Chicago's iconic 'footwork' dance is stepping into the spotlight, and ShaDawn "Boobie" Battle is leading the charge. The dance style, a fixture in the city's Black community, is being celebrated thanks to the National Public Housing Museum and Battle's new role as Artist and Instigator, the Chicago Tribune reports.
Battle, a native of Chicago's Chatham neighborhood and an assistant professor at Xavier University, was selected out of nearly 100 applicants nationwide for her extensive research into the dance movement. She's knee-deep in producing a documentary series titled "Footwork Saved My Life: The Evolution of Chicago Footwork," which examines the dance style through the lenses of generations who've performed it. The series notably features interviews with individuals who have roots in the city's public housing projects, including Ida B. Wells Homes and Cabrini-Green, Block Club Chicago detailed.
The museum's residency program seeks to incubate works that bridge the arts with housing issues, social justice, and equitable development. Battle's project, "Place, Space and Werkz," is deeply tied to these themes, utilizing footwork as a medium for examining the dispossession of home and space and environmental racism's impact on the community. "I want to look at the dispossession of space and home place (via land sale contracts and the Chicago Housing Authority's Plan for Transformation). I also want to look at the relationship between environmental racism and public housing," Battle told the Chicago Tribune.
The project is expected to kick off in early 2024, supported by a $10,000 honorarium and an equal budget for production from the museum, which itself recently received a substantial grant for its innovative Artist as Instigator program. Tiff Beatty, associate director of the National Public Housing Museum, emphasized the historical and creative significance of footwork, "There’s built-in joy and excitement for being able to highlight this art form that has been at the margins and is starting to become more mainstream," she said, according to the Chicago Tribune.
Battle's passion for footwork is personal, having grown up immersed in the culture. Her explorative work draws from her family's experiences with housing, recalling her grandfather's efforts to secure homes for relatives facing eviction due to racial discrimination in the property market. Her work aims to educate and induce transformative discussions through the intersection of art, culture, history, and policy. "I never lost sight of Chicago Footwork," she said in her interview with Block Club Chicago, having carried the dance form with her from the Rink Fitness Factory to the academic halls of Xavier University.
