Creative Collaborations: How to dance hack with a diverse group of people
In this workshop I will draw from my years of experience teaching a course called Collaborative Innovation at UC Berkeley that focuses on gaining more insight into the creative process within group settings. We will cover concepts such as: (1) Gaining meta-awareness about the creative process and how everyone in a collaborative group approaches this process differently. (2) Practicing entering a collaborative community so that everyone feels a sense of belonging and trust, including how to find a group of people to hack with. (3) Aligning the goals of fellow hackers in your group so that an optimal outcome is achieved - whether that be a decision to experiment with a broad array of ideas, develop a prototype or performance, or simply share knowledge, etc. We will use hands-on making activities to explore these concepts and handouts with the frameworks and concepts will be shared to bring with you for the entire dance hack experience.
Sheldon Smith has been a full-time adjunct at Mills College since 2008. Originally from Omaha, Nebraska, he discovered a love of experimentalism and electronic music while becoming the first-ever dance major at Colorado College. He went on to receive an MFA in dance at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where he wrote a thesis, prior to the internet era, speculating on an emerging form of dance that might radically innovate through swiftly evolving technologies. Prior to arriving in the Bay Area, he made highly regarded dance/theater works in Chicago while supporting himself as a stage rigging supervisor.
