Emma Davis, a faculty member at the University of Michigan-Flint, believes that dance can serve as an entry point for community organizing and social change. A recent grant her work with Flint’s Vista Center received from Arts Midwest is allowing her and the participants in her program to demonstrate that concept.
“These sorts of practices, of community dance, can create access for different populations to engage in the arts,” Davis said. “But it can also be a change for the people who are participating. They might feel a sense of change within themselves as an individual. They might feel more accomplished about something. They might feel like they’re a part of a group.”
The Vista Center, founded in 1985, is a drop-in center for adults with mental illness, developmental disabilities, or who are homeless. Currently located in the Genesee Valley Center in Flint Township, it provides a safe space for community, skill-building areas such as literacy and arts, enrichment activities like field trips and exercise, and other services. It provides people with social connection and reduces isolation through activities that include art therapy, dance, and life skills training.
Davis began working with the Vista Center in 2015, when she was a faculty member at the Flint School of Performing Arts, and expanded her work with the organization later as an independent artist and after joining UM-Flint’s faculty. Over the years, she’s done regular sessions with Vista Center participants that include different movement exercises and blending of dance and visual arts.
This is the second year the Vista Center received a grant from Arts Midwest to support her work. Arts Midwest is a nonprofit regional arts organization that supports creative projects in nine states and the Native American nations within them. Grants support a wide range of activities that engage people in meaningful arts experiences. The grant Davis received comes specifically from the Grow, Invest, Gather (GIG) Fund, which supports projects with arts and wellness focuses.
“People with disabilities don’t always have jobs, or they might live in a foster home or live alone,” Davis said. “Most of them don’t drive, so they lack a lot of ways to just connect with the general public. So doing an activity like this creates an opportunity to socialize. I see that as a type of social change too. I think that doing these sorts of projects changes people’s perspective of what dance is and who’s able to dance, the importance behind dance.”
Last year’s project with Vista Center was also supported by Arts Midwest’s GIG Fund. That project was called, ‘Inner Harmony.’ The project started by simply having each participant think about what inner harmony means to them, and what that would look like over the course of a year. Based on those verbal responses, they created dance movements or gestures that represented those thoughts, and then eventually began putting them together in a sequence and choreography. They also created a ‘mantra,’ a verbal piece of text that was pre-recorded and then played during the dance performance. One of the Vista Center members plays piano and he created a piano composition for the dance. Greg Zafiroff, a program specialist at Vista Center, leads visual arts classes and worked with members to create watercolor art pieces based on the theme. Then, in May of last year, members were able to perform at an event at UM-Flint called, ‘Flint Dances.’
“That in itself is kind of life changing and transformational to be a person up on stage looking out to the audience,” Davis said. “I think it was really rewarding for them to have that opportunity, but I also heard a lot of really great feedback from the audience members of how it was really cool to see people who are older dancing on stage, or people who are categorized as disabled engaging in dance because a lot of times it is something that people might think you have to be highly athletic to participate in. It’s just really rewarding work to engage in and directly impact the lives of people who participate.”
This year’s project will have a similar structure over the course of six months, but it will center around the theme of “connection” and what that means to Vista Center members. Working with adults in the program is rewarding first and foremost because the participants choose to be there – unlike in youth dance programs when there are often kids who are there because their parents chose it for them.
“Everyone has the autonomy to be a part of the project if they want to,” Davis said. “Everyone’s invested in it, and that in itself is rewarding.”
But beyond working with people who are excited to learn more about dance and expression, she also loves building community. That aspect leads to a lot of important outcomes.
“I would put this under the category of community dance,” Davis said. “And community dance is an approach to creating dance that builds community. There’s a lot of things that can come out of that. It can be healing for the people that are participating. They can feel seen. It can be accessible. It creates opportunities for greater access to the arts.”
There are typically not readily available dance classes that people Davis works with at the Vista Center would be able to go and sign up for, as most of those adult classes are focused on specific approaches like ballet or tap or jazz, and there are also not many classes for people with little or no previous experience.
“This population specifically, they wouldn’t be able to go sign up for a dance class at Flint School of Performing Arts, or even a local dance studio, they don’t necessarily offer classes for people that have different abilities outside of the traditional approaches,” Davis said. “So it’s filling an important gap that exists for populations that are more on the margins or left out (of arts programs).”
The program blends with Davis’ other work, including her PhD research, which centers on community-engaged dance as a tool for connection and social change. She has created and led dance projects with students, seniors, and community members in a wide range of settings, and her research explores community dance as a form of organizing and activism. She also performs professionally and teaches using community-centered, student-driven approaches grounded in lived experience.
Davis is not originally from Flint, but since moving here in 2012 and completing her undergraduate and master’s degrees at UM-Flint, the community has become home. She said that the city’s history, particularly with organized labor and workers’ rights, plays a large role in creating an environment that is welcoming to artists.
“I just feel accepted in this community,” Davis said. “The people who make up the community here are awesome. I’ve had so many opportunities to just keep doing the kind of work that I’m passionate about, using dance as a method to bring people together to address social issues and engage in meaningful conversation, there’s something very unique about Flint in that way. It’s a very interesting place that brings these intersections together using art.”
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