Dancing With the UCLA Dance Faculty
In Part 1 of this article, Choreographer/Dancer/Educator Sharon Took-Zozaya recalls her studies with several members of the UCLA Dance Department Faculty from 1972 to 1975 as an undergraduate student, and during her graduate studies in Kinesiology between 1977-1978. In Part…
A History of Mexican Folklorico in Southern California
Choreographer, artistic director, and dance advocate Gema Sandoval writes about Folklorico in the growth of this art form from its origins and how it evolved into the present day as a central expression of Mexican American culture. One of the…
Dance Kaleidoscope: A Personal History
It was an article in the LA Times about the state of dance in1988 and a comment from post modern choreographer Rudy Perez that first made me focus on the importance of the then defunct Dance Kaleidoscope Festival. Mr. Perez…
A Brief History of My Adventures in Dance Based in Los Angeles
Dance artist/educator Linda Gold writes about creating the Dance Department at Santa Monica College, dancing and performing in Los Angeles, her international work, her long association with Dr. Alma Hawkins, and her research on the work of Jack Cole. Ms….
My Experience as a Los Angeles Dancer 1970-1985 (Part 1)
In this first article, Iris Pell, writes of her dance studies at California Institute of the Arts with Bella Lewitzky, founder of the School of Dance, where she also studied with Donald McKayle, and Mia Slavenska. Iris was in the…
For My Daughter, Sarita
1 Three flights above the hardware store on Main Street a brown wooden door opens off a musty hallway into the studio. There, my ten year old legs carry me to my first true home. Splotches of light from three…
Working With Bella Lewitzky, 1967-1975
From 2004-2007, Fred Strickler spoke with dance historian Lizbeth Langston and videographer Robert Backstrand in a series of four video interviews about his life in dance. This article on Bella Lewitzky is largely based on the January 2004 interview. The…
Before There Was a UCLA Dance Department
In 1952 Carol Scothorn came to UCLA from Mills College to teach dance and begin a nascent dance program from what was then a Physical Education elective in dance. Carol, along with Pia Gilbert, began to develop a dance program…
Amidst Flocks of Angels
A personal history in arabesque time (Part I) IN THE BEGINNING . . . The storefront ballet studio was in East Los Angeles, Lincoln Heights to be exact, across from Height’s Cooperative Nursery School where my mother brought me every…
Gloria Newman: Early (Beginning) Years in Southern California (Mainly L.A.)
Gloria Newman arrived in Los Angeles from New York City in 1954, and soon began teaching at Eugene Loring’s American School of Dance located in a hotel basement on Hollywood Blvd across from Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood. There she…
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