show up and be honest

i stumbled across this article today and totally identified with it.  as a side note, i loved it before i realized it was written by one of my favorite dance articulators, lauren warnecke (follow her @artintercepts on twitter, really valuable).  and like i usually do, i got thinking, and thinking got me writing, and here i am.

she's talking about the grey, wavery line professionals in the dance world walk every day.... dancemaker? dancer? dance critic? dance teacher? theatre choreographer? social media manager? grant writer?  mentor?  mentee?  producer? director?  i find myself in any (usually many) of these roles on a given day; we all do. she also discusses what she likes to see, as a dance critic, and asks what dance artists are looking for from their critics.

ah, the many roles of "dancemakers."  i am fortunate enough to live in new york city, a place basically teeming with performers and artists.  i know teachers at basically all the major studios in the city; i walk into any given class at city center or at mark morris and see friends and acquaintances.  i run into people i know in rehearsal at 100 grand dance and gibney dance center.  freelance dancer life, you know how it is.  but nearly all those people, all the wonderful artists i consider friends, are hustling their way through various jobs, and roles, and tasks.  and for most of us, those roles are part-time or full-time jobs on top of the other part-time or full-time jobs we take to make us money.  i don't need a degree in process efficiency to know that this is not optimal.  this is just plain not working.  is it any wonder we, as a field, aren't great at marketing?  at showing our communities that art is worth paying actual dollars to see?  at taking care of our performers and our critics and our administrators?  at preserving our culture and our history?  it's actually ridiculous!

we are smart people.  we are artists with a plethora of strengths and talents.  i propose a new model for the dance world; one that supports diversity and allows individuals to specialize without jeopardizing their status as an "artist."  i'm envisioning a dance world in which the marketing is slicker than the ads for silicon valley.  i'm envisioning a world where venues small and large are sold out all over the country; where the "cool" date night is seeing a performance of an emerging dance company (and you don't have to know someone in the company to know about it).  a world in which performers make enough money to take care of themselves.  a world in which dancemakers feel they have the space to be generous and supportive of one another with time, talent, money.

we are responsible for this.  this community is filled with beautiful, brilliant, hardworking individuals.  i propose we work smarter.

how do we create in a way that fulfills ourselves and that fulfills our audiences?  not everyone is going to love watching dance, of course, but i see so much opportunity to make our art a bigger cultural phenomenon -- without watering it down.  i believe audiences want to be challenged.  they want to be trusted.  they want to learn, be touched, form their own opinions, take big bites of juicy delicious work.  how do we support each other?  how do we change the way WE think so we create the dance community we want?

i'm not really sure, but i'm all in for working on it.

and in response to the question about what i'm looking for in a dance critic... just what i want from any dance professional: show up and be honest!  feedback is crucial to what we do and how we connect.  the more i can learn about what other people -- friends, colleagues, random folks -- see in my work, the more specific and sensitive an artist i can be.  the clearer a communicator i can be.  the easier it is to see where my work can make a difference.  the more intentional i can be about my contribution to the community surrounding the art form i adore!

i guess basically my thesis is this:  let's get accountable, show up, work smarter, and actually collaborate on creating the community we want.

in the meantime, i'm gonna go post this on facebook and twitter and then work on this grant application i'm in the middle of...