In Dance

Photo by Randy Lucina
[ID: Laic Moschino 007 vogueing at the Hella Hyphy Ball no. 2. Laic wears a yellow top and pants and arches back, touching the ground with both hands. In the background, there is a crowd of people watching with a bright light shining towards the camera.]

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Editor’s Note: Oakland to All is a Spring 2023 CA$H grantee. This article highlights their funded activities and vision.

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Oakland to All began in June 2021 as a meeting of the minds. Three ballroom participants wanted to create a safe space for queer youth during the pandemic—at a time when ballroom had begun to wane in the Bay Area. We came together and hosted free, renegade vogue sessions outside at Lake Merritt Pergola. Through the work of Shea 007, Ashlee Basquiat, and myself, and our regular collaboration with venues Public Works and Fluid510, Oakland to All is becoming more than just a safe space for ballroom participants to express their authentic selves. It’s becoming a hub for ballroom experience.

Ballroom is a whole culture. It can’t be summarized just by dance, though expressing one’s self through music and vogue is intrinsic to ballroom. At balls even those who don’t “walk” vogue categories—who don’t compete—vogue on the sidelines, vogue at home with friends, vogue at clubs outside of balls. Those who are a part of the culture have that ingrained in them. We express ourselves through movement significantly more than our words. Even in non-dancing categories like Runway or Face, movement is key.

In addition to hosting balls and parties we hold classes for ballroom participants to learn to vogue or to walk Runway. Oakland to All also always tries to give back to the community. We regularly book ballroom participants for paid gigs as they vibe up, like performing on the main stage at San Francisco and Oakland Prides and participating in the annual Gilead Pride event. Furthermore, we offer some free events, like our annual Hella Hyphy Ball held during Oakland Pride weekend at the Lake Merritt Amphitheater.

We always wanted to throw a ball that celebrates the Bay Area as a whole: its culture, its landmarks, the people. One of the most significant cultural movements for the Bay Area was the Hyphy movement.

The Hyphy Era is a moment in time from the late ‘90s to the mid 2000s where the Bay Area was having a sort of Hip Hop renaissance. It bred a new sound, new dance moves like “going dumb,” and opened the world up to artists like E-40 and Mac Dre. Hyphy energy still permeates through Bay Area natives like us, from the slang we use, to the way we dance, and was a key influence in many of us coming of age. Even now, Bay Area music, dances, culture still radiate Hyphy influence.

So, when we decided to move forward with the idea, Hella Hyphy was an obvious choice for our ball’s name. This was a chance to “put on” for the Bay Area, and by that I mean celebrate where we’re from.

This year was our second go-round hosting the Hella Hyphy Ball (September 9th, 2023), made possible by a few sponsors, including the CA$H Dance grant. Part ballroom experience, part educational tool, we also utilize the ball to educate about Bay Area historic moments and people. Our category sheet—which is a flier that ballroom promoters release ahead of a ball so that participants know how to prepare for the respective categories—reads much more like a booklet of fun Bay Area facts than a vogue category sheet.

Both years we’ve kicked off the event with Bay Area trivia and guest Bay Area rappers: Keak da Sneak last year, who is the person who actually coined the term Hyphy, and Stunnaman and DJ Westcoast this year. Both shows featured some of the best turf dancers from the Bay. (Turfing being a Bay Area dance style that takes its influence from Tutting, bone breaking and gliding). We continue this pre-show tradition because we always want to book and promote artists from the community, and ensure that people from out of town get to see the Bay the way we do.

The Hella Hyphy Ball has also bridged the gap between the hip hop and the queer community, and created a space where everyone can share freely.

Currently, everything publicized about the Bay Area is bad: robberies, shootings, smash-and-grabs. Safe communal spaces, like the Hella Hyphy Ball, are forgotten. Bay Area excellence is forgotten. This year Kamala Harris inspired one of our vogue categories. Though she may be polarizing to some, she is the FIRST EVER Black and Asian American female Vice President of the United States. And she’s from Oakland. That is HISTORIC, as are many social movements that have occurred here, like the creation of the Black Panther Party. We’ve created vogue categories inspired by Bay Area sports teams, Lake Merritt, Oscar Grant, Keyshia Cole, Too Short, Marshawn Lynch, the Thizzle Dance and more. We always want to celebrate Bay Area culture with the Hella Hyphy Ball.

 

 

 

 

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.

