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Dance Theater x3, a collaborative series of dance performances by three dance theaters, opens this week at the Multi-Use Community Cultural Center.
The shows are a collaboration between Daystar Dance, Commotion Dance Theater, and Coffee Stain Dance Theater. The latter is a newly formed child-based ballet theater. The shows will emphasize diversity, with performances paying tribute to local artists, the work of Mexican-American composers and poets, and Native American art and social issues.
Kicking off the event, Daystar Dance’s performance centers on the work of Rosalie Jones, a Pembina Chippewa artist often described as a pioneer in Native modern dance. Native modern dance combines elements of intertribal dance, common at powwows and other Native American events, with modern dance.
Jones’ performance will, in part, pay tribute to the late Joanne Shenandoah, a Grammy Award and Native American Music Award-winning Oneida singer and composer who passed away in late 2021.
“We were friends for many years, and (Shenandoah) asked me to choreograph something to her songs, and so this dance, I feel, is a fulfillment of that promise that I made to her to do these choreographies,” says Jones.
She points to a work-in-progress choreography, “Testament of the Red Dress,” which will be performed by two dancers, dedicated to the issue of murdered and missing indigenous women and girls.
“The red dress symbolizes the large number of missing and murdered indigenous women in North America,” says Jones. “I wanted to highlight this and bring this out to the public because the public is largely unaware of this. It’s, of course, acknowledging these horrific abuses of indigenous women.”
The cases of Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind and Hanna Harris served as inspiration for “Testament of the Red Dress.” LaFontaine-Greywind, of the Spirit Lake Sioux Tribe, was 22-years old and pregnant when she was found murdered in 2017 in Fargo, N.D. Harris, of the Northern Cheyenne tribe in Montana, was 24-years old when she was murdered on July 4, 2013. Red Dress Day, a remembrance day for murdered and missing indigenous women and girls, takes place annually on May 5, Harris’ birthday.
On June 4 and June 6, Commotion Dance Theater will take the stage at 7:30 p.m. to perform new works by Ruben Ornelas and Laurie MacFarlane.
Ornelas’ work is inspired by his experience as a Mexican-American artist and will highlight the music of Mexican and European composers and the poetry of José Olivarez, a Mexican-American poet from Chicago.
“He’s an important voice,” says Ornelas of Olivarez. “He’s always addressing the idea of identity and being a Mexicano or Mexican-American or Chicano and the difficulties of being both and neither.”
MacFarlane’s performance pays tribute to the late John Borek, a local patron of the arts remembered for his distinctive personality and love of the arts. MacFarlane met Borek through MUCCC, where Borek worked to connect artists with the theater.
“He was a total character, a great storyteller. He was a cultural force in Rochester,” says MacFarlane, “and he was also a theater artist, in his own right. He did produce shows at the MUCCC, which were absurd, and wonderful.”
MacFarlane’s performance was inspired by Borek’s personal story about a visit to the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles and the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Hollywood, a notable resting place for the city’s rich and famous.
The week of performances at MUCCC will close with a performance by the newly formed Coffee Stain Dance Theater, a children-based ballet company run by Joshua Lang. Coffee Stain will perform a rendition inspired by “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” The family-friendly performance will include appearances by several nursery rhyme characters and is appropriate for ages 4-12.
Coffee Stain’s performance will be a weekend matinee at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. on June 6, and at 2 p.m. on June 7.
David Wazana is a Rochester Beacon contributing writer and a member of the Oasis Project’s second cohort.
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