Oakland’s Dimensions Dance Theater is celebrating its 45th anniversary with Kick High, Turn Fast, two evenings that celebrate social justice and African-American culture.
Dimensions is the oldest African-American dance company on the West Coast, founded by Elendar Barnes, Shirley Brown, and Deborah Vaughan, who serves as the troupe's artistic director.
When the trio founded Dimensions in 1973, few companies showcased black performers or culture.
“We had been studying dance for years and we wanted to put our work on the stage,” said Vaughan, “but we weren’t seeing ourselves on stage other than when Ailey would come to town,” she said, in a nod to famed choreographer Alvin Ailey and his New York-based Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
“Some of us were thinking of relocating back East,” said Vaughan.
Rather than give up or move, the three formed Dimensions to give black dancers a space to perform, reconnect audiences with African culture and the culture of the African diaspora and deliver new interpretations of social issues through dance.
“We combine and use as a palette many of the dance forms that come from the African diaspora, and use them to express different issues that are of concern to the greater public,” said Vaughan.
Dimensions does not separate schools of performance, but uses what feels most appropriate to respectfully convey the message of the dance.
Many of the works in the theater’s 45-year history have been about distinct subjects. Vaughan created “Down the Congo Line,” an exploration of the cultural and historical inheritance of African-Americans, after a visit to the Congo.
“I saw this connection in terms of movement and people and I wanted to bring that information to the stage through the dancing, through gestures, through some of the topics.”
“We see art as a tool or a mechanism or a means, a way to speak to people,” she said, “and it can show up in any form, whether it’s modern, whether its African, that it’s not something that can be set aside or apart from what people are experiencing.”
Dimensions' two-night anniversary event features two world premiere performances.
In the first, seven dancers tell five separate stories of homelessness. The second, titled “Ain’t No Turning Back,”,is an homage to Harriet Tubman, the abolitionist, suffragist, and “conductor” on the Underground Railroad.
In the evening’s finale, the full company will take the stage with live musical accompaniment from two groups: Twilight under the direction of bandleader Harold Wilson (aka "Homeboy”), and a West African dundunba battery under the direction of Alseny Soumah.
The Friday, April 13th performance will be followed by a short Q&A with the artists. On Saturday, April 14th, the public is invited to gather with the company for champagne and sweets.
Vaughan is grateful to celebrate the company’s enduring success with a multi-night extravaganza. “It’s really been a ride,” she said. “We appreciate all of the artists, the dancers, and people that have supported the organization for us to have this forty-five year history.”
