What's Up - Your guide to what's happening in Fayetteville, AR this week!
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/1206336
Coming from the complete opposite perspective, Virginia Pilgrim Ramey is one of the company's few members who grew up in the city. She began taking lessons at Ballet Memphis when she was 5 years old and joined the company as an apprentice at 17. "I think it says a lot about a company that can keep a dancer here for that long — nearly 20 years," she shares. "There's just been no end to the opportunity I've been given to grow and explore all aspects of the art form. I think if it had been just a place where I showed up every day and danced, I wouldn't have been happy and fulfilled in my career. But instead, I've been able to teach as well and explore a little bit of choreography." Part of that artistic fulfillment, Pilgrim Ramey reveals, also came from Ballet Memphis' identity. The company has always been firmly grounded in its mission of making dance accessible to everyone — that the company wouldn't be elitist or exclusive. Being mindful in their creation of work that tells a story and that speaks to the human condition gave Pilgrim Ramey a greater sense of purpose in her work, she confesses. "There is a sense we are needed here in a way that you may not feel in a city that the arts funding is just incredible and the seats are filled, full houses every night because that's just part of their culture," she says of seeing the arts impact the city. "We're just trying to make Memphis and Ballet Memphis a place where art is part of people's lives, but not in the same way that you go to New York City or San Francisco, and it's only the wealthy people that have access to the arts." The company's community outreach and in-school programming add up to one aspect of that, plus their standing in a neighborhood that also supports the region's only black repertory theater, Hattiloo; the largest black-owned dance school in the South, Collage Dance Collective; and Memphis' professional theater, Playhouse on the Square (whose parent company Circuit Playhouse Inc. just celebrated 50 years). An active part of the city's artistic landscape, Ballet Memphis' repertoire is another piece of the effort to perform art that reflects its community. "A lot of the time, we're using the city itself or the region as a muse — the music, the cultural contributions Memphis has given to the world, has always been a muse for us in our dance making," McMahon explains. And on Feb. 6, Ballet Memphis will share part of that muse with Northwest Arkansas as well. The company visits the Walton Arts Center in Fayetteville to share three contemporary pieces selected from other works in their repertoire. One of the pieces they will perform was choreographed by McMahon himself and was actually influenced by McMahon's relationship with the subject matter: birds. "I hate them. I'm really afraid of them, particularly ducks and swans and geese," he declares. The work, "Flyway," was made during a river project initiative where the company created new works inspired by the Mississippi River, McMahon shares. "And the Mississippi River, as it turns out, is the largest migratory path for birds in North America. And it's pretty fascinating how these birds leave and come back every year to the same place. It's kind of like magic, actually. "So, I was really interested in the strangeness of them, and how I could have a group of dancers and make them look like birds in my own way. Ballet definitely has a history of anthropomorphizing animals onto bodies, and this was my attempt at that." The three works the company will perform at the Walton Arts Center were also chosen for their versatility — to demonstrate the range of Ballet Memphis' dancers. "It's important that we excel at jumping back and forth between styles of dance, because Ballet Memphis is definitely not a company that just does one type of thing," Pilgrim Ramey points out. "From one show to the next, even within the same show, we've got a fairly classical work next to an extremely contemporary work." For instance, she demonstrates, the opening piece of the "Contemporaryx3" showcase is Julie Niekrasz's "Sa Voix," which Pilgrim Ramey describes as taken from the romantic era of ballet, but with a modern twist of equality in the partnering work: "She wanted to show, I think, the strength of women and the ability for us to hold things together while still meeting the expectations of doing it effortlessly and beautifully." McMahon's piece, she says, next sees the dancers less defined by traditional gender divisions as they echo the movements of birds. Third, contemporary ballet choreographer Matthew Neenan's "Water of the Flowery Mill" is a "true neo-classical work," Pilgrim Ramey says, and will leave audiences intrigued and bewitched. "No two people will come away with the same story. You get the sense that there's a story, or at least relationships between the people, but it's very much up for interpretation." FEBRUARY 2-8, 2020 WHAT'S UP! 9 FAQ Ballet Memphis 'Contemporaryx3' WHEN — 7 p.m. Feb. 6 WHERE — Walton Arts Center in Fayetteville COST — $10; at publication, limited tickets remain INFO — 443-5600, waltonartscenter.org, balletmemphis.org "From one show to the next, even within the same show, we've got a fairly classical work next to an extremely contemporary work," shares Ballet Memphis company member Virginia Pilgrim Ramey. (Courtesy Photo) McMahon Pilgrim Ramey