Photo by Robbie Sweeny
[ID: Shinichi, a half-Japanese performer, holding two sticks, a shadowy figure behind. Black and white photo.]

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Editor’s Note: inkBoat, founded by Iova-Koga, is a CA$H Dance Spring 2023 grantee. This article outlines their funded activities and vision.

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The impetus for Clouds from a Crumbling Giant was my father, moving into a sudden decline. I witnessed him crumbling. I watched the strong and capable man I grew up with rapidly change. His vigor diminished dramatically; his clarity of mind slowly faded away. What I observed came into conflict with my long-held ideas of him. I had trouble accepting who I saw him becoming. 

Some weeks ago, he died. Now I’m left with his patterns, his influences… and somehow this study of my father has turned into self-study. Perhaps that was always the case, and I’ve only just realized it. 

As with the creation of most inkBoat works, the personal experience extends into the process, no matter what the theme might be. In this case, the product/process/personal intertwine into some symbiotic fusion where life and art prove difficult to separate. 

Clouds involves multi-generational, racially diverse, cross-disciplinary communities. They each bring perspective to the table, and fold a vibrant and essential layer into the growing life of the work. As director and performer, I sit in the center… literally and functionally. In that position I am guided by many forces: my father, the stories and experiences of the other elders we’ve interviewed for the project, the artistry of the musicians and performers, and the circulation practices shared by David Wei of Wudang West Cultural Center. Being at the locus of all this means receiving lots of information. And sending something back. And trusting the outcome. Letting go. 

The idea of “letting go” lives within the artistic process of Clouds. I invite collaborators or conditions to change the artistic work. The challenge resides in the balance of chaos and structure. Too far one way or the other results in either an over-controlled, sterile aesthetic… or a mess. My role within the project involves a balancing act between my ego, obeying the logic of the moment, listening and providing structure. Even a cloud has structure. 

We’re a year and a half into a very long development and research process that began in 2022 and will continue through 2025 and likely beyond. To date, we’ve performed works in progress at UC Davis, TanzFest in Luzern, Switzerland, the San Francisco International Arts Festival, and the Seattle International Dance Festival. We’re building up the strata of perspectives. One collaborator, musician Jon Raskin, had this to say about one of our scores: 

The sticks are pushing Shinichi into shapes and patterns, and he grabs them and pulls them in a call-and-response type of interaction. The musicians only respond to the particular dancers they are assigned to. What’s fascinating is that it appears that Shinichi’s movement is being determined by the dancers and musicians, but in actuality Shinichi is conducting the movement between himself and the dancers with the sticks, in dialogue with the musicians. It is a conducted improvisation where everyone has agency.

This push and pull operates both as part of the stage work, and within the inner workings of the collaboration, the process. The heart receives and gives. 

On stage, I embody a crumbling, elderly person. Jon asks me: “Is your old man… your old man?” My old man is me. Or everybody. My father said, “Don’t make me an old man!” 

Acceptance doesn’t come easily. In this inquiry, I’m practicing for death… which I hope meets me far, far down the road. Until that time, I believe this process and practice will enrich my life. I hope it will bring value to others.

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.

Photo by Chani Bockwinkel
[ID: Two African American women standing side by side. The woman on the right has a black hat with blue braids, and a black belt around her waist, wearing a white shirt with a bow tie, and her left leg is bent on top of her right knee which is slightly bent as well. The woman on the left side has African markings on her face with an African cowrie shell bra, as well as an African cowrie shell belt around her waist. She has her left arm on the other woman’s right shoulder and her right leg is bent with her right foot flexed. They have a serious facial expression.]

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Bahiya means beautiful in Arabic. We founded Bahiya Movement in 2011 to build a safe haven for those who are typically “othered” by white-supremacist culture, which is very present in the performing arts community and beyond.  

With Bahiya Movement all are welcomed, encouraged and supported to be unapologetically themselves! That is why, in 2023, we decided to pivot our Believe In Self (BIS) program to BIS-QUEERspace. We wanted to give those in the queer community a platform to be free, stand up and have a voice against bullying on all levels.  

BIS-QUEERspace is a 2-month residency designed to provide young artists, ages 18-24, the skills they need to move forward with confidence and sustainability. Participants receive mentorship, rehearsal space and equipment (when available), support with work-in-progresses, professional coaching, photo sessions, a final performance produced in collaboration with the other BIS participants and a stipend upon completion of the program.  

We pride ourselves on offering a platform where All are Welcome, just be and do YOU, boo-boo!!  

