Dancer playing her part in new city
Chicago native chosen for creative leadership study
Ballet dancer Elizabeth Mensah has lived in Memphis for less than a year, but she is committed to making a difference in her adopted city.
“I really want to get more involved in the Memphis community,” said the 22-year- old Chicago native and dancer with Ballet Memphis. “And through our community engagement program at Ballet Memphis — Connections: Kids — I’ve found that I really, really love working with kids. Obviously, we can’t change their lives in an hour, but the experience still means something to the child.”
Connections: Kids brings dancers to 10 different community centers in some of the most economically depressed areas of the city. Participating children are exposed to dance, health and nutrition education, as well as question-and-answer time with members of the dance company.
“Connections: Kids was such a learning experience for me, especially as a new resident of Memphis,” Mensah said. “It gave me a glimpse of the way so many children in this city live, and reminded me how lucky I was to be raised in a community with ample access not only to the arts, but to proper nutrition and health education. Exposure to these things was such a necessity in my upbringing, and I wish they could be a bigger part of every child’s life.”
After graduating from high school, and with acceptances to several prestigious universities, Mensah chose a scholarship to the world-renowned Joffrey Ballet School in New York City. She studied there for two years, then moved to Joffrey Ballet’s new school in Chicago, where the professional dance company is now based.
After auditioning across the country, Mensah chose Memphis to begin her career. She arrived in August 2011.
This year, she was awarded an
ArtsMemphis grant to attend the Urban Bush Women Summer Leadership Institute in July in New Orleans. The intensive, 10day workshop incorporates leadership training for a carefully chosen group of 18-to 26-year- old artists with instruction in modernbased contemporary dance.
The Brooklyn, N.Y.-based Urban Bush Women are a performance ensemble dedicated to exploring the use of cultural expression as a catalyst for social change. This year’s annual conference will address the question of urban poverty, among other topics.
“It will be way out of my comfort zone,” the petite, classically trained ballerina said, “which will be really cool.”