You’re Never Too Old to Dance: Creative Aging at DC’s VA Medical Center

A fresh new season and a fresh new voice on the blog: this one comes to you from our #CHAWsome neighbors at Capitol Hill Village (CHV), an organization dedicated to sustaining and enriching the Capitol Hill community for the long term through services and opportunities to age in place.  We are especially excited to partner with CHV as we embark on a new class offering created especially for seniors in our neighborhood.  Tuesday afternoon seniors-only drawing begins Tuesday, September 8, but there’s still time to register! Take a look and then report back here for updates throughout the semester. Why take an arts class as a senior? We’ll let CHV tell you…

You’re Never Too Old to Dance: Creative Aging at DC’s VA Medical Center

A dozen of us sit together in the atrium, a skylight overhead providing a view of the mostly sunny sky. Earth Wind and Fire’s “That’s the Way of the World” plays for our opening warm up. I remind the group, “You are in charge of your own body. I am here as a guide. I trust you to make the movement your own. Our bodies are different every day, so please pay attention and be patient.”

At the DC VA Medical Center, some residents come in for short-term treatments and rehabilitation. Others have lived here for years. They have served during WWII and Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan. They have cancer, TBI, and PTSD. They are stroke victims and amputees. And for an hour on Mondays and Wednesdays, they are dancers.

A unique program sponsored by the National Center for Creative Aging brings arts programming to the Community Living Center three days a week. We provide movement classes, concert-style music performances, an open studio for visual arts, field trips in partnership with the Philips Gallery.

A moment later, as we settle into a conscious breathing exercise, departing staff members shout goodbyes at the elevator bank to our right, the security guard calls out sports scores to a friend down the hall, and a nurse interrupts Mr. B for a blood sugar check. We continue breathing steadily together, opening arms wide and then closing like a deflating balloon, following the smooth rise and fall of a Philip Glass etude. Soon all the activity around us is white noise.

When we engage our imagination, when we are the most ourselves and creative, we enjoy a heightened state of health. Here in DC and across the nation, VA hospital staff members are partnering with professional artists to provide programs for patients and family members. The arts are now recognized as playing an essential role in delivering patient-centered care. In any art-making process, the creator makes numerous decisions, crafts an aesthetic, develops technical skills, and communicates with an audience. Art ignites self-agency. It brings our most essential selves to the world around us. This heightened state helps us heal faster and stay that way. A Met Life study of patients who make art during hospital stays, found that patients ask for pain medication and nursing assistance less, go home sooner, and have a lower case of recidivism.

As a movement-based art form, dance sparks our imagination and memory, agility, and resilience. A perfect complement to physical therapy and fall-prevention, it focuses attention on eyes, ears, and touch as tools to assist in movement and balance. Equally important, the act of coming together for a dance class – moving to music, talking with one another – is a huge mood boost. Dance instills confidence and breaks isolation.

As the class wraps up, I leave the music on so that people can Mr. C continues to improvise to Sam Cooke’s version of “This Little Light of Mine.” Mr. M and Ms. H head toward the dining room together. Another man stays to tell me that the experience was spiritual. He feels refreshed, inspired. He’s excited about finding a movement class when he goes home next month. The simple, joyful act of dance has set people free, reinforced friendships, and launched new learning.

Margot Greenlee is a teaching artist and program consultant for the National Center for Creative Aging.  She received a 2015 Artist Fellowship award from the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. Visit her website at www.bodywise.com

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Shaking and shimmying to a new community

One of our newest teaching artists, Linda Frye, shares her belly dance story with us.  Come join her as she kicks off a four-week crash course in belly dance, Thursdays all through October!

It all started with a Groupon I bought for the crash course—that’s right; the very same one that begins tonight at CHAW.

I had always liked dancing, but I’d never taken any formal classes.  The Saffron Dance Crash Course was being offered just a couple of blocks away from where I lived, so I thought, “Why not?”, and my girlfriend and I signed up for a fun girls’ night out.