We understand that people come in many shapes and sizes, not only body types, but personality types as well. Look at Nafi and myself. As mother and daughter we bump heads and don’t always see eye to eye. We communicate through our hiccups and differences. We have attracted cool folks that don’t have drama, and we also are cool drama-free individuals.  

I have felt out of sorts in groups that state they are focused on dismantling white supremacy and supporting Black people. I have been shushed, yelled at, bullied, and gas-lit by several white-led organizations in the Bay Area. I have been told by the Black-owned organizations that I will mess it up for them, so just calm down. I have been blacklisted. And this is not just for being queer but for being unapologetically myself. 

We understand that everyone is unique and will always support that uniqueness in YOU! In order to manage and encourage the many styles of bodies Bahiya works with, we are big on everyone signing code of conduct agreements: respect yourself and respect others’ opinions and viewpoints. Judgement free zone. We talk through our differences. The same practices that Nafi and I follow for ourselves.  

As a family owned and operated business there will be hiccups along the way. Nafi and I have found that communication is extremely important. Talking through how we are feeling about the programs, participants, choreography has kept us going strong for 12 years. Do we have disagreements? Sure, most def. Did some toes get stepped on? For sure, still do, just not as much. What is most important is keeping our focus on why do we do this. It’s because of the love we have for dance. And the remembrance of how it feels to be shamed.   

Nafi and I have always been told that “You are a beautiful dancer, but you’re too big, you are too Black and outspoken, you are too opinionated.” We were tired of being looked at as the angry Black women. We understood that if we are feeling this way, then others are too. So, let’s not fight in house, but turn our attention on around and direct it towards those that continue to shame “others” like ourselves. From there we attract those that need to be in our family of Bahiya safe haven. By showing the world that we may be bludgeoned, but our head is not bowed! 

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.

Photo by Robbie Sweeny
[ID: Dear’s headless torso framed standing in profile under magenta pink light, their right arm reaches out gently and is illuminated in contrasting vibrant green light. Their pose conveys patient apprehension, as if waiting to receive another hand to hold their outstretched one.]

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Earlier this year scientists announced the earth’s core’s rotation slowed down, stopped and maybe even changed direction. I think it’s a hint. 

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Notes BEFORE beginning Sick Dance: the process is the purpose. Lean into comfort and ease and gentleness and curiosity over force and directing and doing. This movement practice is at best an invitation for your intelligent muscles and tissues to take over, directing your attention and movement. Take breaks as needed. All you need for this practice is a comfortable place to do it.  

To BEGIN, from an upright position (laying down if you are bed-bound to standing if you are able-bodied), come to stillness and slowly bring your *attention* to the points or areas of your body in contact with the ground. The ground is any stabilizing surface that is supporting you – bed to earth. 

Notice the physical cues, physical sensations that tell you that you are touching the ground. Notice them in as much detail as possible as gently as possible. When you get distracted, begin again. Set a timer if you need or want, anywhere from 90 seconds to 5 minutes. 

Break. Do whatever your body needs to do. Consider – what did you notice about your physical sensation of touching the ground?  

When you’re ready, RETURN again, to your upright position – laying down if you are bed-bound, seated/reclining/standing (whatever works for your disabilities), or standing if you are able-bodied. Closing your eyes if you like, breathing at your pace, center, settle. Now, in stillness, direct your attention inward, to all the physical sensations of having a body you are aware of at this time.  

You’re not making anything up. The physical sensations could be obvious or subtle. They could be many or few. They could be small or large. Whatever you notice is good. 

In your own time, allow your attention to come to rest on the Strongest Physical Sensation – this will be the easiest sensation to rest your attention in. Again, it could be anywhere in your body, any size, any intensity.  

Gently, begin to notice the details of this Strongest Physical Sensation by first noticing the location of the sensation: where it is, and where it is not.  

You may continue, then, to notice whether this sensation has any boundaries, and whether those boundaries connect to form a shape.  

Continue, if you are able, to notice in as much detail whether this sensation has any depth – your body exists in at least 3 dimensions, your physical sensations likely do too.  

When you are ready, witness, in addition to the location and depth, any textures within your Strongest Physical Sensations. 

You may continue to notice some other details about your Strongest Physical Sensation. You may notice very few details. Whatever you notice is good. These details may be subtle or obvious, big or small, you may notice a lot or very little detail. You’re not making anything up, you are just witnessing what is already here. 

