Afro-Cuban Dances with Victor Alexander
Friday, November 1, 2024 | 9:30-11 am
Friday, November 15, 2024 | 9:30-11 am
About the class: Dance is crucial to understanding Orisha in Yorùbáland and the diaspora. For centuries, the body was a site of black resistance in the colonies. Knowledge is not only expressed in language, words, or thoughts but it is also written on our bodies. By practicing the Orisha dance, this information reaches our minds, hearts, and souls.
The class begins with a traditional warm-up that emphasizes large movements in the shoulder and torso leading up to the basic Orisha step, which would be dancing and progressively moving across the floor with repetitions of steps and ending with a circle where the dancers can improvise. Yorùbá deities called Orisha are invited to mount the bodies of their initiates. The human personality disappears and gives way to the divine. Gods and goddesses join human beings, borrow the device of a body, and bring blessings from another dimension.
About the teacher:
Victor Alexander, Director, Ruth Page School of Dance and Ruth Page Professional Dance Training Program. He joined the artistic and administrative team of the Ruth Page Center for the Arts in the summer of 2013. As both the Director of the Ruth Page School of Dance and of the Ruth Page Civic Ballet, he continues a nearly 50-year tradition of exceptional training and mentoring of the next generation of the nation’s best young dancers. Through the development of international partnerships and networks, Alexander has also expanded the School’s reach with important collaborations and exchanges with other leading dance institutions through the development of the Ruth Page School of Dance's International Sister Schools program. Significant among these is the historic relationship with Cuba’s National School of Ballet (Escuela Nacional de Ballet) begun in 2015, and the placement of a Ruth Page School of Dance student, Catherine Conley, in the prestigious Cuban training program – the first American student to be invited since the normalization of relations between the two countries. She consequently was invited to dance with the National Ballet School of Cuba, another first for an American ballerina.
Our International Sister School partners include: Escuela Nacional de Ballet de Cuba (Havana, Cuba since 2015); Profesion Dance & Mandala Dance Company (Rome, Italy since 2015); Conservatorio Profesional de Danza A Coruña (Coruña, Spain since 2016); Ironi Aleph High School of Arts (Tel Aviv, Israel since 2016); Escuela Superior de Música y Danza de Monterrey (Monterrey, Mexico since 2018); Instituto Colubiano de Ballet Clásico (IncolBallet) (Cali, Colombia since 2018).
Alexander’s keen insight, experience and a dedication to the craft come from an international dancing, choreographic and teaching career. A native of Pinar del Rio, Cuba, he was trained at the prestigious Escuela Nacional de Arte (ENA) in Havana, graduating in 1992 with a degree in Modern and Cuban folkloric dance. As a student, his exceptional talents were recognized in 1992 when he won first place for dance in the 4th National Union of Writers and Artists in Havana. He went on to be a principal dancer for the prominent Danza Contemporánea de Cuba from 1992 to 2002, where both his technical talent and expressive dance style gained national prominence. Alexander has studied with distinguished teachers such as Donald McKayle, Chuck Davis, and Jeffrey Bullock and has performed throughout Europe, Asia, the Caribbean and the United States. Since relocating from Cuba to Chicago in 2002, Alexander has performed with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, Houston Grand Opera, Hedwig Dances, CDI/Concert Dance Inc, and Luna Negra Dance Theater. While with CDI, Alexander was a featured artist in the 2008 Emmy Award-nominated production of the re-envisioned Ruth Page’s Billy Sunday on PBS. While with Hedwig, Alexander was a dance artist in the 2016 Emmy-nominated film Arch of Repose.
His teaching experience is extensive, encompassing local, national and international dance institutions. Of particular importance to Alexander is teaching in outreach programs that bring dance to youth. Recent outreach programs include Dance Art (2007–2010) and the Elementary Dance Scholarship Program (2010–2011) within the Chicago Public Schools. Included in Dance Magazine’s prestigious “25 to Watch in 2013” list, Alexander is known for his riveting stage presence as he mixes formidable technique he gained in the rigorous training ground of Cuban dance schools with facility at theatrical interpretation. In 2012, he was one of four choreographers selected for the Lab Artists Program, a one-year program of the Chicago Dancemakers Forum that focuses on the development of new choreography. In addition to the Chicago Dancemakers Forum grant, he has also received a fellowship from the Illinois Arts Council for his work, Line of Sighs and was, selected as one of the 2013 Novel Affair Artists selected by The Ragdale Curatorial Board. In December of 2013, Line of Sighs was highlighted in the Chicago Tribune’s “Top 10 Best Dance Performances of 2013.”
Alexander was one of the choreographers chosen to participate in Chicago’s Afro-Latino Festival 2014 with his work Among Us. Additionally, in 2014, he was selected to participate in Hubbard Street Dance Chicago’s choreographic initiative, The International Commissioning Project, which provides residencies to choreographers, offering them the opportunity to create original works for HS2’s dancers and to conduct master classes. In 2022 Alexander received a Dance Leadership Hedwig Dance Award. In 2023, he was nominated Co-Chair of Dance for Life, a one-of-a-kind annual benefit event that has showcased more than 50 Chicago-based dance companies for the past 32 years.
Join us at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts for Open Technique Classes with the Ruth Page Professional Dance Training Program*, on Fridays at 9:30 am. The class will feature rotating guest artists and Ruth Page School of Dance faculty. Method and technique will vary by teacher.
*Ruth Page Professional Dance Training Program (PDTP) serves as a bridge between studio training and a professional dance career. Dancers train and rehearse daily 9 am - 4 pm, from August – June at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts focusing on refining ballet and contemporary technique in an international environment of performers, educators, and mentors. PDTP is designed for dancers between the ages of 17-25 who have completed high school and are preparing for a professional career. Trainees receive individualized coaching from accomplished faculty and curated international guest choreographers. The Ruth Page Professional Dance Training Program also offers international travel* (when available), limited need-based scholarships, and affordable housing. For further information about the Professional Dance Training Program (PDTP), reach out to the Artistic Associate, Maray Gutierrez at pdtp@ruthpage.org