Well, fast-forward to five years later, and here I am teaching that very same class!  I loved it so much that I started taking regular classes, moved up the ranks, and now belly dance—and, more specifically, the Saffron Dance community—is a huge part of my life.

What I really latched onto is how belly dance portrays your body—the way you’re supposed to move just really agreed with me.  You move around, jiggle, move the way you move.  It’s not about looking like someone else.  My body said more, please!  For those of you out there worried about lack of experience, please don’t be.  You don’t necessarily need modern, ballet, jazz formal experience.  In fact, sometimes you have to unlearn that to get your body to move for belly dance!

It’s true: belly dance is for ANY age, ANY body type.  Any woman can take these classes, and should.  Why?  There are so many benefits.  Of course, it is exercise and can be as aerobic as you want it to be—it’s also great for toning muscles.  But more importantly, it’s fantastic for self-esteem.  I walk down the street with total confidence now in a way I couldn’t before belly dance, not even thinking about what I’m wearing.  We can all use as much self-esteem as we can get, including teenagers all the way on up, and this is a safe space to celebrate ourselves and our bodies.

In our society, in the world I’ve grown up in, the way you move your body in belly dance might be described as “awkward” or “inappropriate.”  But belly dance provides the opportunity to let go of all of that—you’ll even live longer!  Studies show that movement makes your brain connect to your muscles in ways that keep you healthy and strong across the lifespan.  I need students to access muscles they don’t even know exist—muscles they don’t know how to find or are told not to.  You have to unlearn the normal movement.  But once you feel it, it’s amazing—I guarantee that at some point, you’ll feel it in your body and think, “Oh, look what I can do!”

At Saffron, it is about more than the physical body.  We are very supportive and completely understand that these movements might feel awkward or strange at first.  You can be sure that I will never make you feel silly in class.  Save the embarrassment for some other day, because in belly dance, we are here to support one another.  The community of women I have met through dance is unreal.

Saffron is an eclectic group of ladies who are dedicated to the studio—lawyers, astrophysicists, stay-at-home-moms… This is a community of women, an outlet for stress and getting feminine feedback, and a space that welcomes and encourages all kinds of different perspectives.

For me, belly dance is a way of connecting the mental and the physical, and a way of creating community through movement and dance.  It’s the freedom to shimmy and to move our hips, it’s a place to celebrate our bodies and what we can do, and I would love nothing more than to have you join me in this next fantastically fun four-week Crash Course at CHAW!

For more information and to register, visit the CHAW website or call CHAW at (202) 547-6839.  You may also find out more on the Saffron Dance website, register directly, or email us at admin@saffrondance.com.

The Arts Mean Business

I am an artist, I own a business that does commercial art and I support the arts in numerous ways including volunteerism, actual cash donations and simply going to enjoy a dance/theater/gallery show on a regular basis.

I’ve always known instinctively that arts are important and valuable, not just on a personal level, but also to society on a harder-to-define and more broad-based level.

That level has now been well defined and quantified, by many groups but particularly by the organization Americans for the Arts, who researches and publishes the economic impact of the arts in a variety of easy to understand fact/impact sheets: http://www.americansforthearts.org/

I could wax philosophically about how important an well-rounded, arts-based education focused on teaching people how to think rather than teaching them what to do has helped me as a person and as an employer but then my Jesuit-education would be clearly and unabashedly be showing. The facts are, arts can help kids and adults learn and adapt to new things (something as easy as playing music while you write or work can improve efficiency, don’t believe me – read more here in the New York Times:http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/12/jobs/how-music-can-improve-worker-productivity-workstation.html?_r=0), can help us access and understand that tremendous link between our emotions and our decision to purchase things (my entire business is based on the fact that how we depict information is just as important as what we depict. Skeptical? I’m teaching a webinar-based course starting next week:http://www.24hrco.com/gographic.html) and generally the arts provide us with an opportunity to appreciate beauty which is scientifically proven to lift our mood (Linda Stone has some fantastic tips about realigning our attention to maximize our own efficiency and hone our focus including appreciating cute things—LOLCats is now market research time, wohoo!—and taking a walk in nature, read more about her here:http://lindastone.net/).

