Interview with Jessica Goldman, Gentry Magazine

RE: SOTA Seven dancers who performed with dance ceres

1. How long have you worked with these particular students? Just this year or have they been in your class since entering high school?

I teach the school of the arts choreography class, which has all students in the dance department (directed by the acclaimed, Elvia Marta) together in one class on friday afternoons. There are roughly 40+ kids -- freshman to senior and beginning to advanced dance levels. The rest of the week they are split up into their dance level, so i feel very fortune to get to all of them for 4 years! I usually choreograph a group piece for them all to open their annual spring concert each year - but this year i had another opportunity for a smaller project. This was the first time i'd worked with any of these dancers outside the classroom. Three of them were new to me last year and the others i'd had in class for a couple of years already.

2. I know (from my wonderful experience with you) that you work with student groups a lot in a professional capacity. Can you tell me more about the impact you think an experience like this has on a developing dancer?

You are sweet! ;) I think that this particular occasion gave them a little taste of what it's 'really' like to get started as a modern dance professional. (They get to dance on the cowell stage to 400+ family and friends each year, which is pretty cool but nowhere near where you start out...) this project with dance ceres was a very small work-in-progress based performance in a black box theater downtown san francisco. If they pursue choreography in the next few years - no doubt they will spend some time in small venues workshoping material before it gets to a main stage!

3. Have you had students work with Dance Ceres in the past? If not, how and why did you decide to create the collaboration this year?

I have never invited students to perform with dance ceres in the past as i feel very strongly that audience members who go see professional dance should get professional dancers on stage. That said, i did invite a graduated senior to intern with the company and perform during a summer program a couple of years ago. She was an exceptional dancer and had an excellent academic record.

This project again, was different from any of my past works. I was specifically studying the flow of a river, with all that it encompasses and collects along its way. I was trying to unwind why we as people get stopped by things in our way (emotionally and physically), while the river simply flows around. I wanted to recreate situations wherein one could inevitably get stopped, yet instead, though the physicality of the movement, would continue on – either with the help of another or by making a choreographic choice. More on that later—

Just as a river has many tributaries, I thought it a relevant experiment to work with several groups, feeding into the same overarching project… to get multiple experiments in the same pool. From the most youthful stream to the collision of all the rushing characteristics at the intersections. I also worked with a quartet at Stanford on the same themes and they performed in the showing as well. So, in all – we had ages on stage ranging from 15-35! Here’s some basic writing on the work that we are continuing to develop:

“The river continues-- it does not sleep, but it devours ravenously. It nurtures, but it does not care. It simply exists in the thoroughness of movement. There is no judgment, only growth and functionality. Is it ruthlessness, inconsideration, oblivion? Or is it forgiven in its naturalness, in its inevitability? Maybe we understand the endlessness because there is no mechanism for stopping. In contrast, the damage we create is from decision, not biological unavoidability. We are destructive to one another on purpose, for even the slightest difference, not inevitably… or is it inevitable? Human fear and confusion facilitates destruction, yet the river knows nothing of judgment or difference. Wash out the human in me and let me be like the river.”

Columbia Chasing, studying the defining differences between the flow of a river and the fluidity of the individual, will highlight our strengths as a dance company as we draw from many ages and experience levels. Through the process of abstraction, blending personal confusion to propel healing, regardless of logical understanding, we reveal the stab of shock and the spark of surprise are one in the same action. Whether through devastation or elation, the immediate state of disbelief renders us motionless. Our work celebrates the things that profoundly surprise us. The body knows when it is finished grieving. It becomes lighter. It flows again."

4. How involved in the choreographic process where the SOTA students?

I directed and choreographed all of the work outside of one collaborative section that was quintessential to the theme of the work-in-progress:

With each group (SOTA, Stanford, dance ceres) I set out to create sections of current wherein the dancers would have to react to each other over time. I described it to each group a little differently each time to see if it made a difference – sometimes I used actual characteristics of different rivers around the globe and other times I gave simply instructions like this: each group had a 2-4 minute section wherein they would rotate through this format until everyone had been the leader 2 or 3 times.

1. one was the leader for “a move or short series of movements in a direction”

2. a second dancer(s) was a follower – or attempted from their angle and space on the stage to do nearly the same thing as the leader

3. a third dancer(s) was a compliment to the first two – reacting in a way that ‘went with’ the others but was not the same – like a set of complimentary colors

4. a fourth dancer was then the agitator – or reacted to the leader in a way that was contrary or dissonant to the leader and served to break up any symmetry that may have developed.

These sections took a long time to make, but were ultimately very interesting. And technique wasn’t really an obstacle because I wasn’t dictating the movement outside of the intent, so all of the dancers looked great together – and though it wasn’t pedestrian based, it was action/reaction based and each movement therefore became essential. And the current sections flowed through just like a bend in the river – tumbling over and through, dragging across the stage space in fluid falls and manipulated angles. There was a leader and an agitator each time but they too were caught up in the current to the outside eye.

5. How did you pick the lucky seven?
They were exceptional in their attendance, classwork and homework in the previous semester and had shown an extra interest in choreography. I will only work with students who show a solid effort in learning. It is my opinion that dedication is much more important than talent at that age and it should be rewarded – luckily each of these dancers are also incredibly talented and captivating, already as their young ages! They were also willing to commit to extra rehearsal time (which can be pretty tricky with teenagers!) I usually try to spend an extra 30 minutes after class with the students who really want to dig into choreography, helping them with outside projects or more specific assignments.

6. How has the experience affected/influenced the Dance Ceres Dancers?
For this particular project, all of the dancers were new to me, as I’d had an audition only a few months before. So actually, I’d spent more time with each of the students than with the dance ceres dancers this time around…


7. How has the experience affected/influenced you as a teacher? As a choreographer?

It was quite overwhelming for me, actually – to have all aspects of my professional life in the same room. Had I had a couple of my choreographic mentors there (Diane Frank, Tarin Chaplin, Jean Isaacs) – that really would have been full circle! ;)

I enjoyed giving myself the permission to take an idea and really beat it into the ground from multiple angles. Sometimes these works go by so fast – conception, rehearsal, performance, done (sometime within as little as 3 months times). And I don’t really feel like I’ve gotten to fully investigate what I wanted – or it changes half way through and I honestly can’t take the time to follow the new trajectory. With this project – I got to work simultaneously with different groups and was therefore able to distill the work to its essentials much more quickly. Now as we’re in the final phases of rehearsal, I know what worked and what didn’t and with a little distance, I can easily cleave the sections away that aren’t going to help the final piece really shine.

As a teacher, I’m always looking for new techniques to unlock movement ideas to help my students develop a language beyond that which they’re familiar from their technique classes. I enjoyed the structural work we did in question #4 and felt it lent itself to more authentic opportunities for movement.

Thank you Brittany. And please keep me updated on performances as I would love to see your students and your dancers live and in person. Also, the article will be in the October issue, so if there are any events for SOTA or Dance Ceres you would like me to include that are happening in Oct-Dec, let me know.

We’ll be premiering Columbia Chasing (which will include some of the choreography from each of the student sections) at the West Wave Dance Festival on Monday, November 8th, 2010 at the Cowell Theater, Fort Mason. The piece is currently being reworked/finalized with our material from the spring and will feature a duet by Yukie Fujimoto (formerly of ODC dance) and Roel Seeber (of Bandaloop and formerly of the Limon Company in NY). For tickets: www.westwavedancefestival.org

And for more info on dance ceres: www.danceceres.org