Latin Dance Ensemble
Featuring the passion, artistry, and storytelling of Latin dance and music through Mambo, Salsa, Cha Cha, Rumba, Samba, Tango, Paso Doble, Bolero, and modern Urban Latin dance forms. This group seeks to explore the connection of music and movement, honor the history of Latin dance, and share dance in the Spokane community through various skills training, performances.
This ensemble is currently seeking more members! Experience is preferred but not necessary. Contact us to inquire about joining or visit us in person during one of our weekly classes. We hope to dance with you soon!
Performances
Performance Volunteer with Derek Hough
Mindi was asked to perform in a presentation titled “Taking the Lead: Lessons form a Life in Motion” with Derek Hough in the spring on 2023 at Gonzaga University. She assisted the demonstration of how leadership principles are evident in dance and performed a Cha Cha with him during the show.
Community Movement
Connection to nature, advocacy efforts, and protecting where we live or what we love engages our somatic, or bodily felt, experience. Bringing art and ideas about nature into traditional technical or scientific realms can provide a more deeply sensory experience of what matters. Creative expression in and about nature, especially in community, can offer cohesion and adds meaning to our lives and enhances the broader level of environmental literacy. I will be doing a series of community movement projects projects related to art, nature and science beginning with a project called “Voice of the River”. The purpose of the Voice of the River project is to engage at a deeper level around rivers, water, and fish - because movement matters.
I aim to create new metaphors about nature, rivers, salmon, and your relationship with the nature and art. In particular, for land and water stewards, this project is meant to offer pathways for connecting in a more embodied way to the resource you love and protect. For community-members, this project will offer ways to connect more deeply to the parts of nature that moves you here in the Inland Northwest. Projects aim to find ways to create an ongoing dialogue with scientists, tribal leaders, tribal artists/writers/activists to find new ways to integrate art and science. I’ll be developing the next site specific project fall 2021.
If your group is interesting in being involved in a future Art and Nature project, please reach out if you are interested in collaborating! I am looking for collaborators - dancers, writers, poets as well as environmental leaders to help create a series of ecological stories that focus on metaphors related to forest ecology, aquatic ecology, water quality, climate change. Such stories will be prompts for future site specific art projects over the next year. Ensuring tribal voices are heard and providing opportunities for voices to be heard in new ways is a guiding principle of the project. All new projects will invite tribal participation. I will work to find ways that this Art and Nature project can create community bridges.
Past Workshops
RELATED EVENTS:
Project talk on VOR about Ecology and Ritual - artistic director Mindi Sheer (March 19)
Project video part of INDA DanceFest 2021 (April 16) Spokane/Columbia VOR project
Project Interview, Creative Mindset, public radio KYRS, 88.1 & 92.3
Voice of the River Dress Rehearsal June 6th
Voice of the River event June 13th, 11 - 2pm
Local performances (stay tuned!) to happen this summer
Follow us on Facebook and IG!
IG @voicesoftheriver
FB Voiceoftheriver
FB DanceEcology
Global Water Dances 2021 - Voice of the River
Art, Science and Nature - June 13, 2021. 11 - 2pm, peoples park
Thanks to everyone who attended and assisted with this project ! We had a great time and had about 100 people attend this event!
Our small team of dancers, artists, and community-members helped to craft this first Voice of the River event, and helped to set a path forward for public events that integrate art, nature, and the body. The voice of the river project is an embodied approach to integrating art, nature, science to gain a deeper appreciation of place, local rivers, and history.
We had many people that participated in community dialogue and poetry about the Columbia River, the Spokane River, Pacific salmon, and what nature means to them. This helped to shape our event, which had three original choreographies, along with the global movement choir, and poetry readings. We also were blessed to have Rena Priest, Washington State’s first indigenous poet laureate speak at our opening ceremony. The Voice of the River performance project is part of a set of larger international water-related event happening around the world that same weekend. It was the Spokane/ Columbia River event for the Global Water Dances Project 2021.