Creativity is the one of the top three personality traits most important to career success, according to US employers (from a study between Adobe Systems Inc., the Conference Board, Americans for the Arts and the American Association of School Administrators). The study claims: “Teaching creativity develops critical thinking, engages students and fosters innovation.”

Further, 72% of all employers say creativity is a primary concern when they are hiring, yet 85% of those employers cannot find the creative applicants they seek. The majority of employers (in all/any industry) and superintendents of schools agree that a college degree in the arts is the most “significant indicator of creativity in a prospective job candidate.” This I’m sure is welcome news to my fellow liberal and fine arts majors.

Similar studies have found that students with an arts high school education “have higher GPAs and standardized test scores…. lower drop-out rates… regardless of socio-economic status.” Additionally, “students with 4 years of arts or music in high school average 100 points better on their SAT scores than students with just one-half year of arts or music.” (Americans for the Arts)

The arts make you smarter and making arts accessible to all people regardless of their ability to pay for lessons/classes/programs will make ALL people smarter and make all businesses potentially more pioneering and competitive in an increasingly difficult global market.

Arts are big business in this country. Dun and Bradstreet in a 2014 analysis found more than 750,000 arts-based businesses in the US employee more than 3.1M people. In DC alone 2,537 arts-based businesses employee more than 22,000 people ranging from museums, performing arts, graphic design to art schools. Many arts-based organizations are not-for-profit and a study done in 2012 found that spending by arts audiences, specifically for attending events, is on average $26.40 per person in addition to the event cost for things like restaurant visits, parking or babysitting which pumps even more money into a local economy and creates an arts-based eco-system where tons of non-related businesses can also thrive. The same study found that non-local attendees spent more than twice as much as their local counterparts $39.96 vs $17.42 (per person). Arts drive local economy growth and provide an opportunity for tourism dollars.

Speaking of tourism, the Department of Commerce reports that international travelers in the past 10 years have increased their arts consumption in the US from 18-24% visiting our museums and 14-17% attending a concert or theater performance. Additionally, we export more art stuff then we import—exporting more than $72B dollars work of arts goods including things like movies and jewelry and only importing $25B.

While the arts continue to show growth, vibrancy in local and international economic development, and are key indicators in the overall success of students seeking employment, the arts continue to be slashed from school budgets. Art, in all its many forms (dance, theater, creative writing, drawing, etc.) is seen as expendable, particularly amongst the socio-economic groups that may benefit the most from exposure to the arts. A 2011 study by the National Endowment for the Arts tracked from 1982 to 2008 the decline of arts education to “underserved populations” and found that in 2008, African-American and Hispanic students had less than HALF the access to arts education then their white peers.

While at the same time researcher James Catterall from UCLA found that “low-socio-economic status students who are engaged in arts learning have increases in high school academic performance, college-going rates, college grades and holding jobs with a future.”

If we want our country, our local community and our kids to be successful in the future we should be investing in not only our own access to the arts, but to EVERYONES access to the arts.

Supporting a local arts-non-profit is a great way to do that.

On average, as found in a 2014 study across arts-non-profits in the US, 60% of all revenue is earned with only 24% coming from individual donations (the rest is a mix of grants from local, state or federal governments, corporate philanthropy or foundations). This means that the arts are not always standing around looking for handouts. The arts are making money and driving, as noted early, spending in unrelated but geographically close business while providing jobs.

Go to a show, visit an art gallery opening and grab a drink at a bar before hand (do both with a paint and sip event!), have dessert at a local restaurant after a poetry reading. Support your local artists by enjoying them, regularly.

In DC you cannot shake a stick without hitting an amazing arts experience. We have festivals and performances, cultural events and galleries, there’s art outside and inside, there’s art online and in your own backyard. Get out of your house, away from your TV and experience art. I promise it’ll make you smarter AND happier. It might also make you more marketable for your next job or help you find a new employee (I’ve been known to hire theater people—they are the best at providing customer service even with the most cantankerous clients).

