W83 Newsletter Feature March 2020
"Sanctuary"
Lindsey Hanson
When did you first get the idea to do this project?
I got the idea to do this project while I was developing another project, centered around a park bench. I needed a place to rehearse, with a bench, but rehearsal studios don’t have benches that were connected to the floors, so I was racking my brain, Where can I rehearse this piece? I realized after going to church, Oh, this place has lots of benches. During the first couple of sessions of working with the dancers at Redeemer, suddenly this other idea, having a piece set in the Redeemer sanctuary started to emerge, a much richer idea than my original.
How has the project changed as you’ve created it?
I spent the next three to four months collaborating with my go-to composer, Lena Gabrielle, and a few dancers generating material, not trying to zero in yet on perspective, just having two people dancing together in a church. It wasn’t until the very end of the process that I thought, I haven’t looked at it from the balcony yet. Let me see what that looks like. When I went up there and saw dance happening from a bird’s eye view, it altered the whole project, because that perspective was so unusual and powerful, loaded with different kinds of intention and visual interest.
What is your story as an artist? What led up to this project?
I always enjoyed choreographing and performing equally, but because of the dancer’s short life span as a performer, I knew that I needed to focus on my performance career first. I had a really exciting decade performing full time, but then started to feel the urge to create. I decided to devote more of my time to choreography and became a little bit more brave in putting my own work out there. It was very easy to keep it in my head and not actually physicalize it. There’s so much fear and vulnerability in creating art, and I think a lot of artists relate to that fear. You can’t let it be safely inside of you. You have to be willing to be exposed.
What do you think is important about getting a new perspective on familiar things?
That is the DNA of this piece. I think being able to see a new perspective on familiar things is what connects our inner spirit to our ordinary world around us. And it also can drastically help us in how we relate to each other. I think how bodies in space relate to each other is just a blueprint for how we can relate to each other in our world. That’s when God’s kingdom is revealed, when we can see each other in a different perspective, and hopefully in God’s perspective.
What do you hope people will experience when they come to see "Sanctuary?
A lot of things that I create are really athletic and aggressive, high energy. When I choreograph, I usually can’t even do the choreography myself. Creating this piece, I’ve had to really pull back from that. In doing this piece I want the same experience to happen for the dancers as for the audience. I don’t think that usually happens in a performance. For the audience, I want this to be a meditation. They don’t have to think so hard, just observe, take it in, relax and just let it wash over them. And I want the same thing for the dancers. So if I can have my dancers go to this calm and therapeutic place, then the audience will also be able to experience this calm and therapeutic visual experience. I want the audience to feel well rested by the end of it.
And I want people to see people or places around them, whether at Redeemer or their neighborhood block, with a new perspective. It’s a magical thing when you have a new set of eyes.