The Department of Dance is hosting a concert called ROYGBIV: Momentum on November 5 and 6 at 8:00 p.m. at the Gaertner Performing Arts Center in the Dance Theater.
“Our grad students or MFA candidates are choreographing all the pieces,” Malin Hilmersson, Assistant to the Dance Department Chair, said. “The faculty is not involved at all. It is their own show.”
The concert is put together both in production and choreographed by first or second year grad students.
“We want to give all our students different opportunities to show their work,” Hilmersson said. “The grad program is for people who want to choreograph and show their creativity. They each learn not only to choreograph and produce something and direct, but they also put on the show and organize everything- from the posters to the program.”
The faculty concert that is held every year is called Spectrum, so the graduate students used the name as inspiration for their name of their annual concert as well.
The director of the concert is Margaret Leary, second year grad student. She has had previous experience being in charge, for she was the co-producer in the ROYGBIV: It’s Good to See You Again concert last spring.
There will be seven pieces performed in the concert.
“The fact that we have seven different choreographers is a huge thing,” Leary said. “It is seven different creative voices. It is super interesting. You do not typically get that in one show.”
Performers were selected after auditions that were held at the beginning of the semester.
“Typically the people who preform are undergrads with a dance major or graduate student dance majors,” Hilmersson said.
The ROYGBIV grad concert is held in both the spring and fall semester.
“It gives us a chance to present our research, being physical research or actual research we have done,” Leary said. “It is good to be producing work at this level. It gives us good experience too, as professional art makers in the process.”
The research that is included in the show is both physical research exploring physical ideas and physically embodying a type of moment and choreography in which a certain topic is researched and they create a dance.
“The dances all have their own different inspirations,” Hilmersson said.
The pieces all fall under the umbrella of Modern Dance. The seven dances bring different elements of postmodern, virtuosic, and site specific emerised modern dance.
“I love the art making process of choreography,” Leary said. “I am very creative, so it is a great creative and expressive outlet. I love trying to solve problems. I like to work hard. It is a creative puzzle to solve. It is really awesome.”
The last piece that the concert will showcase will have a guest artist and SHSU alumna, Jamie Williams. Performing along with him will be students of the San Jacinto Community College Department of Dance.
“Our piece that is closing the show, it fuses theatricality and visual art,” Leary said.
The event is open to the public and tickets can be purchased through the box office.
“The concert is great because not only does it give our students opportunity, but it gives Huntsville and the other students the opportunity to see something that they might not normally get a chance to see and support,” Hilmersson said.
The show will run about 90 minutes. Call 936-294-2339 for more ticket information.