Black Choreographers Meeting in San Diego

Black Choreographers Moving Toward the 21st Century began in 1989 as a festival featuring eight dance companies, when it was founded by Halifu Osumare of Expansion Arts Services in Oakland.

Osumare stated then that to have a cultural democracy means accepting all the aesthetic principles and philosophies, “all the hybrid forms,” that make up America. To encourage that acceptance, she brought together black choreographers and contemporary dance companies from around the country for performances and panel discussions. For this first festival, the program was performed in San Francisco and Los Angeles, and a second festival was produced in those cities in 1991.

The festival has since evolved into a national dance project. The number of companies and events has been scaled down, the educational focus is stronger, and this year’s presentation of symposiums, workshops in local schools, master classes, and performances is a pilot project for a national touring model.

This week, the third Black Choreographers Moving will have its San Diego debut, with a weeklong series of workshops and performances at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and at 2 p.m. Saturday at the Lyceum Stage in Horton Plaza. The festival is being presented through a combination of private and public grants by Sushi Performance and Visual Art.

In the past Sushi has presented African American choreographers Bebe Miller and Donald Byrd, both previous BCM participants, as well as Ron Brown, Blondell Cummings, and Ishmael Houston-Jones.

Following the San Diego presentation, the project moves to Los Angeles (April 19-26) and San Francisco (April 27-May 3).

The program includes:

* The 11-member Dallas Black Dance Theatre has been performing modern and contemporary dance since 1976. For BCM they will dance Milton Myers’ “Pacing,” a four-part modern-dance work with primitive African art and music influences; Myers is a former member of Alvin Ailey’s American Dance Theatre. He has choreographed ballets for numerous dance companies and for Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, where he co-directs workshops.

“Obsession,” an eight-minute dance by Kevin Jeff, will also be performed by the Dallas company. Jeff has performed in film and Broadway musical theater and is founder of the 10-year-old Jubilation! Dance Company, based in Brooklyn.

* David Rousseve/Reality will perform a 30-minute segment of “Colored Children Flyin’ By” . Rousseve, choreographer, actor, writer, and director, performed this dance-theater work with his 5-member company in the 1991 BCM program.

* Los Angeles-based Spotted Leopard Company, headed by John Pickett, will perform “Things Fall Apart,” minimalist movement and narrative, adapted from Chinua Achebe’s novel by the same name. The work recounts the effects of colonization on tribal Nigeria in a “dreamlike diffusion of image, incident, and emotion,” according to dance critic Lewis Segal.

* Maia Claire Garrison, a member of the New Orleans company Urban Bush Women, will dance her untitled solo “( ).” Based on the manipulation of West African dance forms and performed to live conga drumming, Garrison fuses African and American sensibilities with a “white-hot kinetic combustion,” one reviewer commented.

Events and performances for the festival are as follows:

Symposium (7 p.m. Tuesday): “Black Choreographers in the Community.” Panel discussion on dance programs that serve community needs. With choreographers Rousseve, Garrison, and Pickett, and Bernard Thomas, artistic director of San Diego-based Teye Sa Thiosanne. Moderated by Sylvia M’Lafi Thompson, director of 21st Century Harlem. At Sushi Performance and Visual Art, 852 Eighth Ave. Free.

* Performance (8 p.m. Thursday9): Dallas Black Dance Theatre in “Pacing” by Milton Myers and “Obsession” by Kevin Jeff; David Rousseve/Reality in “Colored Girls Flyin’ By”; John Pickett and the Spotted Leopard Dance Company in “Things Fall Apart”; and Maia Claire Garrison in “( ).” Lyceum Theatre at Horton Plaza.

* Performance (8 p.m. Friday): At the Lyceum Stage. Repeats Thursday’s program, followed by a symposium at 10 p.m. titled “The Choreographer’s Statement and Cultural Identity,” a post-performance talk on what defines black dance and other issues pertaining to the black aesthetic, with Rousseve, Pickett, Garrison, and Dallas Black Dance Theatre artistic director Ann Williams. Moderated by Union-Tribune dance critic Anne Marie Welsh.

* Performance (2 and 8 p.m. Saturday): Lyceum Stage. Repeats Thursday program.