The lights come on. Six women, all clad in purple dresses, with identical brown hair sit around a table. The sound of typing takes over as the dancers begin to move in an almost frantic pantomime.
“GIRL POOL (an adaptation)” is a dance choreographed by University of Oregon graduate student Rachel Winchester.
This June, six students from the University of Oregon will travel to Washington, D.C. to perform the choreography.
The piece has been selected to perform at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts as part of the American College Dance Festival.
Winchester’s piece, was selected as one of two to represent the Northwest Conference at the ACDF this year. California State University and Fullerton will also perform.
Winchester’s choreography is based on the Kurt Vonnegut short story “GIRL POOL.” It’s about women working as typists in the late fifties and early sixties.
UO students Jessica Hage, Cecilia Potter, Faith Morrison, Dakota Bouher, Sasha Rawlinson and Nadya Matiya will perform the piece at the festival on June 7.
“I’ve seen this dance performed by three different casts, but this cast, they just burst off the stage,” Winchester said. “They were at their max potential … They’re a big reason we were selected.”
The cast performing in D.C. is the third cast to perform Winchester’s piece. “GIRL POOL” was originally choreographed by Winchester as a practice piece for her thesis project.
“GIRL POOL” premiered at Spring Loft, a dance event put on by the UO Dance Program last June. Winchester then auditioned it for the UO Department of Dance to go to the Northwest Regional Conference of the ACDF this April 2-5 in Missoula, Montana, where it was then selected to go on to D.C.
The festival is a large program that gives dancers and choreographers recognition.
“It has been wonderful,” Winchester said.
The choreography used a “unique process of creating.” Winchester gave the dancers in the piece specific choreography and then gave them room to play with their characters and movement, letting them choose their own choreography the would show off the dancer’s personal characterization.
Winchester provided the dancers with about eight “improvisation cues” which is where the dancers inserted their own character decisions.
According to Winchester, they could not have gone to the conference without the help of Dance Oregon, a program which fundraises in order to send dancers to the conference. They also provide the dancers in UO’s program with opportunities like National College Dance Week, bringing in outside dance professionals to teach students.