Instructor Sees Art Beyond Joffrey

What Orange County could use are a few more visionary curmudgeons like Mark Sharon.

Sharon, a dance instructor at the Saddleback Dance Center in Mission Viejo, won’t let local arts mavens rest on their duffs and will spend his own cash to advance his cause.

Sharon, you might remember, created the Laguna Beach Dance Invitational last summer, a weeklong series of daily classes and two concerts, one by well-regarded New York modern dancer-choreographer Sally Hess and one by local students. He managed to corral support for the event from the city of Laguna Beach and the Laguna Beach Arts Commission.

This year, he announced the return of Hess, the addition of a concert by modern dancers Lynn Raridon and Dee McCandless from Austin, Tex., plus daily classes covering everything from “the most minute details of stage performance, choreographic techniques and artistic interpretation . . . to lectures by world-class nutritionists and bodybuilders on such subjects as health and nutrition, proper warm-up techniques and injury maintenance.”

It was lofty. It was ambitious. It was premature.

Sharon says that because he didn’t act in time to get nonprofit status with the IRS, he faces a mountain of costs that he could have handled at the lower, preferential nonprofit rates, but cannot cover now.

So he has had to cancel everything except the two dance concerts: Hess on Sunday and the Texans a week from today.

He is not happy. But at least he was able to salvage the things that meant most to him.

“Basically, my mission is to evolve people beyond the Joffrey (Ballet) or ABT (American Ballet Theatre),” Sharon said in a recent phone interview. “Orange County is sterilized in art appreciation. They think the biggest thing they have going is Joffrey or ABT. . . . I consider myself well-bred in ballet, but I can’t sit through a classical ballet without lying to myself. That’s what I’m doing. It’s limited.

“What I’m trying to bring in . . . are people pouring their souls into their performance. This is original art, as opposed to art applied onto trained dancers.

“People have not seen this level of dance. These people I’m bringing in are wonderful.” The three guest artists have received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and “have been featured on PBS,” Sharon said.

Hess will dance “Small Gate,” a part of her ongoing, autobiographical “Dancetales” series. (She danced another part, “Autobiography No. 72,” at last summer’s invitational).

Raridon and McCandless will dance excerpts from “Auto-da-fe” and “Aquamirablis.”

“They’re also bringing (dance) videos, which I’m going to put on endless loops in the lobby,” Sharon said. “One is done underwater; another is computerized dance. I’ll show both for free in the lobby. But I’ll be asking for $10 at the door. I should be asking for $110!

He laughed at a question about his budget.

“Budget? Zero budget! I’m hoping there will be a gate. But this will probably will cost me over $2,000. This is more a mission”--there’s that word again--”than a money-making thing for me.”

“I don’t know if Orange County is so young, so new, so uninformed, but Orange County tends to attend the Performing Arts Center and the Pageant of the Masters. ‘It’s still the county of K mart shoppers.

“That’s sharp and sarcastic. But I don’t care if people hate me. What have I got to lose? In order to put on this concert and pay for the rental, I have been moving my furniture into storage and will be living in my trailer so I won’t be paying rent for two months!”

Despite all the problems, though, he already is looking ahead to a third invitational next summer. He anticipates getting on the ball earlier to ensure that all-important IRS nonprofit status. But even if that falls through, he is determined.

“I’ll be doing it again next year,” he vowed, “if we have to dance in the park.”

The Second Laguna Beach Dance Invitational will consist of two modern-dance concerts--Sally Hess on Sunday, and Lynn Raridon and Dee McCandless on July 12--at Laguna Beach High School, 650 Park Ave., Laguna Beach. Both programs will begin at 7:30 p.m. Tickets: $10. Information: (714) 494-8505.

HERE COMES KOLPIN: Starting next year, Royal Danish Ballet principal dancer Alexander Kolpin will be a permanent guest artist with the newly formed California Theatre Ballet, company officials have announced. Kolpin was last seen locally in early June when he danced the title role of Eugene Loring’s “Billy the Kid” at UC Irvine.

California Theatre Ballet was formed in March by two UCI dance faculty members, James Penrod, former chairman of the school’s dance department, and Donald Bradburn, the department’s artistic director of concerts. The 16-member company is scheduled to dance at Cal State Los Angeles on July 21 and 22 as part of the school’s Dance Kaleidoscope II programs. Kolpin will not appear with the company during those dates, as he will be dancing with the Royal Danish Ballet at summer festivals in Hamburg, West Germany, and Athens.

But he will be a regular with the company starting with its two projected two-week seasons in 1990-91, according to Bradburn, whose plan is to offer nine performances of four different programs each week. Exact dates will depend upon the completion of the 750-seat, $17.6-million Irvine Theatre, scheduled to open in fall of 1990.

Kolpin will also set works by Danish choreographer August Bournonville on the local company and will enlarge his own repertory by acquiring roles by other choreographers, Bradburn said.