Resource blogger Donatella Gasparro loves that time of the year when dance bachelor students from ArtEZ bring their unpredictable dance solos to Impulse. ‘A little disruptive force that reminds scientists that there is more out there.’
For some time already, dance has irrupted into campus a couple of days per year, transforming otherwise boring lunches into rather interesting experiences. ArtEZ dance students have the chance to share their end-of-the-year personal dance piece (solo) during a lunch break at the Speakers Corner in Impulse; and WUR employees and students have the chance to peek into a completely different world.
Dance schools – and arts schools in general – are probably the furthest away in mind set from WUR and hard-science universities alike. I love the way young dancers, with only movements and music, can completely disrupt someone’s ordinary day and thoughts, making you feel awkward, uncomfortable, lost, confused – or simply inspired.
Thank God someone is working on that thick layer of foundations of our being and our society at a depth
The most exciting and thought-provoking part is not movement per se (although I admit I am a contemporary dance enthusiast) but the concepts and research behind what ends up being a dance solo. That’s what destabilises me the most: while we’re here trying to understand and fix the world with more or less debatable strategies in more or less divergent ways, their research and efforts touch deeper layers of the human condition and everything around it. This makes their works not only technically and aesthetically interesting, but meaningful and intriguing as well – whether one likes them or not.
The first time I attended one of these solos presentation lunches, I was shocked by how different their study is from ours, and I even doubted its relevance for a while. I am now convinced: thank God someone is working on that. On that thick layer of foundations of our being and our society at a depth that we only grant to soil horizons.
May these kind of interactions between different worlds be preserved and fostered, as we as the scientific community need often to be reminded of values and meaning, of humanity and arts, of what the weight of things is, of contemplation without measurements, of beauty without reference.
Donatella Gasparro is a master’s student in Organic Agriculture; she hails from Italy.