At the beginning of the semester, Ensemble members were invited to create their own "under 3 minutes" dances that proposed a response to thoughts about money, the economy and economics. Five students came forward with proposals. Four chose to use a song that spoke to a particular idea. One chose text from the web.
Rosie Fuqua danced to the Flying Lizard's version of "Money, That's What I Want"
Jermaine Stewart-Webb danced to Abba's "Money"
Eva Dawson and Sofia Tedesco danced to "Enjoy Your Worries You May Never have Them Again"
Ana Novak created "Just Follow the Directions" to a wikihow article, "How to achieve Financial Freedom in eight easy steps.
Student Choreographers
"Rosie Fuqua danced to the Flying Lizard's "Money", popping around stage and completing complex, jazzy turns, jumps and floorwork, all while maintaining a huge smile plastered to her face. It was a piece that seemed to encapsulate the idea of money and frivolity, of striving for the snazzy and the jazzy, but not necessarily substantive, like the pop music and the smiles of the dancers." -Lauren Sheely, audience
"In contrast, Jermaine Stewart-Webb danced a dark solo to the upbeat Abba song, "Money", revealing the lives of those made invisible by the wealth around them."
In Eva Dawson and Sofia Tedesco's etheral mourning to "Enjoy Your Worries You May Never Have Them Again", the dancers pulled, and dragged a white shirt between them, with powerful partnerings and uncouplings. Their dance posed the tension in an economic system that proposes that there can only be one winner, thus everyone else is by default a loser."
"She [Ana Novak] recited the WikiHow article, "How to Achieve Financial Independence" while performing a series of movements that corresponded with each of the eight steps. As Novak swung her arms around her body while "assess[ing] [her] station in life" (Step 1), I felt lost and overwhelmed for her - this task seemed so daunting, and Novak's movements undercut the seemingly simple "8 Steps", highlighting how problematic and condescending this article could be to a 20-something year old who was looking down the scary path of financial independene. Her thoughtfulness in executing the movement was apparent, and her movement on a diagonal throughtout the dance space evoked the idea of the proper "path" people must take to acheive conventional success. It was a different approach to the idea of economy than Fuqua's sugary pop satire, and yet both tied into the larger picture." - Lauren Sheely, audience