A submission from the creator of ArtsBridge

I would like to share an experience that perfectly illustrates creativity, connection and collaboration between the arts in a small local community. The ArtsBridge transmedia experience was set up to allow similar artistic connections to be made, built upon, nurtured and shared in an online arts community. Here is the story:

Matthew Pierce is a violinist/composer who moved to Northport, NY (the town in which I live) approximately five years ago. His interest in the arts crosses many platforms, and upon his arrival in our community he sought to immerse himself in his local arts community and to find avenues to collaborate with other artists. Inspired by a passion for the music of dance, he had previously composed ballet scores for many renowned American ballet companies. Also inspired by fairy tales and storytelling, he was motivated to write a ballet score based on Hans Christian Anderson’s very sad story of “The Little Match Girl”, and brought his music and his dream for a collaborative project to our town. He contacted the Northport Arts Coalition with his idea, and was referred to my ballet teacher, Elsa Posey, R.D.E., of Posey School, a presence in the local arts community for 59 years. Working with Matthew’s violin concerto, the fairy tale, and with my daughter Jean dancing the part of the match girl, Elsa choreographed the first two scenes of a ballet in progress. Matthew’s wife Christine, a costume designer, contributed her creativity to the piece. Melissa, a local piano player accompanied on piano. Rehearsals were conducted with artistic ideas and input from each artist involved, keeping their future audience in mind as they worked, for their intent was to give back the gift of their art to the community in which they live. This work was showcased at Posey School and open to the public with donations going to Dance Education Services of Long Island, a non-profit organization serving dancers and the general public.

Click the photo below for

Video Clip of Match Girl Project

This is an example of art crossing many platforms, growing somewhat organically from each artists’ intense desire to create. Let’s look at the mix of artists who converged in this collaborative project, observe how each was inspired by the others’ art and added his/her piece to it, resulting in a community experience that was far richer than each piece alone.

First we have a writer with a story … who inspires a composer to write the music for a ballet he envisions… then a choreographer, inspired by the music to create a dance, envisions a dancer dancing the ballet … a costume designer inspired by the choreography and the music envisions her garment’s flow with the movement of the dancer and the mood of the piece … then the dancer, inspired by the choreography, the story, the music and the costume brings the ballet to life with her technical skill and artistic expression.

When the mix of artistic input is complementary, the resulting piece is a gift to be offered to the community, the audience loves the performance, the proceeds go toward further artistic pursuits and opportunities, and the entire community is expanded and enriched.

Julie Mason

Please add your own collaborative arts experiences or artistic vision below:

A submission from Renee Kurz ...

On Tuesday evening, in a little village in the South of France, Jean Miotte witnessed himself painting…  through my dancing. I was deeply touched to stand beside this great artist and simple man who, after 84 years, can stand in silence before his life… a life of surrender and offering.   And again, in a deep and humbling attitude before our art, I knelt beside him after my dance, both of us smiling at how in union our hearts are… how each of my movements and gestures brought to life his painting.   Through my strokes and spirals and arabesques I danced the beat of his gentle heart.  I am still in awe over the beauty of this encounter… over the gesture of friendship to offer this night to Miotte, witnessing his deep blue eyes say ‘thank you’.  Every one present brought him a breath of meaning to his life.  And as his painting is inspired by dance, this was the sweetest gift… bringing him, once again, to the verge of harrowing heights that propels his painting.
It was a true experience of surrendering to the gift… of entering and exiting the painting…  and the heart of  Jean Miotte.  A heart that knows trial and suffering and heartache… and out of a gesture to keep living, to go beyond the suffering and give meaning to his life… he paints.  The same is true for my young heart, except I dance.  Miotte’s paintings capture the movement from within every soul and every reality… they bring permanence and contemplation to the transience of dance… to the mystery that I touched a few nights ago and that still resonates in the hearts of all present.
Miotte’s ateiler,  a huge white warehouse tucked in the countryside of Provence, is a space full  of energy demanding movement.  His grandiose canvases grace the walls with life and remnants of the creation dot the floor in a multitude of colors.   When I entered for the first time I stood still before each one, absorbing their energy and  imagining the movement of his body as he painted.  How he must have jumped and ran and swooped and stretched.  The second time I entered and improvised in silence… getting to know the paintings more… memorizing their lines and shapes and hues.  The third time I entered was to perform. It is always a mystery to me what transpires when I dance… leaving me in awe of the encounter with that which is completely beyond me.  The offering of my dance provokes those witnessing to do the same… to offer their lives in a much deeper way to the other.  That is where I touch the continuity of my artistic life and my mission with Heart’s Home… there is no separation, only a deeper and deeper coalescence of my being.
For the final dance I was blessed to be accompanied by a choir of voices singing an old, stirring Slavic hymn. A sweet and tender ode to the voice within guided by the full moon of grace and embodied by heart rendering experiences. Many classify Jean Miotte’s paintings as abstract, a term which suggests a sort of departure from reality.  In fact, I believe they draw us deeper into reality… into our personal inner reality full of emotions and dreams.   That is exactly why I must keep dancing… it draws me into the reality of ‘now’ to the degree of intensity with which I perceive it.  The reality and depth at which I am living in India brings me to that precipice with firm ground beneath my feet.  I enter the performance space in the same manner in which I enter the humble homes of our friends… with bare feet and a listening heart.
Dancing before Jean Miotte’s art gave me an energy to ‘keep going’!  To keep dancing!  To keep stepping into the realm beyond ideas and speculation.   To keep entering that silence within…  to gently rise and  swiftly run, exiting the silence with an explosion of color.  Only afterwards stopping to marvel and wonder at the creation… the moment is simply a gesture from within.   At the end of the night Jean asked me to dance… I promised we’d dance together again soon…
either in Pignans… or in New York!  Thank you Jean Miotte for encouraging me to keep risking my life to live.

A quote from Jean Miotte, French Abstract Artist ...

For me dance, choreographic expression, appears as the most acute gesture, instant and intangible, once given and then forever captured by the eye; movement, shifting lines, fixing them in our imagination and in time - abstract art par excellence. What a fantastic thing is the communication between the arts - between painting, music and choreography.  - Jean Miotte