Tea Party #17 ~ Features ~ Trans•Dance
Toys, Robert Fuentes larger version
A Cup of Tea with Choreographer Sean Dorsey | Jenna Humphrey
Sean told himself he would only take a year off from school. He never went back. Instead, he received a scholarship to participate in the Main Dance program and went on to pursue yet another year. “I got there and everything just exploded and opened up and blossomed,” says Sean. “It just all fell into my path. It was amazing.”
Here in San Francisco, Sean’s artistic and activist worlds have finally converged. He fosters community through his artistic directorship for Fresh Meat Productions and his activist work for the Queer Cultural Center, therefore combining social and community-based awareness with dance, which has been at times considered a disaffected, high art form. “Any time someone offers beauty to their community, that is a good thing. But I would say that my particular interest is not in ever, ever—I hope ever—creating modern dances with a quartet of dancers in gossamer dresses making abstract shapes or geometric patterns on the floor.”
Sean describes movement as the ultimate form of expression in that, “there’s something so visceral about the body that goes deeper than writing or film or theater can do for me.” That said, he doesn’t credit dance as being his main form of inspiration. “I devour texts when I want to find inspiration to create. I love beautiful writing.” He cites everything, from the New York Times Book Review to academic texts about gender or a good novel. So the dance movements come to illuminate a story, one that “needs to be told.” He mentions people approaching him after the show to admit they’ve never before cried or been so moved by modern dance. Even when choosing the music for a performance, Sean tries to figure out what it is about the music that makes it accessible and emotive enough to elicit a response from the body.
What disconcerts him about dance is not the discipline, but the contrived boundaries erected. “I haven’t gone to see a ballet in years because, although I could as a dancer watch and marvel at the technical virtuosity of the performers, I get so enraged and triggered and put off by the form, that it’s so limited and for me, stifling. Even in modern dance, it’s still such a highly gendered art form.”
He considers the Bay Area the strongest and most highly evolved transgender community in the country. “Everyone I know here is almost always on the edge of burnout or just ridiculously busy because we were all called here to self-actualize and meditate. It’s like, ‘Sorry, I’m busy this week. I have to self-actualize.’” » next page »