or move his hand on the fretboard, and his face is trapped in a stiff mask, like a dummy in a vintage Disney World ride. And while you can add more animations and poses to an avatar, if you have the time and you're handy with 3-D modeling software, you can't make the spur-of-the-moment gestures that even stiff indie rockers need to liven up their acts.

- And Rik Riel (his SL name) in his "Dancing with myself... with other people " post, says that he goes to a lot of SL events and music gigs. He describes how dancing works:

In Second Life, you are given a small set of pre-defined dance animations that you can trigger from your keyboard. It's easy to pick up other animations at parties or from friends. You can easily perform everything from a waltz to b-boying to country two-step (not to mention more, uh, provocative dancing).

But he's not really sold on this virtual dancing:

A real basic question is Why would you do this? Virtual dancing provides none of the perks of real world dancing, either the joy of movement, the physical response to music you are digging, the pleasure in touching another person, or the pride of executing a difficult move. There's no learning curve, no physical exertion, no effort to anything, except maybe the effort involved in designing your own custom animations.

I've been dancing my whole life, from all of the terrible 80's trends (smurf, running man, pac man, etc.) to popping and locking, salsa, tap, and now lindy hop. There are few other moments when I am happier than when I am dancing. There is nothing to compare to sharing great music with someone you care for swaying in your arms. I love dancing so much, I help administer the largest lindy hop community website on the net, Yehoodi.com.

Rik Riel adds this picture from Flickr to reinforce his point:

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June 8, 2006

Goooooooooooooooooooal!!

World Cup '06 starts tomorrow!

Costa Rica vs. Germany in opening match. US plays Czech Republic on Monday. US will make it to second round where they will play Brazil and win 1-0 - a little wishful thinking.

Everybody's dancing to celebrate the World Cup (or destroying their living rooms):

Britney Spears Pepsi Commercial:
This is How to Score Pepsi Commercial:
Destroy the Furniture Adidas Commercial:

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June 7, 2006

A Dance Vocabulary for Performance Art

On the Networked Performance blog I came across an interesting write-up about a multimedia and performance art work by Ursula Endlicher.

For this installation, "Website Impersonations: The Amazons (.at versus .com)," Ursula creates a movement vocabulary that corresponds to the underlying HTML code of a webpage. You can watch a video that shows exactly how users interact with this art work (QuickTime video file is about 27 MB):

A user sits down on top of a giant trackball as they watch two side-by-side projection screens positioned in the corner of a room. One image is projected of a performer whose movements reflect the HTML code for Amazon.com while on the other screen the performer's movements reflect the HTML code for Amazon.at. The code is generated in real-time from a live Internet connection. By moving one's butt to roll the trackball, users can determine the position of the cursor and thus the corresponding movements that appear on screen. Here's a diagram of the installation set-up and a larger version of these technical requirements are available on Ursula's site:

I think that the online presentation of this installation would be enhanced if there were a separate movement vocabulary gallery that showed, in a visual fashion, the specific connections between HTML code and the individual movements. For example, what are the specific series of movements made by a performer when he or she encounters a tag for the beginning of an HTML table? By creating this video-based movement vocabulary library, both online and in-person audiences would have a better understanding of the inner workings of this installation and would likely enjoy it more.

Ursula Endlicher will be showing her work this Saturday, June 10th at 7:00 PM at 315 Broadway, 5th Floor (between Duane/ Thomas Street) in Lower Manhattan.

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June 6, 2006

Maria Finn's Books on Latin Culture

Maria Finn is the author of just published "Mexico in Mind," a literary travel guide that takes readers through two-centuries of fiction and non-fiction accounts about Mexico.

Maria has created a plog for her book and upcoming tour on Amazon.com where she shares additional information about herself and her future projects. A plog is Amazon's name for a blog. I like that you can read an author's thoughts as you're learning about their book. In her plog, Maria shares her passion for dance:

I’m currently working on a memoir about learning how to dance. I started salsa lessons in New York City (on 2-for salseros who know what this means, but I can follow on 1 with no problem), and these led me to Cuba where I fell in love and married my handsome cab driver. This romance didn’t work out quite as well as I hoped, and so to recover from the heartbreak, I’ve immersed myself in the Argentine tango.

In an email to me last week, Maria described how she uses her plog:

The Amazon blog is supposed to help writers connect with their readers directly and I believe the purpose of this is to create a sense of community. Since writing and reading are such solitary activities, I think this is great. But when I'm traveling and arrive in a town where I don't know many people, I've found that if I go to a tango milonga, I'm immediately part of a community, and when tangueros that I meet arrive in New York, I give them tips on classes and milongas. So I'm trying to see if I can locate a cross-over and connect with readers and dancers and make my book tour more fun and blog a little livelier.

