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Are You Still Immersed In The Process? How Content Culture Can Cap The Artist

 It felt so good to move, undulate, and slide into a deep second position to recoil into a contorted contraction. It truly felt like breathing. Surely, I adore codified technique. However, taking a contemporary class last night taught me way more than I bargained for. Get out of your headspace, get out of the mirror, ditch the "content concept" and just dance. I reckon that is my honest thesis. I felt like Jodie (without my Cooper) as I whisked across the floor. Throughout class I thought about the likes and wisdom of dancers like Robert Battle and Matthew Rushing. While dancing, I recalled both of their sentiments that included abandon and connection (to the floor, to the movement, to the work...) while dancing. Truly, I felt that. Suddenly, I am met with a challenge. Maybe it's culture or maybe its Maybeli — nope! It's definitely culture.  For about one minute, I wrestled with walking off of the floor, grabbing my phone, finding a proper angle to record, propping...
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This Is Not Good For Young Dancers, At All

 I'm sure someone feels like I am beating a dead horse by discussing this topic. Truth is, I sort of feel like I'm beating a dead horse with this topic. But, man, like clockwork I either see or hear something that erupts within as a sign to me that my passion for dance and my role within its world and industry, are alive now more than ever.

One day last week I heard a leader of a children's dance company express to dancers, pushing the thought "What is more beautiful than seeing back and brown ballerinas?". The woman leadership figure, I am unsure of her actual position, did not mention anything about the actual content of what the dancers were working to present. She did mention however, keeping on their pointe shoes for the entirety of the audition. 

My concern is that the blackness of young dancers is taking precedence over their ability and development within the craft. Black ballet dancers have become a trend yet again. You know how things can happen in waves. Now it is the idolization of black women training/having a career in ballet and with that comes the popping up of schools and programs building their fame by focusing most on the color of a dancer's skin. Why are people so obsessed with proving themselves great despite their race? That isn't a victor's mentality at all. You know, even when I do minimal research on black ballet dancers, sometimes it’s just black women who dance. Here's one question. Are we adding to the misinformation of black women who have pioneered in the world of classical ballet alongside those who actually don't study ballet at all today by presenting and teaching the bare minimum all in the name of blackness? Question two, does excellence matter beyond being recognized by others just to showcase once again that "we're black"? How can we truly take satisfaction in the legacies that precede us as a method of moving ahead excellently if the goal is to merely be black, dancing ballet, because some people say we can't? That will never make sense to me and I will never stand behind it. Who you are matters least when what you do is of great caliber. 

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