Category: Art

Awards for Dance

Justice is Bling

I have been sitting up (just now) cramming for a meeting tomorrow.

I am in my third year sitting on the Metro DC Dance Awards Finals Selection Committee. The public narrows it down to three, or five, nominees and then this committee decides who gets the awards. We each get one vote. We’re supplied with DVD’s of everything. The performance/performer with the most 1’s wins. The system is set up to run quickly, so we really only discuss if there are two items with same number of #1 votes.

I’ve sat on a few grant committees. I don’t mind the work of it. I find it interesting, and I like that my judgment is trusted. For some reason, I’m really uncomfortable tonight. Yes, I’m about a week late turning in my ballots (which are supposed to be turned in before the meeting), but that’s not it.

Some of what I watched, I watched with more pleasure, cause it was more to my taste. Who am I to say that my taste deserves an award? Is the thing that I and most people will give a ‘1’ too really the best? Moan, struggle, angst… but seriously: the stuff I ‘liked’ more – does that mean that it’s ‘better’?

I’m tired of judging my peers work. Ok. I’m not tired of judging my peers. But I’m tired of my judgment impacting them. There were very few performances that I saw that didn’t deserve an award, and none that I saw that I was like – holy shit, that just has to win. And there were things that weren’t nominated that I thought should be. That I saw cause there were other categories, or people, in the video, so I happened to see them watching for other things. (Chris Morgann’s sonnets thing for citydance really didn’t suck at all. Little rambly, but good.)

Lady Justice

I like sitting on grant panels. Hearing what people might do. Seeing what they have done. But I don’t like these awards. I know they serve a great purpose for our community. They really help to raise the winner’s profiles. And that’s a service. Shit, I want one! Nevertheless:

I read in the LA Times last night that from 1918 to 1948 (or something) art was in the olympics. You could win a medal for watercolor painting, or sculpture. I’m glad I wasn’t a judge. I’m off the committee after this year anyway, but I’m really struggling with trying to fill out these ballots. I’m not sure how to give my peers justice. I don’t feel it’s mine to give. And I’m tired of giving them judgment.

Clavigo by the Paris Opera

Being a student of dance history, I have immense respect for the Paris Opera. The Opera House was at the forefront of ballet fashion/development for a critical hundred year period. I found a video of a new ballet made on the company in a sale bin at olson’s in dupont. I was astounded. So astounded that I shared it with a friend. I don’t remember who.

If it was you, dear reader: shame, shame shame!!! Return my video!

Regardless – enjoy. The whole is well worth viewing, if only to inspire one to realize that some people really are still making serious ballet out there.

This is the entrance scene by Le Riche. Watch. (He plays a saucy little minx, and is an astounding dancer.)

So much of the ballet is so enthralling. Tomorrow night Hilary Clinton speaks at the convention (according to someone – ‘Clinton in 2012!) and so its appropriate to say that it takes a village to make a ballet. The sets are amazing. The music, the costume, the dancers, the choreography. It takes a village to make good art. When I wrote ‘some people are making ballet’ above I meant it. Making ballets is not an individual sport. In that way it’s much like policy. Inspiration/leadership MAY come from the top, but it takes many many many to create anything real.

I’m posting this next clip for simple shock value; the French are less afraid to include sexual content. Oral sex never looked so arty.

I’m pretty verbose, and not afraid to offer an opinion. Watching this ballet humbles me as a writer, dancer, and choreographer. Check out the video if you can. You can order it from Kultur or Amazon.

Judge Art Now!!

I frequently meet people who are scared to judge Art. This is fascinating to me, because as I understand it, Art is an inherently personal experience, a gift from the artist. It is mine, and so mine to judge, like bad breath or bad shoes. I feel comfortable assessing a Van Gogh as second rate, a Pollock as mediocre, or an unknown coffee-shop drawing as brilliant. It is a sign of the (perceived) irrelevance Art has in modern life that many do not feel licensed to judge it.

Most lay-people evaluate Art (be it music, visual art, or dance) with simple standards. Discouraging the use of these standards does us no service. It is never in an artist’s best interest to imply that he/she is more intelligent, or sophisticated, than the audience. It is interesting to consider the public’s disinclination to judge Art in contrast to its inclination toward the judgment of sport. Sports teams, which have a loyal community based on geography, are the subject of constant – and usually completely uninformed – discussion.

The act of judgment is an act of ownership, and investment. Sports teams have public support, in part, because the public is empowered to critique them. Art is reliant on encouraging the engagement and investment of its community. How does one encourage engagement and investment? By encouraging judgment. Burdening potential stakeholders with the correct means to evaluate an experience is asking too much. As we move forward to the discovery of the Art and audience of tomorrow encouraging judgment could be meaningful to the growth of the Arts community.

This was published in the dance magazine Contact Quarterly a few months ago as a letter to the editor. It’s the short short version of a 1500 word piece.

I would add here that I find sports to be a common ground in our society. When I don’t know what to say to people ‘out in the world’, I can usually strike up an engaging conversation on sports. (I’m not faking it; I do genuinely like and follow some sports.) Perhaps in the 18th or 19th century it was different. Maybe then people talked about sonatas, witches, or taxes. But I find comfort – and I think many do – in the common shallow shared passion that sports provide.

I do not mean to imply that sports are bad. I am simply trying to explain the mass appeal. A conversation on the relative merits of sports vs. arts for children and adults will be forthcoming.