Hi everyone, I hope you're having a great Thanksgiving break!! I am SO excited to finally share this collection of photos from backstage at my school's winter dance show. Last week I had the amazing opportunity to take some backstage photos for my school's dance show, and it was such a fun and unique experience. (And yes, my school has its own dance company, I'm awed every day too!) I tried to take them in a similar style to a few photographers I love, and mix their styles a bit.
My inspiration behind this project was a collection of photos I saw that the russian photographer Sasha Gusov did from behind the scenes of the Bolshoi Ballet. They were gorgeous photos, but I was specifically interested in the feelings behind the photos. Dance is such a beautiful action to watch, and from an audience it can seem effortless, elegant, and just plain beautiful. I wanted to experience the feelings that went on behind the curtain, in the dark (literally) where nobody was watching, and capture that. Those feelings of nervousness, excitement, and pride.
Luckily, I go to school in the home of the Grier Dance Company, so I had the perfect opportunity to capture those feelings. It is always so awe-inspiring to go to a school that has girls with such incredible talents, like horseback riding and pre-professional dancers, and it was even more fun to see my peers and friends switch from the classroom to the stage so quickly. Welcome to a boarding school for the arts!!
The experience from being backstage that moved me the most was the collection of moments right before the music started while the curtain was parting. The seconds felt like hours, and I'm sure they would have felt even longer if you were about to dance. It was pitch dark, you couldn't see anything except the curtain moving. Everyone was laser focused on what was about to happen. Nobody was moving, there was no point - you couldn't even see the person in front of you. Everyone's breath was quieted, as though each girl had a microphone on them that picked up every sound they made. There was such unity in that moment, everyone had one goal: to make the audience feel something through the beauty of their movements. Then, suddenly, the music started and everyone went from frozen in time to moving, twisting, and running around.
All of the dancers did uh-mae-zing, and it was so cool to be in their space and experience what backstage of a dance performance feels like. THANK YOU to all of the dancers and dance instructors for this opportunity!!
Enjoy this collection of photos, a cumulation of insane Grier talent, hours of editing, and a lot of inspiration.
💚💃👯♀️