And if you feel so inclined to enjoy making a little art yourself, take a class, or even better still, help someone else take a class.

I have been on the board of the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop (CHAW) for 8 years. I have given my blood, sweat, volunteer hours and cold hard cash to make sure that someone else has the opportunity to do a little art or music or dance or sculpture in my local community. I grew up welfare-line poor and only because other people helped my mom and I, did I get the chance to explore my own creativity. Those experiences have made me the daring, problem solving, confident, professional businesswoman I am today who was able to still be inspired and innovate despite my family’s economic limitations.

You can donate to CHAW here, specifically to support their tuition-assistance fund. No one (child or adult) who has asked for assistance has ever been turned away in more than 40 years of the organization’s existence: http://www.razoo.com/story/Chaw

Or here: http://chaw.org/index.php/donate/paint_bucket1/

You can visit and take a class or see a show at CHAW (they’re metro accessible!) or find a way to support the arts in your local community, wherever that may be in whatever way is most meaningful and appropriate to you.

The arts get a bad rap for being expendable, additional, the “icing” on a cake that is unnecessary for education or for living a full and rich life. Arts aren’t the icing; the arts are the plate that the cake is on. You cannot have a viable, creative, innovative, wealthy and independent society without giving your entire population access to the arts and now, the numbers prove it.

Colleen Jolly

Reprinted with permission from american-broad.blogspot.com.

Summer Step Dance Class with Briana Stuart of Step Afrika

This summer CHAW hosts a two-week Step Dance intensive class for students in 3rd through 8th grades. The class is led by teaching artist Briana Stuart, a full time company member of Step Afrika, the first and only professional stepping company in the world.

We asked Briana to share more about the class:

For two weeks students will engage in the highly energetic and dynamic art form of stepping. Stepping is percussive dance form that uses the body to create intricate rhythms and sounds through a combination of footsteps, claps and the spoken word.  It serves as a fun and energetic tool to promote the importance of education and college to young people of all ages. Students will learn more about its origin, three key principles of stepping: teamwork, commitment, and discipline, and basic movements and techniques in stepping.

The class also seeks to foster leadership skills within the participants in order to utilize their gifts and talents. Stepping serves as a tool to connect and transform young people into the best they can be individually and within a group. In addition to the important educational aspects, students are able to have fun and harness their energy into an enjoyable activity that allows them to make music and express themselves. At the end of the two week session, students will present what they learned in a demonstration for friends and family at the final class.

“I enjoy teaching step to students because it allows them to have fun and be kids while developing into strong leaders,”says Briana. “The environment of a step class requires students to be team players and positive contributors to our community. When the students notice their contribution to the orchestra of sound, they realize that their positive individual actions creates a stronger and confident group of steppers. Plus, who doesn’t want the opportunity to literally be the music and use their outside voice, inside!”

Step Dance runs from July 14-24, 2014 on Mondays through Thursdays (eight classes) from:

4:00-5:00 p.m. for 3rd-5th graders
5:00-6:00 p.m. for 6th-8th graders

For more information or to register, click here or call (202) 547-6839.

 

