UCSB Department of Theater/Dance Presents Fall Dance Concert WITHIN EXISTENCE | EXISTENCE WITHIN

Journey to UCSB's Halten Theater this December to experience the fall dance concert, "Within Existence | Existence Within" debuting December 1-3, 2022. Featuring choreography by five UCSB senior dancers and UCSB Dance faculty members Christina McCarthy and Christina Sanchez, these choreographers are curating original, and imaginative pieces into one holistic and contemporary concert.

As the culmination of three years of dance curriculum, the five BFA student choreographers have been experimenting with cutting edge and modern rehearsal practices. Choreographer Bailey Dodgion explained, "I like to be really in tune with how my dancers are receiving the movement. Oftentimes I ask them for a certain step and they add their own individuality to it which sparks my imagination further." Bailey is creating a contemporary ballet work titled "Experience," which uses fast paced virtuosic and athletic movement juxtaposed against a mysterious duet that emerges and disappears throughout the piece.

This dancer-centric model is also exhibited by choreographer Jazz Hayes who shared, "My rehearsals are dancer-led and focus on what my dancers need from me for support or clarification on movement. This allows my dancers to feel more comfortable with the movement and the piece in general as well as give them more time to get familiar with the intricacies of the music." Jazz has created a minimalistic and highly detailed movement piece titled "Threshold, excerpt 2" that traps the dancers in a liminal space of transition between states of being. The dancers on stage at times evoke humans waiting and affecting one another and other times evoke synaptic electricity bouncing around in the cells of the brain.

Jaliana Apawan Semien starts from a place of exploration in movement vocabulary generated from the seven virtues and seven sins. Using a visceral and expansive movement palette, Jaliana's work is ethereally connected to these sins and virtues. The dancers shift through snapshots of interactions and energetic snippets of these states of being in a push and pull of grace and conflict.

Leia Zorba, connecting with the seven archetypes of femininity, explores the ways in which feminine power has been undercut by the confining stereotypical ideas and old-fashioned notions about women. Leia sees elements of control and limitation in these ways of understanding femininity and looks to break open our understanding of feminine self-definition for each person.

In the piece, "Tethered," choreographer Dalya Modlin creates an atmosphere of memory, loneliness and reflection that pairs individual dancers floating in a state of reverie on one side of the stage, with a group of dancers flowing through a visceral interpretation of emotion and recollection on the other side of the stage. The piece unfolds as a collage of images that mix in a stream of consciousness that relates to how memory comes and goes in our conscious and subconscious mind.

Each of these student choreographers hopes to build an experience for audiences that keeps them asking questions. These dance creators hope the audience will focus on the humanistic elements of live performance and through that empathetic lens, feel compelled to manifest change in their community.

You will not want to miss "Within Existence | Existence Within" at UCSB's Hatlen Theater December 1 - 2 at 7:30pm and December 3 at 2:00pm. For tickets and more information, visit theaterdance.ucsb.edu, or call the box office at (805) 893-2064.