Journal articles and newsletters from Ausdance and industry partners.
Annette Gillen’s touching world: Lee Christofis interviews Annette Gillen
Annette Gillen (nee Dunlop) remembers performances of the Ballets Russes de Monte Carlo in Sydney, and their direct influence on her becoming a dancer—first as a student of Helene Kirsova and then as a professional dancer in the Kirsova and Borovansky Ballets.
Themes from an unfinished major work: the Wellington New Dance Group
Marianne examine the influence that American and European dance and physical education has had on New Zealand's physical and artistic expression, gives modern dance a context within the social and cultural landscape of immediate post-WWll New Zealand.
Dancing with MAVIS in the National Film and Sound Archive
Garry offers an excellent appraisal of the dance holdings at the National Film and Sound Archives in Canberra, and reminds us of the value of having dance on film to experience a history of dance.
Dancing te moana: interdisciplinarity in Oceania
This seed for this article began at a conference at the University of Otago where there was much debate about the connections between, and the definitions of, 'interdisciplinarity' and 'interculturalism' within the Oceania context. The featured dance ethnography investigates the creative process and somatic philosophies of the Atamira Dance Company.
Body commons: toward an interdisciplinary study of the somatic spectacular
Kohe and Newman investigate the parallels between sport and dance studies and also consider the emerging discipline called 'physical cultural studies'. They suggest that an intercourse between study of dance and study of sport "could provide novel methodological, theoretical, and metaphysical spaces which transcend disciplinary moorings."
The role of dance studies in a transdisciplinary university research environment
Boundary crossing is the first step towards transdisciplinarity. In this paper, Alison discusses the act of academic boundary crossing, of ‘dancing’ across or between the disciplines. She explores the potential role of dance within the relatively new and evolving research paradigm of transdisciplinarity (TD).
Rivers of song, blood and memories: tongues of stone perth
Carol talks in detail about the collaborative work Tongues of Stone, made in Perth in 2011 with designer Dorita Hannah and sound artist Russell Scoones. "Our collaborative process seeks to make connections between the lived-in present and long-buried traumatic pasts..."
On the politics of interdisciplinary collaboration
Alex questions whether interdisciplinary collaboration must necessarily be seen as democratic and therefore desirable, or whether it could instead be viewed as a more problematic corollary of contemporary forces such as globalisation and the modern market economy.
Sociography
In a departure from conventional Western concert dance choreography, Larry talks about his collaborative works with performers who "disengage aesthetic design-based constraints carried by codified dance techniquers and choreographic principles."
Body knowledges: dancing/articulating complexity
With a particular interest in the ways that dancers reflect social, cultural, political and economic currencies, Ananya talks about the intersection of dancing, dance studies and social justice work. Many of her questions come from experiences of art-making that encompass a broad range of race, gender, class and sexuality.
When in doubt, laugh
Felicia writes candidly about her experiences as a participant in the 2008 Asia Young Choreographers Project (AYCP) in Taiwan.
Brain, dance and culture: choreographer, dancing scientist and interdisciplinary collaboration
This article outlines a project that incorporates methods from phenomenology, cognitive ethnography and dance anthropology, as well as knowledge and theory from the neurosciences.
Reframing arguments about the value of contemporary dance: putting creativity at the centre of dance
Sue talks about the challenges of sustainability for contemporary dance in Australia, and argues that the notion of creativity should be at the core of future debates about the intrinsic, cultural and economic benefits of dance.
The Ballets Russes symposium
The Ballet Russes symposium was devoted singularly to the collaborative practice in the creation of ballets since the advent of Serge Diaghilev's Ballet Russes in 1909. Curator of Dance at the National Libray of Australia, Lee Christofis gives his account of the conference.
Anna Pavlova’s 1926 Australian tour
Nina Melita gives an account of Pavlova's first Australian tour, during which the famous dancer astounded her audiences with her artistry and passion. Pavlova was an honest and outspoken person who did not particularly enjoy attention from the press.
Yumi Umiumare’s DasSHOKU Hora!!: critique through ‘cross’-cultural femininity
Postcolonial theorist, Homi Bhabha proposes an interstitial space exists in between polarities along axes of subjectivity. Georgie Boucher uses Bhabha’s notion of the interstitial subject to investigate how Umiumare might utilise strategically in-between subjectivities in performance.
Becomings and belongings: Lucy Guerin’s The Ends of Things
Melissa Blanco Borelli uses some of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s postmodern philosophical ideas of becoming, and Elspeth Probyn’s provocative conceptualisation of belonging, as ways to theoretically read choreography.
Fitting in: reflections on a dance research project
Eleanor Brickhill reflects on a 2005 research project which was not intended to come to any conclusions, but to hopefully illuminate certain ironies or conflicts. She talks about "taste" and how it can create boundaries and divisions between people.
Brain, dance and culture: evolutionary characteristics in the collaborative choreographic process
This is part 2 of a broad hypothoses of an intuitive science of dance. Elizabeth Dalman and neuroscience researcher Paul Howard Mason (1982 – ) joined forces to explore the evolutionary characteristics of a discrete social system, with a belief that choreography involves processes that expose the social machinery of human expressive systems.
Dancing with information and communication technologies
Felicity Mandile (Virtual Schooling Service, Education Queensland) talks about the World Dance unit embedded within the VSS Dance Course and in particular, an innovative project that utilised videoconferencing technology to create a collaborative choreographic environment between two indigenous groups of students.