Student Projects | Dance
Students projects in the dance program are an important and enriching component of the Pacific University experience.
Students conceptualize, research, develop, and produce integrated dance projects that go beyond the walls of the stage space. They choose to use their projects as a way to communicate, express, educate, and to create awareness that pairs dance with a wide array of topics that include science, technology, social issues, and much more.
Pacific University Senior double major in Dance and Media Arts, Grace Hankins, discusses her process of choreographing and creating a dance film.
Senior Olivia Oetker (Class of '23) double major in Dance and Anthropology talks about creating her capstone project, Dance as Community building and Meaning Making.
Senior Dance Major and Creative Writing Minor Olivia Parent ('23) talks about their creative process in making "Untangling."
Photography by Blaine Truitt Convert
Technology and dance are paired in Annalise Nilson's '18 choreographic capstone as she investigates the theory of time by conceptualizing designing and constructing a digitally animated hour glass that shatters and interacts with the the dancers on stage.
Jessica Bauder's '18 choreographic capstone Blue Haze investigates the concern for mental health support while hoping to create greater awareness about it in our community.
Brenna Calmer '18 blends dance and science into her Capstone by creating a moving landscape that explores how the brain stores memories.
Jesus Contreras’s '18 choreographic work Extranjero was created in response to the immigration discourse specifically in the United States. Contreras said "This work explores themes such as media portrayal and the virtualization of immigrants, the realities behind immigrants’ experiences in the United States, and the creation of the anthropological binary opposition in the discourse that has led to immigrant objectification."
Kylee Putnam '18 expresses how her choreographic capstone Shadows Within "was created to bring awareness on the concept of personal struggle and to share how each person experiences and processes it differently. While I utilized my own story in the partial development of the work, I also asked my dancers to share their experiences, which were also included into the creative process and outcome of the work"