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June 5, 2006

Integrating Dance into Our Contemporary Discourse

Dance and movement can offer important insights into the pressing issues of our time. Dance can also serve as a powerful springboard for encouraging conversation, building community, fostering understanding and inspiring action.

Yet while performances often encourage audiences to see contemporary topics from different perspectives and address issues that do not receive sufficient coverage in the media, dance is not in any meaningful way an integral element in how our society thinks about, reflects and reacts to the world in which we live.

Imagine an alternative reality where every time a newspaper, a TV show, a community group, a cultural organization, a governmental department, a non-governmental organization (NGO), a website, a blog, a trade association or any other entity addressed an important societal or political issue that they turned to dance for the answers.

Take some of the important and sometimes controversial topics and issues of the day: immigration, race, genocide, gender, gay marriage, gay lesbian bisexual and transgender (GLBT), environment, bio-ethics, poverty, war, education, disabilities, healthcare, natural disaster, AIDS/HIV, physical abuse, incarceration and many others. How often do the people and organizations that are devoted to addressing these topics actually turn to dance for answers and insights?

The answer is not very often.

But it doesn't have to be this way. Dance can be integrated into the overall fabric of how we contemplate challenging issues and think about taking action.

Two of the main challenges to achieving this goal, I believe, are 1) that most people don't know about the many dance programs that already exist for addressing contemporary topics and 2) there are no online resources that aggregate these dance programs (performances, workshops, educational programs and outreach initiatives) by theme and subject matter.

One of the things I'm thinking about doing is creating such an online resource in the form of a blog that groups the politically, socially, economically and culturally-focused efforts of dance companies on a thematic basis. So a user could visit this weblog and find dance-related content for any of the topics I listed above (plus other issues).

So, say, a person from an organization that addresses race and poverty issues is seeking dance resources regarding this topic. Through such a blog, they could quickly learn about dance companies that do performances, workshops, and community outreach programs that deal with race and poverty. Even more helpful, in some cases they could find video clips, audio programs, pictures and other multimedia resources that were already online and immediately available for use. And, in the future, there may be a way to license this digital dance content and add it directly to an organization's website. This way this hypothetical community group that addresses race and poverty issues could integrate directly into their own website dance programs that encourage their website visitors to think about these issues in new ways and, hopefully, inspire action.

I'll write more about this new dance resource soon. But for now, I thought I'd do some initial research and explore how dancers have been or are currently addressing some of these topics. Here's an list of eight annotated resources that explore what dancers are doing on a number of fronts - I came across a lot more, I just didn't have time to include them all. I think it would be great to conduct audio interviews for my podcast with the dancers below to learn more about their dance programs and how they hope to inspire their audiences to learn, contemplate and take action.

- Saturday night I saw a wonderful community performance of Liz Lerman Dance Exchange's "We Are Still Crossing," an updated version of an 1986 commission that celebrated the one-hundredth anniversary of the gift of the Statue of Liberty from the French to the US. The current version incorporates themes, stories and movement that reflect upon the current debate over immigration and the building of a wall between the US and Mexico. "We are Still Crossing" integrates both the company's professional dancers with community participants.

- Jennifer Monson's "Flight of Mind" dance performance is based on her multi-year study of the migration paths of birds and whales. This project includes the "Bird Brain Educational Resource Guide" for grades 3-6. (Download PDF classroom guide.)

- Anne Bluthenthal and Dancers performance of "Unsing the Song" deals with the nature of genocide. Part of a multi-arts exhibit that addresses Rwandan genocide, rape and deliberate attempts to spread HIV. You can learn more about this grassroots oral history project.

- Pat Graney Company's "Keeping the Faith - The Prison Project" is "designed to enable incarcerated women and girls to discover a sense of identity within themselves and to develop that identity within the context of community - through the vehicles of performance, video documentation and a published anthology of their writings. . .Each year, the program culminates in performance where the participating women perform their own movement and writing, and display their own visual art for 200 members of the general public, 500 of their incarcerated peers, and the prison administration."

- David Popalisky, director of Santa Clara University Dance Program, created and performed "Barred from Life" which explores issues of wrongful conviction "...through a combination of media including dance movement, video imagery, [and] excerpts from interviews with exonerees..."

- Urban Bush Women (UBW), founded in 1984, "is a performance ensemble dedicated to exploring the use of cultural expression as a catalyst for social change. Programs such as "Batty Moves," in the Caribbean "batty" means buttocks, "directly challenges the audience to question their own notions of physical attractiveness and appropriate movement. Now Urban Bush Women hosts "Batty Parties" to expand its civic dialogue practice to discuss positive body images."

