The Dandelion Seeds is a grass-roots, community-based organization dedicated to supporting the diverse projects and core values of Dandelion Dancetheater, including:

 

  • Inclusion: Our company is made up of artists with and without disabilities and of diverse sizes, shapes, genders, sexual orientation, races, ages, religions, artistic disciplines, and world views. We see all that we do as a laboratory for accessibility and inclusion training. All of us are stretched beyond what is familiar and comfortable to embrace difference throughout the process.

 

  • Long-term Relationships: Dandelion artists are deeply invested in the company and a majority of them have been active members for ten or more years. This has allowed our life experiences to powerfully influence the organic creation process.

 

  • Bringing All of Who We Are to the Work at Hand: Dandelion artists incorporate their knowledge and skills from diverse artistic backgrounds, family configurations, cultural lineages, and working professions into decision making, creation, rehearsals, and performances.

 

  • Intersections of Ideas: We seek artistic expression that merges movement, story, music, speaking, visual art, rigorous training, community ritual, and social activism. We view all of these as vital aspects of a “unified art form.”

 

  • Quality at Every Stage: We work from the view that everything we do together is part of the artistic process, and that each rehearsal is in itself a performance, and every performance is also a practice. We rehearse all year long, whether or not a production is approaching, and our relationships as collaborators and community members are the foundation of the art.

 

  • Always Learning: Our ongoing work is infused with continuous cross-training. We teach each other artistic skills, explore new approaches to creative research, practice inclusive communication, and reach out to our extended communities for additional input. We train all year long and are always seeking to expand our skill sets.

 

  • Bandelion: We value collaborative ensemble processes of communication and creativity. Bandelion (Directed by Eric Kupers) is our most active experimental ensemble. Bandelion trains and creates together all year and blurs boundaries between dance company, music band, spiritual community, collective, and found-family.

 

  • Revisioning the Nature of Performance: We actively challenge and question what a performance space/venue/atmosphere looks like, as well as how the audience and performers interact. We experiment with combining performance with Community Acupuncture, massage, spiritual practice, street theater activism, training, inter-denominational and secular rituals, rites of passage, and accessible education.

 

  • Community Supported Art: Having the support of the community allows us the freedom to create whatever excites us, and to respond to the current cultural moment with honesty and spontaneity, without having to adhere or conform to the often restrictive requirements of government or foundation grants. Grass-roots support gives us the space to follow the creative process as it evolves organically, transforms, and takes surprising leaps of faith.