Wednesday, 5/28/97 Seniors explore, display individuality in
festival Personal pieces focus on issues such as environment,
gender
By Kristi Nakamura Daily Bruin Contributor In a matter of
moments, Maile Collmer is transformed from a stressed graduating
senior into a vibrant red-costumed wave of energy and movement.
Collmer, along with fellow dancers Bridget McCarthy and Roanna Lee,
move across the stage of Theater 200 in the Dance Building like
rhythmic tin soldiers, in sync. They are practicing Collmer’s piece
"Off Guard" for the "Bodies Speak, Words Move" portion of the 32nd
annual senior concert, "To Be Continued." "To Be Continued," a
festival of world arts & cultures and dance majors’ senior
work, will take place Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings in the
Dance Building. Many of the pieces the seniors plan to present
focus on various issues they feel are important. Cultural
explorations, gender and environmental issues are a few that will
be addressed. "I feel that there are a lot of things in society
that are falling apart, that are very fragile and need to be
reinstituted, so I wanted to do a piece that gave the audience more
direct interaction with my piece and my ideas, my intimate self.
That’s what art is, its your intimate self and you expose that on
stage or in whatever venue, you expose that in performance," says
McCarthy, co-producer for the concert. This senior concert will
combine the work of UCLA undergraduate scholars of intercultural
studies with the university’s graduating senior dancers. In
addition to the performances, there are also installation works and
cultural exploration pieces that the seniors will have on display
at various times throughout the day. The installation pieces are an
alternative form of performance for the seniors. They are an
attempt to communicate with the audience without spoken or written
language. The installations are a sort of interactive display that
require the audience to do more than just sit back in the theater
and watch the dancers. "I’ve been very well educated on how to
write a paper, you know, the whole idea, intro, body, conclusion,
indentations, punctuation, the whole bit," says McCarthy. "What do
I punctuate in myself if I’m doing an installation? How do I,
without ever speaking, how do I, by using inanimate objects, how do
I bring an idea to life and can it be conveyed with the same kind
of intensity and clarity that something theoretical and word-based
can be." Aside from her duties as coproducer and a dancer in five
of the pieces, McCarthy has her own work. McCarthy is responsible
for the creation of one of the three installation pieces. The
general theme of her work is deforestation and the audience will be
invited to walk through the forest of "trees" she has created in
the lobby of the Dance Building, which incorporate materials from
the natural and industrial worlds. The other two installation
pieces were created by Nicole Baum and Shyamala Moorty. Baum’s
piece emulates a classroom environment and will be located in Room
152 of the Dance Building. Moorty addresses gender stereotypes,
moving the audience to contemplate the circumstances of their lives
from the perspective of the opposite sex. Moorty’s work will be
shown on the balcony of the dance building. "Its hard because all
of these pieces are going to die the day after (the performance is
over). They’re all seniors," laments Amy Vaillancourt, who is on
hand to design lights for the performance. Each of the performances
featured in "To Be Continued" is the product of two quarters work
by the graduating seniors of 1997. The performances will be short
lived because the seniors are all moving on to other things after
graduation. "I want to implement more dance programs in public
schools and then I’m going to join my mom in business to supplement
my funds, because there’s not a lot of money is dancing," says
Collmer. Collmer’s piece, "Off Guard" is an energetic and personal
tribute to her experience with color guard, also known as "the
sport of the arts." Collmer joined the world champion Blue Devils’
color guard after being dissatisfied with her business major at a
junior college. She toured with the Blue Devils for four years
until she was too old to participate, then entered UCLA as a
sophomore. "I try to make my piece fun for myself," says Collmer
with a smile as she returns to giving instructions for how the
lights should be set for the performance and watching McCarthy and
Lee practice. "That’s what its about. I mean, why else do it."
DANCE: "To Be Continued" begins at 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday,
May 30, 31 and at 7 p.m. on Sunday June 1 in Theater 200 of the
Dance Building. Installments and cultural exploration pieces will
be displayed at various times prior to performance. There is no
charge for tickets. For more information call (310) 825-3951.
Previous Daily Bruin story: ‘Out of WAC’ concert marks end of long
process