I dig Flash Mobs. Watching them never fails to elicit a big grin. Truth be told… I sometimes get a little teary eyed, but who wouldn’t watching Christmas Food Court Hallelujah? Of course, I have yet to see a zombie flash complete with fake blood or a mob of naked folks streaking the streets, so my enthusiasm for flash mobs might be selective.
Regardless, groups breaking into dance and song in public and seemingly out of nowhere is pretty cool, and now Davis has it’s very own Dance Flash Mob.
The Pamela Trokanski Dance Workshop has received an arts contract for Taking It to The Streets, a public art program offering free dance classes and the chance to create art in public places.
Taking It to The Streets is funded jointly through an Arts Contract from the City of Davis’ Arts Contract Program and the Pamela Trokanski Dance Workshop, we’re offering two free classes a week for the Davis Community! Come to a single class, or come to every class, move with others in the studio, move with others in public places. It’s all about building community, making connections, creating art in public places, and mostly… Having a great time with movement! (1)
The free classes will be running for the entire year and are held on Thursdays from 5:30-6:30pm and Saturdays from 12:30-1:30pm. The classes are open to everyone age 7 on up through senior citizens. Trokanski plans to offer a special class for children under 7 sometime in the near future. If you won’t be attending the classes, you can still get on an email list to be notified whenever they will be putting on a flash mob.
No previous dance experience is necessary for these classes!
I think this gets to the heart of why I love flash mobs. Dancing, singing, creativity and art are available to us all and I love seeing people reclaim that together in community. Watching a performance of technically trained dancers is wonderful, but dance is so much bigger than that small sphere of amazing, but elite, folks. The Pamela Trokanski Dance Workshop knows this, and their classes are geared toward bringing dance back into all of our lives. Trokanski writes that dance (and I assume she applies this to all of the arts) is a “form of expression, communication, and creative endeavor that belongs to all people of all ages.” (2).
The dance workshop’s website says: “Taking It To the Streets is about coming together as a community, and creating something special together. . . . Bring your family, bring a friend! If you have additional questions, please call Pamela at 756-3949 or email her at ptdtdw@aol.com, otherwise…Come and Dance!”
Pamela Trokanski Dance Workshop
2720 Del Rio Place, Davis, CA 95618
(530) 756-3949
ptdtdw@aol.com
(1) (http://www.trokanski.com/special_events_taking_it_to_the_streets.html
(2) http://www.trokanski.com/index.html