If it is easier for you to observe only one aspect of your Strongest Physical Sensation at a time, that’s great. If you’re able to practice witnessing different aspects together, that’s great too.  If the Strongest Physical Sensation moves or changes, allow your attention to move or change to follow the Strongest Physical Sensation. If you notice you have lost the Strongest Physical Sensation, stop and begin again.  

Set a timer and try this out for as long as you like, taking breaks as needed. When you choose to end the practice, rest. After resting, consider – what did you learn from witnessing your Strongest Physical Sensation?  

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.

Photo by Audrey Johnson
[ID: Audrey is mid movement bending in a spiral with arms reaching diagonally, back facing the camera. Audrey is a lightly melanated Black woman with a low afro puff ponytail, wearing loose clothing. The plants are lime to dark green, there is a dappling shadow of a tree in the foreground.]

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Editor’s Note: Audrey Johnson is a Spring 2023 CA$H grantee. This article highlights her funded activities and vision.

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As I sit on a porch overlooking a small meadow, the sky in a sensual humid holdout with the rain, crickets holding their breath as the trees tease coming winds, I am breathing within my now near daily practice of attunement. The meadow, the porch and I are on Cherokee land in the Blue Ridge mountains of northern Georgia, on the final days of an artist residency at the Hambidge Center. Here to dig into my performance project land|body|memory, much of my time has been spent attuning, breathing, feeling and just being.

On this porch, I am a few hours’ drive north of Macon, GA, the hometown my grandparents left for Detroit, MI, which is Anishinaabe land, along with so many of our folks during the Great Migration. Eventually they ended up in a house on Whitney Street, where in the ‘90s and early 2000s I would spend frequent days of my childhood sitting on my grandmother’s porch, eating Oreos, making mudpies in the dirt with my cousins, playing in the small urban meadows across from and to the left of their home (in other contexts also called vacant lots, abandoned, or blight).

​​Though the home is no longer in our family and my memories are colored in the skewed blurriness of a child’s eyes, the home and street is a present place in my body-memory. The feeling shows up as a sense of slow wonder, and a reoccuring attraction to open grassy spaces, such as those speckling the neighborhoods of ungentrified Detroit.

These mini meadows, and the meadow I am looking out at now, are necessary spaces in which I have experienced my own Black queer feminist imagination, breathing, delicious boredom and zoning out dreaming time.

Here in Georgia on the porch, and in all the life that will happen beyond it, I locate myself as a part of this land, through my lineage as well as my present experience and participation with it. In my reattunement to the experience of “just being,” I give a dear nod to bell hooks, who in Belonging describes porches as liminal spaces, meeting places, places for Black fellowship and “a willingness to be known.”^[1] hooks writes, “A perfect porch is a place where the soul can rest.”^[2]

​​I’ve been practicing letting my soul and body rest, and allowing myself to know and be known by the land. This has been the crux of my creative work here really, once I let go of the expectations/assumptions that a residency should be more “productive” creatively than my life at home. Taking full breaths. Naps. Walks in the trees. Gazing at the sky. Time to listen to the plants and bugs, tracking the rhythms of the cicada and cricket chorus, their shifts in musical scores throughout different parts of the day and night.

All of these practices have been, for me, methods of attunement: to the land and to ourselves.

My project land|body|memory has become another one of these slowing down time, sitting and gazing out, attuning and listening practice spaces. The work has appeared in the world as a solo outdoor popup at Fort Mason in October 2022, and at ODC’s State of Play Festival in August 2023 as a duet with my dear friend Laila Shabazz. These performances and the coming iterations I am building now activate movement towards spacious breaths, body connected to the earth, attuned to the connectivity of being on this planet.

There is an ache I cannot ignore that arises within the capitalist, colonial project that rules many of our commonly accepted orders of space and time; an ache that no longer wants to deny our inherent connection to each other and the land, that instead asks for breath and healing connection to the land and each other. I am asking myself how the dance and performance making space I embark on can be a salve to that ache: a re-membering^[3] of ourselves as part of land, and a reminder that we can do this re-membering in the most simple of ways, ways that allow our souls to rest, such as sitting on a porch.

My residency time in Georgia has asked me to go still, be quiet and notice, dancing as a place where the noticing blends with the being, the stillness spreads open like unstructured time; memories, dreams and visions mesh. While I pursue making dances that allow for this kind of spacious freedom, I am growing in questions of how to keep working in this field in ways accessible to my own human body, a body that is changing—just like everything else. Out of physical necessity, I’m straying away from “impressive” moves or phrases that rely on a certain physical capacity, and moving into a rigorous commitment to presence, a space that asks me to really listen.

