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An Exploration in Improvisation
The UCI UROP program sends dance students to research improvisational movement in Andalusia
Choreography “Dixit” performed by Katrina Muffley and Aska Soto under the direction of Lisa Naugle; Composer Vladimir Scolnick (Photo: John Crawford, using his interactive video system “Active Space System”)
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In summer 2009, 12 University of California, Irvine (UCI) students from the Dance Department in the School of the Arts attended a two-week intensive on Dance Improvisation for Performance in Andalusia, Spain. The group consisted of dancers, choreographers and musicians, who all collaborated in their exploration of improvisation. Chair of the Dance Department at UCI and the Resident Choreographer at the Composer Festival in Malaga, Spain, Professor Lisa Naugle traveled to Spain with the students for this unforgettable cultural and educational experience.
Throughout the trip, dance students collaborated with the musicians and composers to create improvisational pieces.
Alysha Shroff, a Modern Dance student at UCI, describes her experience collaborating with musician Barrie Webb. “It was only he and I working together to create a piece pretty much just for the two of us. I did not expect him to offer to change his work slightly, and was thrilled that he even offered to do so.”
Getting the opportunity to work one on one with professional musicians was truly inspirational for me,” says Shroff. “In the environment we work in now, we are constantly catering to the music, as it is a static piece of work that is recorded on a CD, it can never change, and you never get to see the person who is playing it.” Shroff plans to return to Spain this summer.
In addition to the musical improvisation, the dance students used their surroundings to inspire movement.
Another dance major, Lindsay Berliner notes that her improvisational background has been strengthened by the program. “The freedom to focus on exploration is exactly what I needed in order to create my own movement vocabulary,” says Berliner.
“Your whole life is an improvisation; it really informed our movement, “says third year dance major Rachel Berman, describing the atmosphere in Andalusia.
The students were in Andalusia for two weeks, spending the majority of their time outdoors in the small, mountain village of Frigiliana, located on the Costa del Sol. The environment allowed them to interact with the locals as well as the local scenery.
Katrina Muffley, a second year dance major at UCI describes a memorable street performance in Malaga.
“At first, Professor Naugle was organizing us for a video shoot under a bougainvillea tree;” Muffley explained, “as we moved through space this video shoot shortly emerged into an improvisational performance where we soon attracted an audience as well as a saxophone player right from the streets.”
“All of our performance spaces were outside or on the street;” says Marissa Brown, a sophomore dance major, “having such a beautiful backdrop to work in brought new creativity to my movement.”
On May 15, these young and creative dance researchers, among many others, performed in front of the community at the 2010 seventeenth annual UCI Undergraduate Research Symposium, organized by Said Shokair, the Director of the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP ) at UCI.
“I would recommend the UROP program to other dance students,” says Brown. “Without their help in funding this amazing experience in which I have learned so much would not have been possible.”
To find out more about the dance program, visit Rachel Berman’s section of: http://undergrads.universityofcalifornia.edu/
To learn more about UCI’s UROP Symposium, visit: http://www.urop.uci.edu/symposium.html