How has your understanding of the arts/music/dance evolved as you have continued to grow within them, especially while attending Philadelphia School of the Arts?
I can’t think of a path that I would have rather went down. I think that my view on dance was heavily influenced by the way we were taught which was a very academic way. There was no hiding or cop outs in our classes whether they revolved around dance or not. You always had to defend your viewpoint on the arts. It gave me a lot of tools to use and defend myself against criticism, not that criticism is something you have to always defend yourself against, but it taught us how to express what we are thinking and why we are thinking it. To be able to talk about it intelligently is huge, especially because dance isn’t always taken seriously. U-Arts really taught me how to think about how I’m presenting myself. We all thought about the arts the same way, but differently in our different disciplines, whether it was actors, dancers or musicians.
Has it always been a dream or goal of yours to attend a school of the arts and further your career within it?
I always knew that I wanted to go to college. I didn’t make the decision to go to a school for the arts until I was a junior in high school. From then on my sights have been set on it.
What role do you see art/music/dance playing in your life? Or is it something that may fade at some point in time?
As of right now I want to dance for as long as possible. I would love to remain around the arts and curate or run my own shows or a gallery. I also love teaching. I am teaching dance and making my own projects with other choreographers. I feel like I'm teaching people how to see and feel through the avenue of dancing and I also love working with kids.
Finally, across the three types of arts, visual, dance and music, what parallels can you draw between the three of them or what single common denominator do they all share?
I think, it's all about the way any kind of piece of art makes you use your senses in a different way than others. It forces you to pay attention to the juxtaposition of how everything is composed. It's
all about how you get drawn in or forced to pay attention to something that you wouldn’t pay attention to otherwise, had it not been focused on or presented in a certain way. For example, in dance it revolves heavily around your sense of sight and hearing, which are both used to draw you in to the details that they want you to focus on. It sounds hippy-ish, but it’s like the general opening of your senses.