photo credit Dances for A Variable Population

Dancers dressed in vibrant red move across The High Line, an elevated historic rail line turned public park in Manhattan’s West Side, enticing passersby to stop and look at the beautiful performance. Half of the dancers seem to be young, fit, and professionally trained. The other half move more slowly, some dancing in place, and some sitting. In fact, they are all older adults.

Dance artist Naomi Goldberg Haas founded and directs Dances For A Variable Population (DVP), a dance company whose goal is to erase the borders between dancers and audience through its unique choreography and dance company, comprising adults 24 to 82 years of age.  Haas enjoys site-specific dance performances, which place the audience and dancers of all ages in the same space. She says, “[In these] new conceptions of shared space, we celebrate how dance can be a vehicle for wellness and expression for seniors, persons with disabilities, youth, and regular folk; how dance can change from an ‘under-exposed’ art form in a community to become an active tool for community participation, enthusiasm, and social interaction.”

Haas founded DVP in 2005, to offer seniors the opportunity to dance, not only as recreation, but as a form of exercise and wellness. Soon it became evident to Haas that older adult dancers offered a new opportunity to explore choreography. By incorporating moves that accommodate the older dancers’ physical limitations, Haas translates her pieces into new and expressive dance forms. Haas states about older adult dancers: “Years lived give us opportunity to be more of ourselves.”

DVP’s Autumn Crossing on the High Line was The High Line’s first public, open-air dance performance, and demonstrated community support for the refurbished public park. From 1934 to 1980, The High Line, New York City’s 1.5 mile-long, elevated freight rail line, was used to ship goods to warehouses and factories and ran through the middle of some buildings. In its period of disuse in the 1980s and 1990s, the City considered demolishing the rail line, but in 1999 neighborhood residents joined together to save it. In the spirit of the community’s transformative role, the dancers were asked to perform in the newly finished public space. Seniors from the local neighborhood, along with professional dancers, participated in a performance that figuratively and literally brought the community closer.

Founder Haas is a dance artist who has worked in concert, dance, theater, opera, and film. Through her directorship, DVP has won critical acclaim for performances at New York City theaters, the Y, public schools, outdoor festivals, and public parks, and has produced site-specific performances at a Staten Island Ferry Terminal and in New York City’s Times Square. The Los Angeles Times says of Haas that, “[She] has an ability to translate ideas, themes, emotions and text into kinetic terms. She gives it discipline and precision, but her work is suffused with emotional life [i].” DVP showcases young and old modern dancers performing successfully with one another. Haas says that adjusting to the physical limitations and capacities of the older dancers has expanded her own choreography skills.

In addition to concert work, the company has developed distinctive classes and workshop programs for community collaborations designed for a range of populations. In the fall 2008, DVP initiated Dances for Seniors, which brought classes to eight downtown senior centers that engaged its participants as both audience members and performers. The classes are led by Haas and company members of DVP, and focus on the way dance is built from personal stories, and to encourage seniors to enjoy dance as a means for expression, wellness, and celebration. 

Admission to the classes is offered free of charge through the support of the Manhattan Community Arts Funds, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and the Harlem Arts Alliance. In its first year of the program, over 350 older adults participated in Dances for Seniors, and in some of the senior centers the classes were translated into Spanish and Chinese. In 2009, the program expanded to include uptown Manhattan and Harlem, and currently provides over 650 older adults with programming.

Additionally, DVP offers low-cost classes to seniors through its Movement Speaks program in downtown Manhattan dance studios, uptown Y locations, and through a long-term commitment at a citizen's care center in Harlem. Classes culminate in public collaborative dance performances in which senior participants are joined with company dancers. Dances For A Variable Population breaks seniors out of their shell, and encourages them to realize their innate ability to connect through motion and physicality, despite their physical challenges or disabilities.

DVP teaching artist Ani Javian says, “During these dance and dance/fitness workshops with DVP's Movement Speaks program, the truest, simplest, and finest elements of dance shine through. These older dancers produce movement that scorns pretention and celebrates life. They carry in their bodies a lifetime of experiences, yet they learn certain concepts for the first time. I leave these sessions confident that dance has bettered the world.” Dances For A Variable Population has proven that its unique approach to dance emphasizes a new cohesion between young and old in society, and is joyful for both the audience and performers.