20230403
Age: 26
Hometown: Mississauga, On
Primary Medium: Contemporary Dance
Secondary Medium: Writing / Journaling
When did you start dancing/choreographing and why did you keep up with it?
I started when I was really young around the age of three.
I took a little bit of a break from it and later started dancing more seriously at the age of ten.
I started choreographing when I was in university.
So a little bit further down the road.
The university that I attended (Toronto Metropolitan University) provided us with opportunities to choreograph and I just wanted to kind of jump on that, being given dancers in a space and kind of just an opportunity to give it a go and then I fell in love with it.
When did you start your secondary medium?
I started seriously journaling in 2020 when the pandemic first kind of started, mostly because it was a confusing time for all of us, I think. And it gave me a chance to write out my thoughts and kind of calm myself down and focus on the things I needed to focus on in order to get through it.
And I’ve stuck with it ever since because it really helped me ease my mind and to just get everything out of my mind and on the page
Does your secondary medium affect your primary?
100% I feel like it does.
I definitely feel very different towards my performance aspect now that I do journal more frequently.
And I also sometimes like to, when I’m creating, I like to pull from my entries and use them as inspiration or as material to create work that is more authentic to me and who I am in that moment.
I think that pulling from my entries allows for that deeper connection to happen between writing and movement.
Aside from that, how else do you consume art?
What is your relationship with art in general?
I like to consume art in multiple capacities.
Something that I really love to do when I’m visiting areas and just traveling, I love to check out art museums.
I love looking at paintings and photography and diving into that.
My relationship with art in general is that I think that everyone is typically an artist in their own way.
I think that there’s no right or wrong way to do art.
Whatever feels good to you, whatever allows you to be true to yourself and feel vulnerable is art in its own way.
So I don’t really like to put expectations on anything. I think that everyone kind of has their own story to tell.
What do you do when you feel creatively stuck?
When I feel creatively stuck, something that I love is being outside and being in nature and disconnecting from social media and just social aspects in general.
I think that that’s very important to just sit with yourself for a little bit.
So when I’m feeling creatively stuck, I’ll go for a long walk.
I’ll spend some time outside.
Just take that all in, just breathe a little bit, meditate in that.
And usually it gives me a sense of calmness, and it kind of releases my anxieties and/or my overthinking.
And then I can kind of regroup after that, and things seem to flow a little bit easier