IMAGINE Magazine SprIng 2017 • Vol. 3, no. 1 ImagineMagazine-Spring 2017 | Page 16

PEACE I N M O TI O N Dancing in step with the times T By Winifred muench he dance arts are central to all civilizations. They provide a means for personal and political expression, for conveying ideas and emotions, and for preserving cultural knowledge from generation to generation. Across the centuries and the continents, dancers and choreographers have expressed their aesthetic and emotional passions through performance. Bitter Sweet Farewell, choreographed by Donald McKayle in 2016 and danced by the UCI Etude Ensemble explores the loss of life long friends through death and hauntingly moves the observer through the grief to a type of peace and acceptance while creating the opportunity for each audience member to walk away with their own experience of what that acceptance might be for themselves. Photo courtesy of John Gerbetz. 16 IMAGINE l Spring 2017