Heidi Hess, Early Childhood Parent Liaison

Artist Heidi Hess has been part of the CHAW family since 2006 teaching dance and jewelry making classes in Early Childhood, Youth and Adult programs. In addition, she chairs CHAW’s Dance Department and also serves as the faculty representative on the CHAW Board of Directors. Through these varied roles she has gained unique insights in arts education and community art building that truly embody the CHAW story. With those insights, she is eager to share new ideas and strategies for growing the arts throughout the community.   In particular, her work with Pre K students has confirmed for her just how adventurous and full of passion for learning the youngest CHAW students are. That, coupled with her own multi-disciplinary perspective as an artist and a dancer, has led her to fully understand the importance of adopting art as a way of life from a very early age and by extension, the role that CHAW plays in helping neighborhood families to access and nurture those leadings. To that end, she has been instrumental in helping CHAW to expand its programming for Pre K children to include more teachers, more variety of dance, and more visual and integrated arts classes.   Because she has been integral in introducing so many families to dance and to CHAW and has developed close ties to those families whose children she has taught, she also envisioned a broader educational role for herself as CHAW grows its Early Childhood programs. This winter, Heidi added Early Childhood Parent Liaison to the variety of hats she wears at CHAW.   As such, she will serve as a primary resource for parents and caregivers of 2 – 5 year olds helping them to not only navigate classes and programs for families at CHAW but engaging parents in an ongoing dialogue about kids and the arts.  Look for her at family-friendly events, visiting classes, leading hands-on activities and offering new ways to incorporate arts as a way of life for a lifetime. Please feel free to contact Heidi with questions or thoughts about Early Childhood programming at CHAW at earlychildhood@chaw.org.

Celebrate the Holidays at CHAW’s Holiday Fête

CHAW says “Happy Holidays” the only way we know how with a day full of art, performances, and gift buying!  Join us for the CHAW Holiday Fête, an Arts Showcase and Sale on Saturday, December 7, 2013 from 12 noon to 8:00 p.m.  The day is free and open to all!

Events include:

12:00-8:00 p.m. Capitol Hill Art League’s annual Give Art and Wrap It Up Holiday Party and Sale in the Gallery

12:30 – 8:00 p.m.  CHAW Teaching Artists’ Sale in the Ceramics Studio

2:00 p.m. Performance by A Second Wind Senior Chorus

2:30-3:30 p.m.  Showcase of Young Music and Dance Students in the Dance Studio

2:00-5:00 p.m. Gingerbread House Making & Cookie Decorating at Eastern Market’s North Hall

4:30-5:30 p.m. Recital featuring CHAW Music Students and Teaching Artists in the Dance Studio

6:30-8:00 p.m.  Student Art Show in the Dance Studio

And just what do our CHAW friends say about the upcoming day of festiveness?

“Giving someone dear to you a gift of art is perfect.  It shows you care enough to seek out the unique and beautiful hand-crafted items for that person, and support artists in your own community.  In Washington terminology, a win – win.” 

– Rindy O’Brien, Capitol Hill Art League Chair

“I’m so excited about this year’s CHAW Holiday Art Fete!  The day is going to be truly magical and full of art.  This year my ballet class will be doing a small performance to the Nutcracker’s “Sugar Plum Fairy” followed by some wonderfully cheerful music from CHAW’s music programs. And the festivities won’t stop there! CHAW will also be hosting a Faculty Art Sale throughout the day, which a is great way for our community to get to know some of the members of the faculty and their artistic side; including my work, Jewelry by POPPY. (PoppyMetals.com).  On top of this, I’ll be inviting my youth after-school Jewelry Making classes to showcase and sell their jewelry alongside mine… learning the importance of making and selling art!”

– Heidi Hess, Teaching Artist and Jewelry Maker

“The December Adult Student Art Show gives students an opportunity to exhibit and share their art with the public. Join the celebration of  art at the opening on December 7 from 6:30-8:00 p.m. Our juror will be Holly McCullough, Curator of Exhibitions at the Greater Reston Art Center.” 

– Ellen Cornett, Teaching Artist and Student Art Show Coordinator

Summer Camp Fun

Summer Camp instructor Laura Maravilla has put together a  video preview of dances campers will be learning this summer as they explore the worlds of Colombia, India, Italy and the American West. Check it out! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WzBFKtLoA4w

Registration for the one-week sessions is open now. Don’t miss out on the fun!

What’s the Buzz on the Bloom?

by Binahkaye Joy

 

In a few days I’ll be sharing a new dance workshop, The Body in Bloom: a dance class for expectant mothers, at CHAW. Whenever I have the opportunity to dance with people and create movement programs for communities, I am buzzing with excitement. This is because I’m going to learn something new in the process, and everyone who participates will discover something essential and powerful about their bodies. The In Bloom dance workshop series is also extra special to me because it’s a reflection of my evolution as a movement facilitator, doula, and most recently, a mother-to-be!

