The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
DANCE POETRY
YALE DANCE LAB RELEASES VIRTUAL PROJECT
The term “dance poetry” seems like an oxymoron. Poetry is textual, dance is physical. Put the two together and maybe Walt Whitman could have stunned us with a few pirouettes on his way down that road in the yellow wood.
Instead, the Yale Dance Lab and the Yale Schwarzman Center put together something a little more elegant.
“Transpositions: Dance Poems for an Online World” is a 16-episode series featuring virtual dance poems from 66 dancers exploring “the continuous and interrupted dance practices in digital life.”
Emily Coates, associate professor and director of dance in the Theater and Performance Studies Program, designed “Transpositions” last Spring.
“It became clear that in looking ahead to plan for the coming year, we may very well still be in that situation in the fall,” she said.
“So I started to think about a project that could involve as many dance artists as possible and could reach out and help to connect as many students as possible with projects that could bring together different communities at Yale and in New Haven and in the larger dance world with the goal, ultimately, to foster creative research in this unprecedented year.”
That creativity led to dancers transforming into what Coates calls “dance poets.” But this poetry has very little do with any actual text. The dances are metaphors, physical manifestations of stories and feelings, put into a structure with practical structures.
“Don’t let the word ‘poem’ mislead you,” Coates said.
“There are limitations within the structure and with Zoom, so, in that way, it’s like a sonnet. And when you have poetic structure, there are limitations that can produce great variety of creation and creativity.”
Coates paired students with professional choreographers in the area. Students and choreographers had two two-hour sessions together over Zoom to brainstorm and create this art. During that time, video artist Kyla Arsadjaja filmed the sessions, and compiled the video artistically to create the finished video project.
She witnessed firsthand the creative process between the choreographers and dancers.
“They just made [the dancers] so comfortable being in such a tight space and making it super fun and experimental and using their bodies and objects around them just within this square Zoom frame,” Arsadjaja said.
“They were creating really beautiful choreography and compositions.”
Kellie Ann Lynch and Lindsey Bauer founded Elm City Dance Collective, and they acted as choreographers for the “Transpositions” project.
“We sort of approached it with choreographic prompts and questions and asked the dancers to come with a phrase already prepared,” Bauer said. “And sort of organized the time with prompts to provoke exploration and play. Talking about a zoom environment is a really different place than a studio where everyone’s together.”
Bauer and Lynch worked with the students in experimenting how to interact with the camera on the device they were using to record, whether that be a computer or a phone. They said that experimentation led to creative ideas about how to use space and how to exit and enter the frame in a way that contributed to the art rather than detracting from it.
“As with all or many artistic processes, you come in with perhaps a general idea of what you’re interested in exploring and then it takes on a life of its own once you get rolling, especially if you’re working with people who are open and curious and playful,” Lynch said.
Lynch and Bauer both said the project was more than just a chance to help upand-coming dancers. It helped reignite their love of the craft during a time as heavy and uninspiring as the pandemic.
“When the pandemic hit, I didn’t want to dance. I didn’t want to move. I mean, I was moving my body, but I wasn’t dancing,” Bauer said.
“I was angry, I think, about [the pandemic] and about the circumstances and all of it and so… [this project] was very positive for me as an artist, professionally and emotionally and personally. I think it was really fun for all the participants, because even the choices they make in the video are not dramatic and heavy and expressive, they’re playful and inquisitive and exploratory.”
Coates also expressed her gratitude for a project that turned a difficult year into a time of transformation.
“I just feel so proud of this project as a real act of collective community creation,” Coates said. “And I feel like together we have created a document of this year that transcends or elevates our social circumstances into art.” “Transpositions” is available to watch online at schwarzman.yale.edu.