Claire
Claire shares thoughts on Begin Again with Marie on May 5, 2023
(The following is a condensed version of my conversation with Claire.)
Marie: How did you and Benny come together?
Claire: I went to school with Phil (Strom), and, in 2019, watched Land, Lost, Found at Gibney Dance in NYC. It was super thoughtful and complex, and it was like entering a meditative garden in the middle of the city. There was beautiful movement and strong dancers, and that was the first introduction to Benny and the work. I learned about Begin Again when Phil and I connected in Seattle last summer. When the dancer call was put out, it was at a moment when I been looking for dance in Seattle, and to reentering in a bigger way. The pandemic changed how intimate a relationship I had with dance. The audition process was a welcoming and exciting a space, and that reaffirmed not just wanting to work with Benny and be involved in the piece, but reaffirmed myself wanting to create and dance in this way again.
M: Have you participated in choreographic processes that included non-moving collaborators in the past?
C: I think I’ve loved every experience I’ve had working with non-moving collaborators. I’ve worked a lot in processes with composers and live musicians, that’s been the biggest presence. Worked with a piece that was with a live drummer, another with a live guitarist/composer, and in school, with Phil, actually, I took a class called “Composers, Choreographers, & Designers,” and that was really my first experience on the choreographic end. We (choreographers) were paired with (student) composers, set designers, and costumes designers to shape a piece over a whole semester starting from scratch on the same educational journey, so it was all new for everyone to meet at that intersection. I was able to share input from the very beginning, in the conceptual moments. It turned out to be really thorough, and don’t I think I recognized how integral they are in the process and how many conversations go into any choice. Also, the level of trust every person needs to have in the process taught me a lot.
Most recently, at the end of 2022, I was in a piece where we collaborated with a scent designer, which added a whole other dimension. I think collaboration just adds so much richness to the choreographic process. As a dancer in the process, it gives us so much more texture and concepts to play with when we are moving, regardless of how the movement came to be.
M: Inside Begin Again, are perceiving yourself as yourself, or are you building a separate character?
C: Personally, I tend to perform with a mix of both. I think I like a space that allows my live decisions to breath and change with every performance while at the same time having anchors of storytelling. Begin Again feels closer to a character and a journey that I’m portraying. But, because we are so involved in the creative process right now, it does feel particularly mine, and tied to my own journey.
M: How would you describe your level of agency within the total collaboration?
C: Because it is our first collaboration together, I am still understanding that question as we proceed. So far, it has felt like I’ve had a lot of agency. At least, I can offer a lot into the building of it, which is meaningful to me. I think part of it is that I am excited and respectful of the way that Benny shapes work, and I want to allow myself to be swept into that. At the same time, I love processes where I am able to engage and offer myself genuinely. So, I can’t speak to once we get closer to solidifying it, but right now, as we are sketching, my own movement tendencies are allowed, and my thoughts and mistakes are allowed. At the same time, I do want to do Benny’s work honor, and to make sure I’m not only contributing what I want. I feel like I’m still wanting to prioritize what he feels is important in the moment.
M: Do you have thoughts on the props? Do you have experience with props?
C: The boards are new, for sure. But, I think what feels the most natural is when I treat it (the prop) as a partner and a live human. In that framework and mindset, when I approach it that way, it does feel like dancing with a human. I think I’m still understanding their weight and their momentum. Also, the edges feel, because it’s a flat surface and a straight edge, it doesn’t feel like a hand I can grab onto or something 3D that I can grasp easily. So, I think trying to move with it allows for cool moments of corners with my body that I’m finding. Knowing how to hold it, and trust that I’m holding it, that’s what I’ve been wanting to work on so that I feel comfortable in performance.
M: Are you choosing to actively engage with or integrate identity into your approach to Begin Again?
C: I think the concept has felt so personally charging in a way that I don’t think necessarily relates to my outword indentity. To be frank, my pandemic process has been extremely internal. I was in my own apartment alone for six months in New York City, and so I think reemerging into community and life has felt like part of a healing process. At the same time, the struggle has still been internal. Because of that experience and how it relates to the concept, it has maintained an internal world and an emotionality, kind of a journey in that way. At this moment, the concept has provided this opportunity to heal in a different way, so I can definitely see it expanding to be shaped by indentity and how I feel in that way. But, at this stage in the process, it feels interior.
M: Is the trauma and healing work that is happening inside of the concepts informing Begin Again’s creation process personal to you?
C: Even unconsciously, engaging with the creative process has felt like a form of addressing, like, facing trauma for me, personally, and healing. Dance holds a lot of charge for me since the pandemic, and dancing in a space with others still holds a lot of charge for me. Being in a creative process where I'm asked to be present in the space, I think that holds charge as well. In its framework, it's already been asking me to face a lot of things that I need to Begin Again, literally. Even being on a train with other people is asking me to let go of the fears and stresses and be here. In the process itself, in rehearsal, I don't think it's felt as conscious there. Maybe because once I've let go into dance and the structure of rehearsal, it's felt easy, and like I've arrived. I can just, like, be present as myself without some of those stresses.
- Marie