[ME]thod
Movement Director: Kristen Jeppsen Groves
Dancers: Amanda Byars, Dante Brown, Casey Bogosium, Alyssa Lerose, Daniel Holt, and Giovanna Andolina
Music: Rachel’s, Evelyn Glennie, Albert Mathias, CSAN
Text written by: Kristen Jeppsen Groves; text spoken by: Jacob Smith
[ME]thod defines the complicated relationships of policy players and highlights the power dynamics involved in policy language, history, and current challenges within policy. In short, [ME]thod is the politics of policy making.
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Two to One
Choreographer & Dancer: Kristen Jeppsen Groves
Sound score edited by: Jacob and Kristen Groves
Performed at Artist, Interrupted: Home Front in 2011
Two to One was a duet/solo that included interview from me and my husband about our first year of marriage. I felt inspired by Radio Lab to try my hand at story-telling through sound and dance. I blended laughter, still moments, stories, and tears as we talked about our perceptions of our careers in terms of creation and destruction and shared ways we’ve stayed connected after a year of long-distance. The piece was meant to be performed as a duet, but, due to circumstances of separation, we had to make it a solo.
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Solve
Director: Kristen Jeppsen
Choreographers & Dancers: Kristen Jeppsen & Giovanna Andolina
Music: Geekspeak by Pamela Z
Premiere 2010 at Ohio State’s Sullivant Theatre
Solve was presented at Ohio State’s Spring Dance Concert 2010 at Sullivant Theatre. The work is part of a larger project for my MFA project concerning the negotiations that occur in the group processes of dance and policy making. The basic vocabulary for the piece started with basic body issues or problems that me and Gio both deal with as dancers. Mine included an SI joint issue and a hyper flexible lower back, Gio’s were an unusual neck flexibility and scapula and shoulder joint issues. We discussed briefly how we adjust or compensate these issues and generated material around those ideas.
During the construction of the piece we highlighted moments during rehearsal that were difficult for one or other. We kept the interesting mistakes, we kept the alternate solutions, and also tried to accentuate the moments when it was apparent the body was trying to solve a physical problem. Throughout the piece Gio and I continue to talk and cue one another; we purposely avoided over-rehearsing so as to keep the material free and full of risk. So far the process has generated very interesting movement vocabulary and choreographically my ability to see movement possibilities is widening.
It was interesting to allow our two bodies to solve problems differently but construct the piece as a unison duet. It is the way in which to consider body policy, to consider performing bodies versus working bodies…more to come.
Read a review from PhD candidate and colleague, Michael Morris, at his blog:http://morrismichaelj.wordpress.com/2010/05/29/2010-spring-concert-extravaganza/
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Duet for 3
Choreography: Kristen Jeppsen
Dancers: Nicole Gross, Lauren Smith, Cecilia Peterson
Music: Rachels
Premiere 2009
Here is my final work of Duet for 3. It was presented at OSU’s spring dance concert in ‘09 and has come a long way since the rehearsal process. One of the best results of the piece was the elimination of the long gestural phrases, they offered great fodder for the rest of the work and I found this process tedious, but necessary, to generate richer movement vocabulary as well as better defined relationships among the three characters. Comments are welcome!
Here is a listing of a few of my choreographic works from my undergraduate work at BYU. Each piece is very different from one another and are the beginnings of my understandings of myself as a choreographer and artist.
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The People’s Evolution
Choreographer: Kristen Jeppsen
Music: “The Bourne Identity” by John Powell
Dancers: Ashley Bradshaw, Keely Shaffer-Glenn, Philip Hartog, Colin Holbrook, Cami Richards, and Katelyn Sheffield
Performed at ADCFA at the University of Utah and premiered at Brigham Young University’s Senior Project Showcase, Dec. 8-9, 2007
This work was created after months of researching human right injustices from the last two decades. After reading Voltaire’s work I felt inspired to find a way to use dance in a similar manner. To inspire people through movement to think about current issues in the world and to make them feel the urgency of many situations. My research included Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch where I found documents, reports, images, and video to understand the complexities of human rights in various parts of the world.
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Awakenings
Choreography: Kristen Jeppsen
Dancers: Members of BYU’s Kinnect Dance Group
Premiered 2008 at BYU’s Kinnect Performance and local elementary schools in Utah, Nevada, and New York.
This piece was inspired by Brian Kershisnk “Nativity” painting. At an art gallery at BYU, I turned the corner and let out an audible gasp when I saw the painting. I was amazed by the motion presented in a still frame. The curve and swoop of the mass of bodies over the holy family gave me such a sense of wonder and awe. I immediately knew I wanted to create a piece about the work. I used the curve and swoop of the angles to create much of my movement, all of the pathways on the floor are spiraled and round as well.
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Unexpectations
Choreographer: Kristen Jeppsen
Dancers: Members of BYU’s DancEnsemble
Music: “From Out of Nowhere” by Apocalyptica
Premiere 2007
This piece is an exploration of the emotional effects of unmet expectations. How they are created and exaggerated, and the emotional process of dealing with disappointment, hurt, frustration, or despair when expectations are not met. These expectations can relate to any area in life. This piece was to try to create that sense of expectation for the audience. I used levels, specifically rise and fall, to solidify the ebb of emotions that result from unmet expectations. The lighting, music timing, and movement has many breaks, unexpected starts and stops, rises and falls. It leaves the audience not knowing exactly when the piece is over or not: it is very unexpected.
HIStory
For DancEnsemble at BYU we each interviewed a relative and retold their histories through dance. I interviewed my grandmother for the HIStory project.
