Dade County And The Arts - Art Within Community

  • Monday, May 25, 2015
  • Lauryn Elise

For several years, a monthly open mic show featured a variety of performers without censorship.  I performed in the first show, watched it develop over time, and was in the audience during the last show. The show taught me how art can function in community. This type of community snuck up on me and seemed to develop slowly through the ritual of a monthly gathering time and space. Those who found themselves artistically fed by participating or observing the event seemed to slowly, organically unite over a common shared experience. For the purpose of this article, I consider community to mean a collection of individuals interested in supporting and challenging each other through the arts. I began performing at the show from a very Me-based place of wanting to show my work, but I left with a deep sense of We and how much the community had impacted my work, simply by being themselves and being there. 

After a couple shows, I started to recognize the same faces from month to month. To me, that meant my previous mentality wasn’t going to cut it. I knew I had reached a plateau with my dancing. A general audience can be intrigued by belly dance several times, but an audience full of artists was going to see past the costume quickly. I started to hold myself accountable for pushing my own boundaries, and in that experience came wonderful mistakes and surprises. More interesting to me, though, was that I was able to witness that process in others. Through seeing performers regularly over time, I was able to observe awkward moments, successes, and thrilling risks. I left shows inspired to take my own risks. I believe that others saw the risks I took as inspiration, too. Simply by participating in a regular gathering of art, I think many of us developed an unconscious wheel of inspiration.

One performer regularly called us “family,” and I thought about that one night. I wondered how we could be family, and yet I didn’t disagree because I felt strongly for these people surrounding me in a dark theater. Besides the regularity and the chats on show night, I think a strong sense of relationship was developed through the fact that performers got vulnerable onstage. The more they performed, the more they shared. So even if I hadn’t spoken to a poet that evening, if she performed, I knew a bit of her heart that I hadn’t known before.

My views on the world changed over time because I trusted these people. The brilliant spoken word artist Christian Collier (www.christianjcollier.com) helped me understand this about myself at the last show, as he mentioned in conversation that he thought trust was key to changing worldviews (though he said it much better). I drove home that night thinking about the word “trust” and how it applied to the views I had developed in the last year. Many perspective gained were through these people I came to know on a stage. I trusted them because they had been vulnerable within their artform. If they posted something political on the internet that I may not have previously considered or understood, I didn’t dismiss it or ignore it. I considered it deeply, which is where change begins. To me, there is no better reason to continue being vulnerable than to effect change, and I thank my community for showing me that lesson.

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Lauryn Elise is a performer who focuses on pushing the boundaries of the dance form commonly known as “belly dance,” using influence from a variety of movement traditions. 

The Trenton Arts Council has invited people who are active in the arts to submit articles for this column. Discussion, reviews, or idea will be content of the articles. The column is about the arts, including writing, visual arts, music, dance, and photography. Different writers will convey differing perspectives and differing specialties.
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