Teaching Philosophy 

 

It is important to remember that as teachers, we are also students. As I help guide and support the personal growth of the future generation of dance artists, I am constantly reminded of their huge role in teaching me as well. There is an exchange that breaks down the old authoritarian school of thought, that “the teacher knows all”. It is my belief that the most productive and effective learning atmosphere is created by offering a self reflective classroom where we all strive to become our own best teachers. 

 

My goal as an educator is to help my students become socially conscious individuals who believe their art can affect the wider community. I want to empower each student to develop personal research that can contribute something relevant and useful to the world. I encourage my students to challenge not only themselves, but the current established ideologies of the field. This self-directed research is important to our ‘art’ and will allow for continued growth.

 

My teaching methods include a balance between understanding the value of the historical contributions of our pioneers, with the investigation and development of personal artistry. Integrating multi sensory methods of kinesthetic awareness and embodied knowledge, I strive to give students the ingredients to become self engaged artists who will take their investigations into the society at large. I want to help steer the future educators away from authoritative teaching methods and towards a nurturing yet rigorous investigative process instead. 

 

In mentoring the next generation of movers and thinkers, I want to help students believe in the power of the individual. There is not one body or mind alike, and to try and force otherwise only creates tension within. I place extreme importance in the practice to understand our bodies as individual movers, and how to find the most efficient and safe pathways of execution. I strive to provide a class that can be interpreted for the individual, so to allow my students to celebrate their personal qualities as well as learn the tools of adaptability they can bring to their own practice. 

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Artist Statement

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    I want to create work about the human experience. I am most interested in exposing sociopolitical issues, and the emotionalism of humanity in its most raw state. By raw, I mean the bare and instinctive human qualities that can be expressed by the body through movement and sound. I continually investigate the power of the human voice and the effect it has on movement. My intent is to combine the power of gesture, spoken word, humor, and physical movement to present abstract yet narrative work. The challenge is to manifest the intimacy of the human experience, and yet still sustain the kinetic volume in the movement vocabulary. My goal is to present an amalgam of language, dance, and visual imagery in effort to forge an intimate yet conversational quality of theatrical performance.