Washington and Lee Presents ‘W&L Dancers Create…’ The W&L Repertory Dance Company’s performances will run Oct. 31 through Nov. 2.

Office of Communications and Public Affairs
October 25, 2024

Washington and Lee University’s award-winning W&L Repertory Dance Company presents “W&L Dancers Create…” on Oct. 31 and Nov. 1 at 7:30 p.m. and on Nov. 2 at 2 p.m. in the Lenfest Center for the Arts’ Keller Theatre.

Tickets are required and are available online or in person at the Lenfest Center box office.

Presented by the Department of Theater, Dance and Film Studies and under the artistic direction of Jenefer Davies, department chair and artistic director of the W&L Repertory Dance Company, “Dancers Create…” will feature works choreographed by guest artists and W&L students and explore a broad range of thematic concepts, designs and movement styles.

“One of the outcomes of the dance performance is to give the students a practice-as-research experience in the arts,” Davies said. “In doing so, we provide them with the tools necessary to express themselves through their art form across disciplines. One of the beautiful results of such a collaboration is the advancement of faculty-led and peer-to-peer teaching, which empowers students to embrace experiential learning and explore their world together.”

“Point to Point,” choreographed and visually produced by W&L dance alumna Ashley Shugart ’22, is an experiment in tying her practice as a visual artist to her work as a choreographer and a step in answering the question, “How can visual art inspire movement?” To accomplish this, Shugart created a stop-motion film that plays for the duration of the piece, serving as a roadmap for the movement, staging and overall feel of the dance. After graduating from W&L, Shugart completed a U.S. Teaching Assistantship in Austria, and during her time abroad, she found dance and art communities to continue her artistic growth. She returns to W&L as a guest choreographer eager to create work that reflects her multifaceted interests.

Misha Lin ’25, a veteran choreographer and aerialist, created “Avulsion,” an aerial dance for lyra inspired by how our bodies’ natural rhythms guide our instincts and impulses, just as the course of water is spontaneous and free. This piece is a cathartic release about the beauty, power and fragility of our natural world. Supporting her academic study in dance, Lin was awarded competitive grants to study at the International Aerial Dance Festival in Boulder, Colorado, in 2023 and the European Aerial Dance Festival in Brighton, England, in 2024.

“Reflections and Refractions” is a work for ten dancers containing a rolling mirror that serves as an eleventh dancer. Choreographed by Elise McPherson ’25, the work questions the toll the expectation of perfectionism takes on young people and muses on a quote by one of the mothers of modern dance, Doris Humphrey: “In maturity, you come to learn that perfection is not immediately attainable, but that there is still happiness, a measure of harmony to be found while working toward the goal.”

Rounding out the program are pieces choreographed by W&L students. Mikaela Schon ’27 created “The Grip of Oizys,” which looks at pressure and its detrimental effects on authenticity, and “Groupthink,” by Sierra Johnson ’25, is a powerful message on women’s empowerment. Tanner Barlow ’27 choreographed “Made Clean,” an exploration of guilt and mercy, and Timi Patterson ’27 joins together a love of math and dance in “Knotted,” which combines the mathematical knot theory concept of danceability of knots with themes of the relationship between rigid mathematical thinking and fluid human intuition, and battling with professionalism and societal pressures.

Order your tickets online today or call the Lenfest Center box office at 540-458-8000 for ticket purchase information. Box office hours are Monday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. The cost is $18 for adults, $16 for seniors, $14 for W&L faculty and staff and $8 for students.

For a full list of this season’s performances, visit the Lenfest Center’s website.

The Lenfest Center for the Arts, home of the Department of Theater, Dance, and Film Studies and the Department of Music and Department of Art and Art History is a multi-use facility designed and equipped to accommodate a broad spectrum of the performing arts, including theater, musical theater, opera and operetta, choral and band music, dance and performance art in one energizing complex.