Life as a Modern Dancer

Category: Choreographers

  • Artist Profile #132: Michelle Boule (New York, NY)

    “White”     Photo by Ian Douglas Hometown: Brooklyn, NY (originally from Sugar Grove, IL) Current city: Brooklyn, NY Age: 38 College and degree: BFA in Dance from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign Website: michelleboule.com How you pay the bills: Teaching, making dances, performing in other people’s dances, BodyTalk, for a while I was able to sublet my apartment…

  • A Choreographic Mind by Susan Rethorst

    Arrival rests on the idea that the dance's premise and content will be made manifest through the making, that I will arrive at where I want to go, at what I want to be doing with this dance by following the dance's lead. It rests on the belief that the ideas that are in me…

  • Building a Dance Company: The Art of Decision-Making

    The Art of Decision-Making By Sumi Clements The hardest part of doing anything is deciding to do it. When approached to contribute to this blog, I was invited to write about any aspect of building a dance company. Since I could write short novels about my particular experiences in dancemaking, directing, working in a partnership, fundraising, producing, the…

  • Artist Profile #130: Gerri Houlihan (Durham, NC)

    Hometown: Born in Ft. Lauderdale, FL Current city: Soon to be – Durham, NC Age: 70 Attended an arts high school? No, but I got out of taking phys. ed by teaching a modern dance component in my high school and choreographing the junior musical so that I could leave school early every day and go to…

  • The Choreographic Moment: Ideas from Jo Kreiter

    The Ghost of a Something By Jo Kreiter The choreographic moment is the beginning before the beginning. It’s when something gnaws. Or wakes me up at 3:00 in the morning. It’s when there is a ghost of a something I am beginning to intuit but have not yet fully understood. Every Thursday I drive down…

  • Building a Dance Company: Open Studios and Rehearsals

    Photo by Becca Green. Wearable art by Amabelle Aguiluz. Open Studios and Rehearsals – How and Why By Stephanie Zaletel It is rare that I feel comfortable opening up my process to the public. As dancers (and choreographers), we are trained from a very early age to present our work polished and unapologetically "complete." At…

  • Artist Profile #129: Amy Chavasse (Ann Arbor, MI)

    Hometown: Raleigh, NC Current city: Ann Arbor, MI Age: 50s College and degree: University of North Carolina School of the Arts – BFA Graduate school and degree: University of Washington – MFA Website: http://www.chavassedanceandperformance.com/ and ChavasseDance Facebook page How you pay the bills: Associate Professor – University of Michigan; guest artist and choreographer at various institutions, workshops,…

  • Building a Dance Company, and Becoming an Arts Administrator: Lauren Simpson of Simpson/Stulberg Collaborations

      Establishing Simpson/Stulberg Collaborations: My Biggest Challenge So Far By Lauren Simpson  When we established our own company, I quickly saw why it makes perfect sense that larger companies have an Executive Director and Artistic Director. These jobs require two different minds. The ED is results driven, concerned with productivity, detail oriented, logical and self…

  • Artist Profile #128: Paloma McGregor (New York, NY)

    Hometown: St. Croix, Virgin Islands Current city: New York College and degree: BS Newspaper Journalism, Florida A&M University Graduate school and degree: MFA Choreography & Performance, Case Western Reserve University @ age 30 Website: angelaspulse.org How you pay the bills: Producing, performance, choreography, facilitation, project management Non-dance work you do or have done in the past: For…

  • Building a Dance Company: The Pre-Company Stage (Part 1 of a 3-Part Series)

      Part One: The Pre-Company Stage By Lauren Simpson and Jenny Stulberg of Simpson/Stulberg Collaborations Around ten years ago, we each had the goal of starting a dance company, but that was long before we knew each other and had the wherewithal to take action steps to make it a reality. A whole set of…