University Dance Company

/ As part of the University Dance Company’s annual spring concert, KU dance students will perform "Other Ramifications" an original choreographic work by Michelle Heffner Hayes inspired by the “branching” activity explored in the Spencer’s Trees & other Ramifications exhibition. The movement originated as a two-week, site-specific installation in Marvin Grove during October of 2008. Dance students of Professor Michelle Heffner Hayes responded to different “movement scores” based on the role of the individual in relationship to his or her environment. Students in American Studies recorded these experiments through sound and film, took ethnographic notes during the events, interviewed the dancers about their experiences, then combined these elements in an interactive wiki-a database of Web pages which visitors can edit live. Students in the parallel courses then added their own commentaries, and made choices about which photos, videos, sound recordings, and writings to include in different places on the wiki. These experiences provided a "map" of the event that became the source material for new choreography. The meditation on environmental impact transformed into an exploration of human relationships-personal, cultural and global. / Co-sponsored by the KU departments of Dance and American Studies / In conjunction with Trees & other Ramifications: Branches in Nature & Culture