Angel Prince is not your typical vision of an angelic being with halo and wings. Recently returned to Waimea from performances in New York City and Burning Man, she curls up in a sage pose in the seat beside me. Ms. Prince is at Kahilu Theater to guide aerial dancer Elizabeth McDonald, who floats, curves and spins in triangles, backbends and upside-down tree poses in a double ring trapeze on the main stage.
They’re preparing for Saturday night’s fundraising dance party, which won’t be typical either. “The Carnival of Exotic Mayhem,” a benefit to support art and science outreach in the schools as well as ground-breaking new choreography, has stirred Ms. Prince to muse on good causes, good workouts, and the purpose of dance.
Audience involvement
Audience, performers, and patrons infrequently break the “fourth wall,” the imaginary line between the make-believe world onstage and the “real” world of the audience.
“But this is taking it further,” says Ms. Prince, “by inviting the audience to be a part of show. Yes, there are professional performers, but the audience is just as important.”
If dancing on the main stage is not your cup of tea, it just might become your favorite elixir when you hear the heart-melting rhythms of DJ Danny Waddell’s world percussion mixes. Or you can roam into the Mike Luce Studio and take in the sideshow: intimate cabaret performances, henna painting, a photo booth.
Metaphysically oriented? Sit with a Tarot card or palm reader. Drink at the bar and stand in the glow of an acrobatic fire dancer. With bizarre tango by Angel and Guillermo Cerneaz, a visiting tanguero from Buenos Aires, Argentina, group contemporary dances, and crazy costumes, carnival gear, masks and hats that everyone is invited to wear, this will be a night of revelry to remember.
“I really like to involve all ages, especially in something like this, where we can have kids, their parents and friends, and people can be entertained and then be the entertainment.
“I think that’s the future of performance art,” she said.
Stellar Motions
The celebration will be heavenly in other ways, too. The new piece examines “Black Matter,” an unidentifiable substance that exists in space, yet remains invisible to light.
“I like to use nature and environmental awareness as inspiration,” says Angel, who is collaborating with Canada–France–Hawaii Telescope scientist Jean-Charles Cuillandre on the piece. Cutting-edge, expansive, and expensive, the 2017 project will focus on “space, the stars, and new scientific advances in the study of the universe. It will be our attempt to bring a little of that unknown into a known or at least embodied place.”
Ms. Prince moved to Hawaii in 2003, wanting to deepen her connection to nature and form a dance institute and nonprofit dance company, all of which she has achieved, while concurrently pursuing an M.A. in dance from the National Institute of Art in Buenos Aires.
Daily Matters
A morning practice of Pilates and yoga keeps her going, she says, “with whatever else my body is asking for that day. As a lifelong mover. I just begin by moving and then follow whatever cues my body gives me. I try to end with a bit of meditation to center and ground me for the day.”
If she does that at least five days a week, she’s happier, calmer and more prepared to handle the ups and downs of life.
Passing the torch
Ms. Prince, who has created more than 10 original shows since she settled here, was honored in 2012 with a prestigious Tanne Foundation award for her body of work. She is a popular teacher for the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, touring the state teaching and performing with her company.
That company includes the aerialist Ms. McDonald, who started 13 years ago as a 15-year-old student in Waimea; now, at 28, she works as a professional dancer and teacher, a testament to the strength of Ms. Prince’s work.
The purpose of dance
“Everyone can dance, everyone should dance, and to integrate different styles is to demonstrate that,” says the choreographer, who has mastered Tango, trapeze, modern, jazz, ballet and her favorite, contemporary dance.
“We are all living in this physical form and there is no right or wrong way to move it. So to show how we are all the same, come from the same place and ultimately go back to the same place is very important to me. To show connections, universal truths, relationships, all these things are vital to the work I do. So I use a blend of music, styles and ideas to demonstrate that.”
New Little Angel
At Saturday’s event, you’ll also get to congratulate Ms. Prince for another heavenly gift. Two and a half months from now, at 38, she’s expecting her first baby. “My dances are all my babies,” she says. “And now they’ll have to share me with this baby.
“I can hardly wait to show her how to dance!”
Marya Mann, PhD, is anauthor, wellness consultant and yoga teacher. She can be reached at marya.mann@gmail.com
