Yesterday, Ani and I visited two New York community centers to talk about bringing Propel-her’s “Group Solo Project (GSP)” to their constituents. GSP is Propel-her’s premiere arts-education, outreach progam. The idea behind the workshop is to enable participants to connect with dance as an art form and as a tool for self-expression, creative decision-making, and peer communication. The overarching goal of the workshop is to promote collaboration instead of competition by exposing participants to Propel-her’s own collaborative model.
Jackie Rousseau and Antonio Caprellan of Hudson Guild Community Works along with Adia Wilson and Basyah Prabhu at Harlem Children Zone’s TRUCE Arts & Media were eager to partner with Propel-her in bringing GSP to their young girls’ groups.
Currently, Ani, Amy, Maggie and I are in Stage 2 of planning GSP. Stage 1 involved each of us developing a choreographic solo based on a female issue of personal importance. Now that the solos are complete, the four of us have started coming together in collaborative rehearsals to create a brief group dance comprised of material from each of our solos. This dance will be performed at GSP workshops to demonstrate the ability to achieve a shared goal through compromise, communication and collaboration. Our collaborative rehearsals will continue through January 2009 and we will also use the time together to further develop our goals and methodology for teaching/implementing the workshops.
Joe Del Senno, a New York City freelance videographer, is graciously videoing our rehearsals and will eventually provide Propel-her with a concise, edited video that reveals our collaborative process and Group Solo Project goals. We will post the video as soon as its available and we hope to use it to reach out to other community centers, schools, camps and youth groups in the future. Further information about GSP can be found on www.propelherdance.com by clicking on the News & Press link.
We are so excited about this endeavor. More than anything, we were inspired by the enthusiasm of our prospective partners and we cannot wait to get started.
Cara Liguori, co-founder, Propel-her Dance Collective
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