Speak With Movement: Winter Dance Concert Engages Concept of Humanity

The NMH Dance Company continues its cross-disciplinary exploration of the NMH humanities program’s “four essential questions” in the Winter Dance Concert, which runs from Feb. 13 to 15.

Following the Dance Company’s meditations on the ideas of power and powerlessness last fall, the winter concert centers around the third question explored in NMH’s Humanities I classes: What does it mean to be human? 

Student-choreographed pieces address topics like female empowerment, the interconnected nature of human identity, and self-perception in the face of society’s expectations, said Gretel Schatz, chair of the Performing Arts Department and one of NMH’s dance teachers.

“It's sort of like a variety show with an overarching theme,” said Schatz. “The dance is the answer [to the question]. Sometimes it’s not always direct, but it’s your bones, your muscles, and your flesh that are answering it.”

In addition to the student-choreographed pieces, Schatz and Williams each produced a group performance together with students.

Schatz revisited a piece she’d choreographed just before the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which deals with the diverse nature of the individual, adapting it to her current students’ skills and perspectives. Her dance incorporates several musical interludes, mixed with vocal elements and audience interactions that break the fourth wall. 

“We contain multitudes, right?” said Schatz. “Human beings are complex, and you can’t define someone simply. I've been working really intentionally with the group to ask who they are, what their identity is, how people might perceive them, and then what their actual truth is.”

Williams’ piece is an interdisciplinary collaboration that sprang from a local writers’ group she participated in last fall. Each writer responded to the Humanities I question with a short written piece. Williams compiled those pieces and had her students provide responses, which informed the final choreography.

“I was a little nervous about whether they would connect with these ideas written from a much older perspective, but I found that it's not age-prescriptive,” said Williams. “It's a human experience: Whether you're 37 or 17, you're experiencing these same ideas at some level.”

Isabelle Eaton-Neubert ’25 drew on lessons from a recent English class to inspire her piece in the winter concert. Blending elements of contemporary dance, modern techniques, and a few flourishes from ballet, Eaton-Neubert reflected on the complex nature of perspective and its role in forming identity.

“The preconceived notions, the stereotypes that we have in our heads, our doubt about ourselves, can be really detrimental to everyone involved [in an interaction],” said Eaton-Neubert. “A lot of times, especially as teenagers, we really want to fit in so badly that we try to look like or act like other people so that we're not on the ‘outside.’ I've tried to show that through the movements of my piece.”

Unlike the fall dance concert, the winter performance will be held in the Rowland Studio. Eaton-Nuebert said working in the smaller space adds an intimacy and intricacy to the performance not found in larger theater settings.

“On stage, you can feel separated from the audience to an extent, but in Rowland, you're dancing maybe a foot away from somebody – it can honestly be pretty nerve-wracking,” she noted. “But it's also really cool: You feel more connected to everybody in the room.”

“If you think about the energy that is put into a space, it's a different kind of sharing – you have to present in a different way that is a little more authentic,” said Williams. “On stage, you're trying to project out, but if it's just you and I here having a conversation, it's going to be very different.”

In the end, what each audience member and performer takes away from the concert depends, like the question, on how they translate it through themselves, Williams said.

“In literally every class I teach, we talk about the mind and body not being separate,” she said. “It's one big system. It just depends on how you read the poem and then how you speak that with the movement you choose.”

The NMH Dance Company performs “What Does It Mean to Be Human” on Thursday, Feb. 13, and Friday, Feb. 14, at 7:30 pm and on Saturday, Feb. 15, at 2 and 6:30 pm. Performances are open to the public. Tickets are currently available on a limited walk-in basis. Attendees are encouraged to arrive early.