One thing I’ve heard from a few pregnant women interested in the class is, “I’m not a dancer. Why should I start dancing now that I’m pregnant?” Well for starters, movement is good for you, whenever you do it! Stretching our muscles, strengthening our pelvic floor for labor, oxygenating our blood, relieving stress, reducing stiffness in joints and muscles, encouraging blood circulation, and acclimating to the extra weight we are carrying are just a few of the benefits that movement can bring to you and your baby. Pregnancy is inherently a dynamic time to develop a deeper connection to your body. Not only is your body changing everyday to support your growing baby, but your baby’s first communication mode is also through movement. Your baby can’t yet talk to you or see you, but they can move within you. Embracing dance during your pregnancy is a beautiful, natural, and fun way to enhance your relationship with your body and your baby!

The Body in Bloom is a gentle dance class, appropriate for pregnant women in any trimester. I’ll be facilitating dance activities that encourage participants to identify movements that feel good to them and support the growing bond between mother and baby. We’ll also do some simple breathing and relaxtation techniques that can provide comfort during pregnancy. I look forward to dancing with all the beautiful mamas very soon! Please contact me at b.joy@bjoyspaces.com if you would like to discuss the workshop in more detail.

The Body in Bloom: a dance class for expectant mothers
Friday, May 3rd, 7:00-8:30pm
$25
For More Info:
http://chaw.org/index.php/events/details/the_body_in_bloom_a_dance_class_for_expectant_mothers/
Register at: 202-547-6839

About the Facilitator

Binahkaye Joy is a member of the CHAW teaching artists faculty and facilitates innovative movement workshops for individuals, youth, communities, and organizations locally and internationally. She is developing the In Bloom dance workshop series in tandem with her own journey through motherhood. Binahkaye has created movement programs for pregnant clients, assisted mothers as a birth coach, and is currently completing certification as a birth and postpartum doula. Learn more at http://www.bjoyspaces.com

Dance a Little Tarantella with Laura Maravilla

 

Join CHAW and teaching artist Laura Maravilla for a night of dancing and pizza!  The Tarantella and Pizza – Family Arts Night and Camp Open House on Friday, April 12, 2013 from 6:30-8:00 p.m. invites folks of all ages to dance, paint, eat, and enjoy a Friday night at the Capitol Hill Arts Workshop!

The term tarantella groups a number of different folk dances characterized by a fast upbeat tempo. It is among the most recognized of traditional southern Italian music and will be just one of the many things students will learn this summer in CHAW’s Summer Arts Camps.

“This will be my third summer camp at CHAW,” says Laura. “It’s one of my favorite things to do each year. I learn so much in my planning that I get overwhelmed and excited and that makes my teaching super enthusiastic – and then the kids and I are on a tidal wave of exploration and creation.”

Click here for more information on the Tarantella and Pizza event.  The evening is FREE but RSVP at (202) 547-6839 or victor@chaw.org.

Boot Scootin’ at the Summer Camp Hoedown

Last Saturday, we built a covered wagon, learned the Tush Push line dance, painted a masterpiece, and ate s’mores (lots of them) all in the name of CHAW’s upcoming summer camps.  CHAW’s Summer Camp Open House Hoedown featured camp staff and instructors doing their thing and giving us a taste of the American West camp happening this summer.  My little and I got to experience just a smidge of what her camp days will be filled with at CHAW.  And she’s still talking about the fun she had and the kids she met.  Not bad for a snowy Saturday!

CHAW summer camps include eight one-week camps from June 24-August 16, 2013 exploring the arts of Colombia, India, the American West, and Italy. CHAW also has afternoons full of recreational activities and a Bollywood, Stage Make-Up, and String Fling specialty camp. Camps are for students ages K-5 with some options for pre-k 4 and 5 year olds.  For more information, visit http://chaw.org/index.php/register/summer_camp.