A dance ensemble can have endless expenses before paying its
artistic director: Rehearsal space, administration costs, costumes, travel… etc.
If you believe these expenses are not necessary, I hope you consider that an
artistic director should be paid. As mentioned above, a professional artist is a
worker. We might not follow the 9am to 5pm shift, but we might get our brains
and entire body working as hard as any other professional. Maybe for you, it’s
all about fun and yes, it’s fun too, but it’s also tiring and challenging.
I use to be an office clerk and can say that not all my
days in the office were tiring and challenging. But as a dance teacher,
choreographer and director I constantly feel challenged and tired after a day of
work. Wondering why? As dance teacher, I
have to: Act as a mentor; provide a safe environment for my students (physical,
emotional, and psychological); offer challenges that will raise them to the
next level, making everyone included (regardless of ability level); provide
appropriate discipline and deliver the best possible age-appropriate skills
(content and materials: including movement, terminology, music, choreography,
technique, and historical influences).
Not mentioning that as a choreographer I need to research,
to have perseverance, to work calmly and effectively under pressure, to solve
problems creatively, to have strong organisational skills and knowledge of the
requirements of the relevant health and safety legislation and procedures.
If this doesn’t sound hard enough for you, there’s the artistic
director role as well, which requires me to have a college degree, experience as
a dancer, to develop and implement dance programs, to oversee the production of
a dance performance, to arrange advanced classes and to develop / oversee
budgets.
I love my work, and I seriously do, but I need to clarify here
that with financial pressure, you will rarely see good fruits from a dance
company/ensemble. Also, it’s important to mention again that an ensemble is connected
to its artistic director as the unborn baby is to its mother. If there’s not
enough support to one of them, they’ll rarely survive.
Unfortunately, funding not always comes from the major
cultural bodies, but it also doesn’t mean other people shouldn’t fund it too. Dance
and arts in general are valuable sources to our society.
It’s not all about having fun it’s about developing valuable
skills for any career. It’s an avenue to be challenged, to develop lifelong
skills such as analytical thinking, clarity in written and spoken expression,
collaboration and creativity.
If you don’t find it is a good reason for you to start sponsoring
your local artists, do at least for the fun side of it. Because fun develops fulfillment and fulfillment usually develops
success and successful people have a social responsibility to make the world a better place, not just take from it.
PLEASE SUPPORT Laois Youth Dance Ensemble on FUNDit campaign:
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