When Liz Winklaar joined Propeller five years ago, the 51-year-old Carleton graduate was studying Canadian Studies in disability policy in Canada and United States. Instead of dry academic learning, she wanted some hands-on experience of the services offered to disabled people in North America.
The poster for Propeller dance class, a community-based class for people with or without disabilities, attracted her attention. After her first class with Ontario’s only charitable dance organization for people with disability and one of Ottawa’s largest dance organizations, she told herself, “Wow, this is what I really needed to get back [in]to my body.”
Winklaar is in a wheelchair, and although it might be easy to assume that it is impossible for her to dance, she believes that a person’s disability cannot stop them from dancing.
“People make that assumption and that’s what [Propeller] hope[s] to change. Come to our performance and see what can be done,” she said.
“We work in school in order to change the perception for children with and without disability, which we find is very important in making everyone realize that everybody has the opportunity to dance.”
Propeller director Shara Weaver said the company is known internationally for having a “really diverse group of disabled dancers.”
“Although there are other integrated dance companies nationally and internationally, many are focused for specific groups such as the dancers who are blind or the dancers with down-syndrome,” she said.
Propeller Dance won the Ottawa Xpress Reader’s Poll for Best Dance Show of 2009 and was a recent finalist for the Ontario Trillium Foundation’s Great Grants award 2012.
From June 1-2, Propeller will perform Attitude at Centerpointe Studio Theatre and will feature performers Bella Bowes, Phil Charbonneau, Robert Chartier, Amelia Griffin, Julia Gutsik, Moni Hoffman, Jessie Huggett, Alan Shain, Winkelaar, and 40 adult performers in Propeller Dance training programs.
Attitude explores ideas of inclusion, openness, and unbridled expression by dancers who are celebrated for their imaginative and creative performances through an installation of metal bars that resemble a playground jungle gym.
“Attitude revolves around the idea of giving your body some attitude, and your body and mind not being limited by what you are thinking in your head. For example, one of the dance pieces has a theme of bringing the attitude to your work place. ” Weaver said.
“Also, Attitude conveys the idea of stereotyping and breaking out of it by using boxes. One of the pieces uses the rock and light as metaphors for the weight we carry, and the camaraderie of the group that pulls us through.”
Every piece is a collaborative creation of the dancers.
“Many dance movements are inspired by the new movement-vocabulary that is almost invented or created in the class, sometimes through just playing. For example, the wheelchair tilting. or a new lift that that involves a new way of sharing weight between an on-balance dancer and an off-balance dancer.”
Propeller o-director Renata Souter said Attitude is “a very abstract contemporary dance piece.”
“Each one of you will find your own interpretation and it may differ from one another,” she said.
On the same evening, there will be a silent auction in support of Propeller Dance’s ongoing programs which bring dance to children, youth, and adults with and without disability.
It gives numerous performances and workshops annually across the city, while training and rehearsing about twice a week at different studios.
“We hope, some day, to be practicing 5 times a week. Right now we are limited because of the funding. So if we can get more operational funding, our dream is to have a dance studio where we rehearse every day, ” Weaver said.
Although it lacks funding, the class overflows with a huge number of dancers.
Co-directed by Weaver and Soutter, Propeller conducts recreational classes and professional classes for around 85 students with and without disability.
Propeller’s main philosophy lies in the idea that “all people can move,” Weaver said.
“Teaching methodology is inclusive. We look at a group of people and choose dance concepts in order to give people equal opportunity in choosing what movement they perform,” she said.
For those with little mobility they create a movement of breathing.
“We first focus on natural movement because that way everyone is on equal ground, despite one’s disability. Then we proceed on techniques such as the balance, memorization, coordination, choreography,” Weaver said.
“How do you dance with someone that uses a wheelchair? That’s a whole skill; a whole new negotiation of space, or taking weight or timing if you are dancing with someone who has more involuntary movements.
Weaver said that dancing with some that uses a wheelchair requires a lot of sensing, intuitive work and a lot of deep listening. It’s about using all your senses and your whole body.
“Biggest challenge is the dance organization. People’s frequency of notion on what is considered beautiful in the main mass and the fashion industry or on many dance shows on television, where there is the body image that is so prevalent,” she said.
“I think we’re always gonna be up against that image of what is beautiful. I think people don’t even want to think about themselves as the possibility that we can be disabled tomorrow.”
