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Noted US dance company gives free performance

San Francisco’s groundbreaking contemporary dance company is about to take Jakarta’s Salihara small theater stage by storm tonight and tomorrow night — for free, and bring two countries a step closer to each other

Julie Shingleton (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Fri, January 29, 2010

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Noted US dance company gives free performance

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an Francisco’s groundbreaking contemporary dance company is about to take Jakarta’s Salihara small theater stage by storm tonight and tomorrow night — for free, and bring two countries a step closer to each other.

Yes, you’ve heard the first bit right. Ten of the best dancers from the Oberlin Dance Collective or ODC, widely acknowledged for its fusion of ballet and modern techniques, will be dazzling a small audience ­— judging by the size of Jakarta’s black-box theater — free of charge.

The dance troupe will perform three pieces choreographed by ODC’s artistic director and founder Brenda Way, to the sounds of 17th century J.H. Schmelzer classical music and Appalachian blue grass.

“Two of the pieces [we will perform] are really about community and the power of community … while the third piece speaks about the human inclination to not think of everybody. It talks about the cost of not being part of a community,” Way told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.

One may wonder why such a renowned American dance troupe, which has been travelling around the world for decades, is performing in small theaters across Indonesia, Burma and Thailand.

Well, it’s about building relationships, Way and US Ambassador Cameron R. Hume said.

“Because of us having travel warnings [to Indonesia] for a number of years, the [number of] people travelling down here from the US has decreased greatly. Frankly, because of the economic crisis, and our own reaction to the events of 9/11, a lot of Indonesians decided, well, maybe they wouldn’t go to the US. But fundamentally, our relationship has to be based on relationships between people,” Hume said Wednesday at his private residence in Menteng, when welcoming the ODC to Jakarta.

In the three days leading up to the show, the ODC will have also performed with 50 non-dancers from the Jakarta Art Institute, taken classes in Javanese and Acehnese traditional dancing, run a dress rehearsal with five students from 10 different schools and interacted with them, as part of a mentoring program for new and emerging artists.

“There is a very direct choreographic exchange going on with the language of different cultures,” said Way, who trained under George Ballanchine, one of the 20th century’s foremost choreographers and a pioneer of ballet in the United States.

Therefore dancers, non-dancers and school children from both the US and Indonesia will have spent a significant amount of time face-to-face over three days, forging strong relationships and hopefully gaining a better cultural understanding of one another.

“This is a new program by the state department, a return to cultural diplomacy,” said Way, adding she was very excited about representing the Obama administration, after feeling uncomfortable about being American when traveling abroad for the last few years.

Hang on. What does dancing, and the arts, have to do with diplomacy?

“Art is about one-on-one relationships, politics is about one-on-one relationships, and as Edward R. Murrow put it, it’s the last three feet that count when you’re that close one-on-one. And that is what makes for meaningful relationships,” Way concluded.

ODC will be performing today and Saturday, Jan. 30, at 8 p.m. at the Teater Salihara, Jl. Salihara, Pasar Minggu, Jakarta Selatan.


Reservations are required due to limited seating.
melan@salihara.org, dita@salihara.org, 0817-077-1913

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