As I continue to understand land|body|memory as a project and a practice, I commit to my continued attunement process, dropping my shoulders when I can, breathing in rhythm with the earth when I can. Perhaps the next time we meet dancing, we’ll start by just breathing. Hopefully we’ll get in some good time just simply “being.”

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Pretty much all of the ways I think about land and presence, and rest as radical practice, come from Black people and Indigenous people. I am thinking and making dance inside of a lineage of Black feminist thinkers, Black women, Black queer people. Additionally, as I learn about ways to connect with land and empower myself and community through my passion in plant work and herbalism, my teachers are and have been Indigenous folks, Black folks, and Brown folks. If you, like me, live on colonized land and have some access to resources like money or time, consider paying a land tax to Shuumi land tax/Sogorea Te’ or to the Ramaytush Ohlone land tax and advocate for rematriation in moments possible. Land Back!

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[1] Belonging: A Culture of Place, bell hooks, page 144

[2] Belonging: A Culture of Place, bell hooks, page 152

[3] The space between re and member is intentional. I recall a talk in which Alexis De Veaux described the word remember as a calling back of something in our bodies, a return of “member” as in a part of the body, a piece of ourselves. Allied Media Conference, 2020.

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.

Photo by Daniel Sun Media
[ID: Tarik, male, he/him, African-American, wearing Royal Supply clothing brand, Dodge Challenger, neighborhood background.]

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Editor’s Note: 1Up Crew is a Spring 2023 CA$H grantee.

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Here in the Bay Area, we have a very strong, talented and passionate dance community. Within the hip hop community there are two different ways to express yourself through movement: freestyle and choreography.

Freestyle started at parties and social gatherings. Individuals connected with music and passion through cyphers: a circle where dancers freestyle and exchange energies. Choreography is an organized movement created to provide guidance for self-expression. Freestyle is usually found in street culture, whereas choreography is led inside studios. 1Up Crew strives to bring these two worlds together.

March 2013 is when Hollis Contreras and I started 1Up Crew. While starting this crew I was exposed to the freestyle scene. Coming from a choreography background I had a hard time adapting. I was told that I moved in a way that was too organized and predictable during my freestyling. While I had my own struggles transitioning into the freestyle scene, I was aware of the struggles others had as freestylers transitioning into choreography.

In choreography you are trying to match the choreographer’s movement. For a freestyler accustomed to creating your own version of movement, it is difficult to learn to match the choreographer’s posture, understand their weight-shifting, dance to counts. 1Up Crew had a lot of ups and downs adjusting so our dancers could participate in both choreography competitions and freestyle battles. Each of us had to work to understand both.

Freestyle and choreography complement each other when used together.

Freestyling supports choreography by expanding your creativity. When you freestyle, you find different ways to explore your own body. When choreographing, people often experience what we call “choreo block.” Freestyling can help prevent getting stuck. Choreography can help freestylers with retaining material. Material is used in battles when you are stuck in a pinch and need a “wow” factor or crowd pleaser to respond to your opponent. Doing choreography can also help freestylers when it comes to teaching and passing down information.

1Up Crew brings these two worlds together by hosting our own labs, sessions (where dancers get together to practice and exchange energy), classes, battles and showcases. We participate in both choreography competitions and freestyle battles to show others that dance is beautiful in all forms.

1Up Crew created an event format for choreography where we give dancers an opportunity to experience a battle-like tournament. They each perform their 40- to 60-second routine and judges decide the winner on the spot. We call this event “We Does This: Choreography.”

For freestylers, we created a 5 v. 5 team battle event called “Double or Nothing” (DON). At DON, teams are required to use commandos (a quick team routine) and utilize each member during each round. This battle is timed and inspired by the movie You Got Served.

We also started 1Up company classes for both dancers who do choreography and freestylers to participate in. In these classes you can learn a specific style such as popping, locking, turfing, afro and heels. We hope those who take choreography classes are willing to come and learn freestyle, and those who freestyle come and learn it in choreographic fashion.

1Up Crew is bridging the gap between freestyle and choreography. Through classes and events we can bring all dancers in our hip hop community together so we can further grow the culture while remembering the foundation of hip hop.

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This article appears in the Fall 2023 issue of In Dance.