Editorial: Taking Our Stories to New Stages

It’s been documented that the bboying in the 1980s gained wider media exposure after moving into the underground art scene in Manhattan. It’s possible that if this crucial transition didn’t happen, then hip hop culture could have evaporated. But when members of the Rocksteady Crew performed at NY art galleries, their dance passion entered a new arena by becoming a point of fascination and a commercial product for others to latch on. Are we experiencing a similar situation with the LXD performing at the TED conference in Long Beach? Or is this a viable solution - that we bring our stories to new stages for other audiences to discover?

There will always be young people who want to dance. They find their self-expression and their refuge in the art form and the community. But the culture may only stay within certain borders if no one takes up the challenge of carrying it into new territory. That’s where the push for new stages comes into play. Let’s focus on the advantages. Bringing our stories to new audiences introduces new voices into our company. Our dance becomes analyzed, commented on, and discussed between minds of different perspectives. We can feed off of this energy and come to see our dance from a different angle.

What underlies this movement is an openness to be flexible. Our dance culture is organic. Yes, there are roots and history that we should preserve. But we also have to allow for room so that our imprint can be made on its long lifeline. Bringing our stories to stages outside of our usual borders highlights the value of entertaining different critical perspectives. And this ability to do so will often spark ingenuity. Our stories need to move into new venues so that they can also be interpreted in new forms that we might not have considered before. What works for the LXD is the union of many different kinds of street dancers along with extraordinary physical athletes. A poppin’ crew or a bboy crew on their own might not consider that approach when their primary focus is to battle in competitions.

So what are the new stages in the future? Are they in front of non-traditional, non-dance-focused audiences? Or do we explore dance pieces in multiple media formats from film to online video to holographic projections? The answer could be all of the above. But no matter what form they take, we can’t stop dreaming. We’re at a crucial fork in the road almost thirty years after the original street dancers were created. Our choice to either preserve without innovation or to remember and to break new ground will will affect how the next thirty years of our dance culture unfolds.