ArtQuest Dance 

 
The Dance Program focuses on the development of technical and conceptual skills in the 
expressive language of Dance, encouraging students to communicate through movement. 
Students explore artistic perception and the creative process by solving problems in 
choreography and performance.  
 
Guest artists expand the students' awareness of diverse cultural and historical perspectives 
of dance as well as different dance styles. A blend of contemporary and more traditional 
strategies are used to make dances, sometimes integrating components of text or 
responding to the environment for a site specific piece, for example. Individual focus, as 
well as group camaraderie, is required and students perform in a wide variety of settings. 
By pursuing meaning in the Arts through the practice, discipline and rigor of dance; 
students find considerable personal satisfaction, as well as multiple ways to apply creative 
problem-solving, critical thinking and positive focus to many areas of their lives and work. 
 
The AQ Theme for 2020-21 has been Question • Disrupt • Create • Change 
a call to action for artist activists. 
 
As a cohesive programmatic theme this year, we have worked with concepts resulting from 
current socio-cultural events, protests, actions, activities and concerns bubbling up 
throughout the American Culture. Question • Disrupt • Create • Change is both a call to 
action for all artists and encapsulates the artistic process in which we all engage when 
making art. AQ shares a theme each year to connect the various arts and core-related 
classes and to create an overarching artistic dialogue throughout the program of issues, 
cultural conditions, situations and ideas, some relevant to a particular time or context, 
some focused on a specific performing or visual art work about the human condition, and 
some a serious investigation of political or social issues. Interpreted in a wide array by 
teachers and students, through projects, events, and other activities the outcomes 
generated have been delightfully surprising. Past AQ themes have been: From the 
Inside/Out…, Objects In The Mirror Are Closer than They Appear, And Still We Rise…, Its not 
about the Destination, its about the Journey (2015-16), The Other (94-95), The Coexistence 
of Order & Chaos (95-96), No Theme ? (aka It’s a Mystery!) (96-97), What is Real? Is it Real? 
(97-98) etc…