Dawn Davis Loring Dances Until Dawn

I’ve been following Dawn’s dance career since we worked together at Austin’s  American Youthworks, an organization that did wonderful things for students and treated its employees miserably.  Rarely does an artist find work in their field that allows them to pursue their avocation; Dawn now as executive director for the San Antonio Dance Umbrella.

Apologies to Dawn: We conducted this interview last year, but I went into the hospital immediately after and am still getting caught up.

Why would a writer, one who writes noir thrillers and dark fantasies about optimists in hell, care about dance? Because writers should immerse themselves in all art forms. Dance delivers grace, speed and motion (even athleticism) rarely experienced in another art form. This is true of ballet, of modern dance and even traditional folk dance. Small studio dance provides an unparalleled up-front exposure to the form. Sit on the front row, smell the sweat, see the muscles strain, and you’ll never ignore human or structural form in the same light after.

Dawn and I took a virtual flight to Cambridge to talk at the Green Street Studio.

The back studio was my favorite because it was so cosy. I spent a lot of time there between 2002-2009. The walls were a dingy white and the sprung floor had a light-gray marley covering on it that was taped down with fraying gray tape. Mirrors covered one wall and along the sides of the room were portable barres in varying levels of disrepair. Although there are a few folding chairs in the room, we will sit on the floor, most likely alone.

Unfortunately, they don’t allow food so we had to bring snacks. Dawn brings snacks from the Harvest Co-op on Mass Ave including garlic tofu and greens with sesame oil, along with sweet onion jam and baguette. I looked for snacks designed for dancers, including no-bake energy bites and spiced granola.

I ask what’s on her playlist.

We can listen to anything in my collection, but I will probably make you listen to a song I am thinking of using for my next piece.

My favorite piece from one of Dawn’s performances is Talvin Singh’s Jann Anokha from his compilation album Soundz of the Asian Underground. I ran out and bought the album after the show, and have lost it and replaced it several times. I finally burned it for iTunes.

How does the place where we’re meeting figure in your work, inspire your work?

It is a place that holds many happy memories for me – rehearsing, taking class, attending concerts, and working. I like the bareness of the studio – no limitations on the work and nothing to distract me.

 

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A peek through the door at a Green Street rehearsal.

 

We discuss the people who influenced us to develop our art. My muse was Nelwyn Moore, a high school friend’s mother who played bridge with me and is the only person I recall encouraging my writing. Dawn points to two:

Pina Bausch and Carol Burnett. Now deceased, Pina Bausch was an extraordinary artist from Germany who explored the idea of merging dance and theatre. For her, dances are epic collections of episodic ideas that overlap and confront the audience with a deep understanding of the human psyche. Her work is not merely beautiful or entertaining – it grabs you with its repetitive insistence and it knows you at a very deep level. There is no tepid response to it. Carol Burnett, on the other hand, used humor (and dance and song) in her variety show. She also explored episodic ideas, but from a delightfully playful point of view. Both greatly influenced my work. One made me fierce and the other made me funny. I love the variety that dance-theatre embraces and I enjoy exploring difficult and troubling ideas and using the lens of humor to frame the subject.

My own family watched Carol Burnet from the time she was featured on the Gary Moore show, just about the only form of entertainment (or anything for that matter) we could agree on.

I ask about a  project that she mulls over often, but for some reason never gets around to staging.

I want to do another site-specific work – this time on the grounds of a new hospital here in New Braunfels. The grounds and outdoor spaces are enormous and welcoming and there are two brilliantly blue glass rivers that wind through, representing the Comal and Guadalupe rivers. There is an elevated butterfly garden and plenty of walkways and benches and partial atriums. They opened about 18 months ago and I have been wanting to do this project since my first visit. Sadly, I am still looking for full-time employment and getting a job has to come first. I would want the hospital to sponsor the performance and there is another dancer that just moved to town who would be a wonderful creative partner. However, she is also struggling with not enough employment and motherhood, so I keep the idea in my back pocket, hoping for better times and friendlier cultural climates.

One project I recall was How to Choreograph which she performed with Austin’s Mosaic Dance body.

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Dawn performs her composition How to Choreograph for the Mosaic Dance Studio.

She admits that dedication to her art makes a personal life difficult to pursue.

My parents have always been extremely supportive of my career, and that has been such a blessing, because this is not the easy path. My social life has been limited by my unwillingness to give up time in the studio to go drink alcohol in bars. The work was always more important. Having a child has made me less of a workaholic and more interested in smaller moments, but the passion to create dances is still there.

She doesn’t share this, but I know that a difficult marriage in which she followed her husband to England where he spent his time at work and left her to cope with a new culture made her eager to resume her own focus on dance. She did return with her son, upon whom she dotes.

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Dawn’s son Bee shows his own artistic turns with this self-portrait.

Readers interested in dance as an art form might want to look at:

Pina Bausch
Carol Burnett
The Mosaic Dance Body, who you can follow on Facebook.
And, of course, Dawn’s official online resume.


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