DALE DONG 3306063297 daledongpho
DALE DONG 3306063297 daledongpho
As choreographer Dominic Moore-Dunson was finishing a residency at the acclaimed Jacob’s Pillow dance center in Massachusetts, the Akron native returned home and needed a space to continue his work. He got a research residency with the National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron — one of only two in the country — in August 2019 and has since collaborated with the center to elevate dance as an art form.
“Having NCCAkron as an asset is major for me as a creator because it’s the only space I can get my hands on,” he says. “We’re coming together to say, What can we do with dance in this city to make a real big impact artistically?”
With seven state-of-the-art studios in Guzzetta Hall on campus, NCCAkron has been working since 2015 to develop a thriving, more equitable dance ecosystem, both locally and nationally. It has worked with over 200 artists through programs that offer them time, resources or space, including residencies and Dancing Labs, which provide opportunities for diverse artists to explore important issues or ideas together.
“Our very first Dancing Lab was about elevating female choreographers and female voices,” says Christy Bolingbroke, executive and artistic director of NCCAkron. “Women are the majority of the workforce in dance, but we’re actually the minority of the story.”
W. Tanner Young
As NCCAkron celebrated its fifth anniversary in December 2020, it launched its biggest challenge to the status quo yet: the three-year Creative Administration Research project, a national think tank allowing 20 dance artist teams to investigate and brainstorm new administrative models. Funded by a $750,000 Andrew W. Mellon Foundation award, it culminates with national summits in Akron in 2022 and 2023. NCCAkron is publishing its findings in University of Akron Press books, which come out in 2023.
“Going into COVID-19, 80 percent of the dancing field was operating on a project basis. That meant they didn’t have full-time employment,” Bolingbroke says.
After NCCAkron surveyed artists, a focus of the project became developing a model for dance to become a sustainable career path. “This is a hard life,” she says. “We need to disrupt the starving artist archetype.”
Moore-Dunson can attest that it’s tough, as his family of three recently got outbid on a fourth house in five weeks. But it helps that Moore-Dunson, who is one of the only Black choreographers in Akron, has found a support system through NCCAkron’s current Dancing Lab, called BLKmenMoves, in which choreographers virtually discuss their positions as one of few Black male choreographers in their midsized cities.
“There’s these questions, like, Are we getting these opportunities because we are good at what we do or because as a presenter institution, you want to make sure you look woke?” says Moore-Dunson, who is also a co-founder of the Akron Black Artist Guild.
The Dancing Conversations series builds upon NCCAkron’s Dance Club format, in which people see and discuss performances, to increase accessibility and understand how much goes into creating a dance.
“Dance needs audiences,” says Bolingbroke, adding that every estimated minute performed onstage takes at least eight hours in the studio. “We’ve been really working to advocate for that by inviting people to be curious and to be open-minded to the possibility of movement.”
Moore-Dunson keeps impact in mind as he is using his residency and two days of studio time a week to develop two big projects: a newer two-year project about law enforcement and their relationship with the Black community in Akron and the second installment of a six-year-long work, titled “Artie & the Black Card,” created with Kevin Parker.
“It has been a result of my personal story about growing up in Akron and being a Black boy who loves to play soccer and loves to dance but was told at lunchtime one day that that wasn’t Black enough,” he says of the latter project.
Authenticity is important to him, so he’s planning to meet with community members to discuss Black identity.
“I start asking people questions about specific experiences and kind of let what they’re saying help me understand what I’m doing in the studio,” he says.
He’s proud that the projects can allow him to hire about 20 Black musicians, dancers and playwrights for the works that have potential premiere dates in 2023. “Artie & the Black Card” already has national venues lining up, and Moore-Dunson is readying to get his important message out through dance.
“I’m going to embark on the two biggest projects of my young career,” he says. “I can spend years researching, thinking, messing with choreography, so when I’m presenting it to someone, this is my most thought-out letter to the audience.”