- Dream Dance Company "brings innovative urban folk art and culture to the stage to tell personal and collective stories of struggle, transformation and inspiration. Their electrifying pieces fuse an incredible breadth of African diasporic movement (including Hip-Hop, House, Break, Funk and Afro-Caribbean dance) with theater, rap, beatbox and live music." [quote link] Their full-length production, "Dig Us Now," "shows how these rich cultural forms have flipped the script on the ugliness of poverty and racism to reflect the beauty and wonder of everyday life."

- Jena Marie Griswold has always been inspired by dance and "its capacity to facilitate cross-cultural understanding." As one of 50 graduating seniors this year who was honored with a Thomas J. Watson fellowship, Griswold will spend the next year traveling four continents pursuing a project she calls "Salsa: Spicing Up the International Dance Scene." Griswold who is motivated by her passion for social justice, will be researching how Salsa and Hip-Hop are both physically and socially reinterpreted as she moves from one destination to the next. (Her journey and exploration of dance would make for a wonderful on-going blog project as well. I'm going to email her to see if she plans to do this.)

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June 2, 2006

An Online Blueprint for Making Dance More Relevant

As a follow-up to my post yesterday, "Reclaiming the Relevancy of Dance," I'd like to offer my initial ideas on how we might move forward with such a project.

First, I'd post a message to my blog saying that I'm creating a collection of links to dancers and dance companies that are in the process of creating dance works or have already created dance works that address a specific topic.

As dancers add content (descriptions, pictures, audio interviews and videos) to their websites, blogs and multimedia sites (YouTube, Flickr, etc.), they can then send me the links to these resources.

For example, I could post a message such as the following:

I'm creating a resource guide with links to dance performances (individual or group performances) that deal with the topic of global warming. If you have created such a performance, please send me links to the relevant websites. Clearly, the best type of resource is a video clip so that people can watch your performance. But pictures, text descriptions and audio guides are also worthwhile.

Your dance work does not have to be finished in order to participate in this project. If you've created diagrams or illustrations of costumes, for example, and posted these images to your website or blog, these would be of interest as well.

So overall the goal is to aggregate dances that deal with a specific topic as a way to reach a larger Internet audience. Environmental topics are especially worthwhile because once we put together a list of, say, ten existing dance works (either completed or in progress), I think this would be an excellent resource for the thousands upon thousands of websites and blogs that address environmental issues.

In the end, I think this project would help all participating dancers and dance companies get considerable exposure for their work and upcoming performances.

Once this project is up and running, it can go in a number of different directions. For example, once there are a handful of dance videos dealing with global warming, then we could launch a mashup competition and encourage people to create their own global warming dance mixes that can be uploaded to a public video gallery. It would be nice, of course, if we could find a sponsor for such a competition that would offer cash and other prizes for both the best dance videos and dance mashups -- this actually might be possible if there is enough interest in this project.

That's my idea. What do you think? Also, global warming is just one of many possible topics to focus on. What are some of the main themes and ideas you address in your dance pieces?

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June 1, 2006

Reclaiming the Relevancy of Dance

One of the ways for dancers to reach a larger global audience - especially an online audience - is by choreographing dance works that address pressing social, political, cultural and economic issues.

Last week I wrote about dance pieces that address global warming. Wouldn't it be great if there were hundreds of dancers from around the world that were actively creating and performing dances that dealt with this important topic? It would be even better if videos of these works were made available online.

With a large number of dance videos to watch about global warming, the millions of people who are concerned about the health of our planet would have a new lens through which to reflect and learn about this important issue.

One of my questions is what are some of the ways that movement can help people - with or without a dance background - think about and relate to global warming? Can it bring people together in new ways and give them a stronger sense of community?

I think that dance videos can inspire more of an emotional way of relating to global warming and thus serve as a powerful springboard for building communities around this topic. This is especially true if some of the videos also strive to help Internet users create their own environmentally-inspired dance pieces and routines and share them with others.

The end result of such a project, I think, is that dance would have more relevancy because it would be integrated into the overall fabric of how people learn about and share their thoughts on important topics.

Imagine, for example, that on hundreds or thousands of websites that cover environmental issues there were direct links to dance videos that dealt with eco-issues. Dance would instantly be transformed from an enjoyable art form that is often disconnected from our daily concerns to a key piece of the puzzle that helps us understand the world in which we live.

In my next post, I'm going to describe some thoughts I have about encouraging large numbers of dancers to address global warming and other important contemporary topics.

Posted by Doug Fox at 10:03 AM - Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)