Tag: Dance

Some years ago (no need to mention how many), I began a journey with the explicit translation of  text to movement/dance.  If I am being honest, my choreographic process, for as far back as I can remember, always began with the translation of the images in my head and/or sensations in my body to text.  I would then, through numerous studio sessions, translate the text to movement/dance and in the process sculpt out the essence of a story.  It is for this reason, I have journal loads of choreo-text, some became fully realized dance works, while others await their dance life.

My collaboration with Joanne Kilgour Dowdy began in the latter years of  the 1990s  when we were both based at Georgia State University.  In that first collaboration we translated  her PhD dissertation to dance.  During subsequent years we collaborated on other projects,  one of which was Carmen Montana: a story of literacy on the move.   Base on the true story of an adult literacy student’s struggle to gain literacy and self actualize, the making of Carmen Montana took Dowdy and I on our own powerful journey.  On this video the then Dr. Dowdy,  now Professor of Literacy Studies School of Teaching, Learning and Curriculum Studies at Kent State University, Ohio,  interviews me about the rehearsal process of Carmen Montana: a story of literacy on the move.