Air Dancing
Air Dancing
VauLT Hosts its 2nd Annual Festival of Aerial Arts
Dancer: Liz Cooper.
Photography by Shandra Hees.
Imagine muscular, dare-devil dancers tumbling from vaulted ceilings and catching themselves in floor-length panels of silky fabric. They swing and spiral and climb as if gravity is just a little weaker for them. It’s part circus, part post-modern dance with enough spectacle to engage a sports fan and elegance for the museum of fine arts.
Modern dance began to evolve into what we call postmodern dance in the 1960s, which is where our story of aerial dance begins. Dance makers from the Judson Church movement questioned the confines of the traditional proscenium stage, and took it to public spaces on land and even the water. Trisha Brown, a Judson Church artist, explored dances on walls and rooftops, altogether questioning our notion of spatial orientation. In one of the very first aerial dance performances, Alwin Nikolais created Sorcerer for a dancer suspended in a partially concealed harness and rope in 1960.
Houston is lucky. We get to claim a hub for this type of dance. This July 18-26 VauLt Houston hosts the 2nd Annual Festival of Aerial Arts where Houstonians and aerial enthusiasts will have the chance to study with some of the finer teachers in the aerial dance world. Amy Ell is at the helm of Houston’s aerial dance community as Artistic Director of VauLt, a dance company that creates work from the floor to the sky. Ell is clear, “I am not an aerial dance choreographer…I am a postmodern choreographer who uses aerial components. Most aerial dancers stay in the air, though the line is ever blurring and they are even spending a bit more time on the floor.”
The festival will be held at VauLt’s studio in Spring Street Studios. Yes, you too can learn how to fly, flip, swing, dance, and climb into the air. This is the only festival of its kind in Texas. Ell has traveled the world setting up aerial dance programs in Germany, Iceland, South Africa, and throughout the United States. She’s influenced the global scene, and she’s bringing it to us with guest artists from the US, Canada, and Europe.
I confessed my fear of heights to Ell and she assured me that “beginner classes will be accessible to everyone. Beginners also don’t have to worry about heights, they will learn techniques at a low elevation.” Ell did a little divulging of her own, “I am afraid of heights…but you get used to the height challenge. When I began I got nervous on a 10 foot ladder–now I perform at heights just over 40 feet without freaking out.”
The Festival of Aerial Arts boasts classes for beginners through professionals, kids through adults, and all class levels are indicated on the website. Some of the strength conditioning and beginner classes are available for a drop-in rate while other classes run the full week. You can try those out the first day to decide if it’s for you, but because of the pace of the classes, you cannot join mid-week. There is a reward for the adventurous: those who take classes for the full week will get to perform on Saturday, July 26.
You may have seen the long silky fabric, or the trapeze—those are the more traditional forms of aerial dance. At the festival, you’ll get to try not only fabric and trapeze, but rope, lyra (hoop), wall running and counterweight for all levels. If you’re like me, you’re already seeing yourself flying through the air with glorious biceps, but still that one sheepish question lingers: “how hard is it?” Ell assures me that beginners are welcome. I think we should believe her, she sent me this Friedrich Neitzche quote, “He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”
A teaser concert performed by professional aerialists from across the globe kicks off the festival on Friday and Saturday evening, July 18-19, 2014, at 8:00 PM. The festival closes with an informal showing of works by workshop participants on July 26, 2014, at 8:00 PM.
A frequent traveler, I asked Ell what she thought of the aerial dance scene abroad. “They are getting more and more experimental with combining dance on the floor and in the air and using invented aerial apparatus.” Sounds a lot like our Houston scene. “I am so incredibly happy and proud to be a part of this movement…this advancement of dance.”
gyrotonichouston.com
www.festivalofaerialarts.com
Lydia Hance is the artistic director of Frame Dance Productions.
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