Call for Essays & Photos on the theme “Dancing Ecologically”
Submission Date: September 15, 2016
“Nowadays, we’re used to wondering what a [dance] says about race or gender, even if the [dance] makes no explicit mention of race or gender. We will soon be accustomed to wondering what any [dance] says about the environment even if no animals or trees or mountains appear in it.” - Timothy Morton
Utah is located at the heart of public lands debate. With our many state and national parks and monuments, our issue with air quality, our water scarcities, our huge (growing) urban sprawl (and its accompanying social & environmental impacts), and our love for outdoor recreation. Alongside all of these, I see the passion of many local dancemakers to present work outside of the proscenium and build dances on ideas of ‘natural’ body movement. In this time of climate change, ecocide, and environmental racism, in this place, what does it mean to dance about the environment? What does it mean to construct a ‘natural’ body, if anything? From my basement office in Glendale, the environment and dance is a crucial issue to address at this moment. Following the lead of the environmental justice movement, I want to expand the definition of ‘environment’ for this issue to include not just Wild Utah, but also all the places that people live, work, play, dance, and learn here.
Questions addressed could include:
- When are we dancing about (or with) the environment?
- Why is site-specific work such a local passion? What does that passion tell us about the environment broadly, and/or the artist’s relationship with it? What is/is there an ethical responsibility when dancing on site?
- What, if any, is the relationship between site-specific work and environmental issues?
- What do our dances teach us about our environment? About ecology?
- What does ecology teach us about our dances?
- How does popular ideology about nature (e.g. ‘the environment’) create assumptions about ‘natural bodies’? How does the relationship of these ideas impact training and creative work?
Send submissions c/o Editor Liz Ivkovich; liz@lovedancemore.org.
All lengths, styles, and even works-in-progress desired!