New Zealand is a long ways away... from New York.

Fulbright grants are all about international exchange between the USA and a multitude of other countries around the world. For the majority of the world's population, the freedom to travel is an oft unrealized day dream. Rarely do I forget the privilege I have to toil away at tasks that earn me a living, with knowledge I didn't always know I gained by being me, and the distance between countries has been an awareness nurtured in me throughout my life. Gratefully, travel continues to be a part of my work and life.

2008 detail from performance shot of me in "Esplanade"

I was born and grew up on the third largest island in the West Indies, Jamaica. Like many island born children, my dream was always to travel and see the world. As a member of the "baby boomer" generation I also benefitted from the advances in air travel and its growing global infrastructure. I remember being told by my parents that it took upwards of a month to travel between Jamaica and Hong Kong when they were children. As a child, my first time on an airplane was a relatively short flight from Jamaica to Miami, and the first time I flew to England, I clearly remember taking three flights: Kingston, Jamaica to New York, USA to Gander, Canada to London, United Kingdom.

By the time I was a teenager, trans-Atlantic flights were common place. The first time I flew to New Zealand from New York City, back in 1999, I was able to change planes in San Francisco and cross the Pacific in a single flight. I imagine that the 24 hour travel day for that excursion was probably similar to my first trans Atlantic crossing some thirty year earlier. For this project, Fulbright have booked my tickets through a partner travel agent, and my flight can only be described as a trans-world nonstop flight from New York City direct to Auckland! I can't say that I am looking forward to the estimated 17 - 18 hour flight, but I do appreciate that this is actually possible. To date, the longest single flight I have taken has been about 14 hours from New York to Tokyo. In under a hundred years, commercial passenger travel from the New World to the Far East has gone from an average of about 45 days by ship to under 24 hours by plane.

It seems like such a cliché to say that knowing our past is one of the best ways to appreciate our present and to guide our choices and understanding for the future. However, in my field of concert dance knowing the past, for creative artists striving to excel and to contribute to its present and future, is rarely as simple as picking up a well researched book. For me, dance as an expressive and performative Art, does speak about the historical eras in which it was created. And yet, legacy (of a choreographer that is no longer alive) works created in past times as performed by dancers today can connect with the zeitgeist of the now. 

As a performer, I benefitted from learning and performing early 20th century ballets and modern dances, as well as growing up training in Afro-Caribbean dance forms. All of that experience informed my participation in new creations, not only because of the technical articulation honed on my body by the varied demands, but for the dramatic clarity and specificity I learned from dancing those foundational works. To me, every dance I had to learn was a new experience, whether or not they had been created on (or for) a dancer before me. With age came confidence and efficiency to build new work and try new approaches as I came to understand what I knew, and what I needed to know more about.

The artistry that transcends skill in dance is no different than other performing arts, and that lies in the observer seeing both the role being danced as well as recognizing the individual performing. These perceptions hold space simultaneously, not only for individual performers, but for the uniquely evocotive works of Art themselves which speak of their creators, whether in the aesthetic of choreography, the brush strokes and colors of painting, the harmonies and tonalities of music, and even the words and phrases of written dialogue.

Advances in technology and understanding of our world and engineering sciences have given us a global transportation infrastructure which also furthers the reach of Fulbright programs as conduits of learning and diplomacy. These advances could not have happened without knowledge and application of all that came before, and they have also opened global access to interact in person.

Advances in technology have also pushed access and learning of dance choreography as an art, in ways not imaginable even forty years ago. In particular is the day-to-day use of video and a growing archive of recovered or AI enhanced footage. However, I have found that nothing replaces the critical eye and knowledgable coaching of an experienced teacher or "stager", working with as much historical data as is available. Staging legacy dances of Paul Taylor means honoring how we imagine the artistic choices Taylor would make seeing the current dancers in the studio, and pushing today's artists to embody a role (abstract or character driven) with all of their talent and abilities.

I continue to acquire, digitize, annotate, record any and all data that might support more than a reconstruction of a particular dance. Performances need to become a statement of Art in and of themselves. I want the data to help shape how the work is viewed compositionally, artistically, and ultimately in how it appeals or challenges today's audiences as the dance may (or may not) have been intended, and how it is performed.

One of my history teachers in college, encouraged me to look at world history through the Art that was created and consumed by different cultures through various eras. Taking this perspective provided insight to how stratified a community might be, or how Art might actually have foreshadowed a general understanding of physics/technology, or how a society managed itself through wars differently from natural disasters, and so much more.

Art and artistes in general are still vilified in many cultures, while revered in others. Yet it has proven to be an ever present factor of human civilization. Dance, while mostly non-verbal, is still most powerful and impactful when experienced in live performances, and it isn't always the new that transcends the need for explanation or understanding to have an impact or make a statement.

This blog (FNZdance25.blogspot.com) is not an official site of the Fulbright Program or the U.S. Department of State. The views expressed on this site are entirely those of its author (Richard Chen See) and do not necessarily represent the views of the Fulbright Program, the U.S. Department of State, or any of its partner organizations.