The Dance World’s Impressive Blueprint for Self Help – Dance for Life

By 1991, HIV/AIDS had been plundering the world for a decade.  And even though the first antiviral drug that showed any promise of stanching it had been on the scene for six years; tens of thousands of once vital and vibrant young people were still dying every year.   Dance for Life, the extravaganza of dance Chicago celebrates every year was born out of the frustration of those harrowing years and one person’s will to make a difference.

Keith Elliott, then a member of the Joseph Holmes Chicago Dance Theater (JHCDT), knew well how AIDS was laying waste in the arts community.  Many of his friends and colleagues were being lost to it.  As a dancer, he wondered how he and other dancers could find a way to actively help each other through a horrific crisis.  He settled on something they all knew best, dance.  Partnering with Todd Kiech and Harriett Ross, JHCDT Associate Artistic Director, they brought together dance companies across the city for a gala performance of their shared craft.  On a common stage and on the same evening, each company would showcase the uniqueness of their own dance specialty.  That first pageant of dance was an astounding success and the entirety of the proceeds went to dancers facing dire medical needs. 

Saturday, August 13^th, marked the 31^st year Dance for Life energized Chicago’s cultural core while tending to the needs of the city’s dance community.  For some time now, and in keeping with its overwhelming popularity, the event’s stages have become much more grandiose.   This year, at the magnificent Auditorium Theatre, seven dance companies displayed a panoramic view of how Chicago interprets dance excellence.  Its purpose, to help underpin its own, has only grown and become more expansive.

Chicago Dancers United (CDU), the organization that oversees Dance for Life’s fiscal management, knows a lot about the lives and needs of dancers.  The specter of HIV/AIDS may have receded, but the dance community still faces significant hurdles that can and do impede their ability to practice their craft in peak form.  Many of those obstacles continue to be health related.  

Until 2020, every dollar allocated to help dancers was used to defray costs stemming from critical healthcare needs.  Through the Dancers’ Fund, Chicago Dancers United distributed short term grants with $4000 maximum payouts to dancers and other dance professionals who demonstrated need.   This year, CDU increased the critical healthcare grant to $5000. Even with AIDS in retreat, other health concerns remain in this community that isn’t known for asking for help.  Although it’s not always spoken, fear of serious injury looms over a dancer’s life as much as it does any elite athlete.  And, like everyone, dancers and those whose careers are tied to dance, can fall prey to unexpected and debilitating illness.

Olivia Serrano, an 18-year veteran with the superb Ensemble Espanol Spanish Dance Theater, shared revealing insights into what it is to be a dancer.  “This isn’t a just a hobby, it is our way of life.”   One that provides its practitioners benefits non-dancers can only imagine.  “There is a mental and physical endurance and balance unlike any other art form or physical activity”, she went on to explain.  Having one’s calling jeopardized by health concerns could easily throw a dancer’s life into crisis.    

The number of people practicing dance as a livelihood; and those who are professionally engaged with it through choreography, production, publicity or copyediting, is large.  According to figures in 2016 from the service organization See Chicago Dance, there were 1,729 entities participating in dance in the Chicago’s Cook County and the five counties adjoining it.

As important as the arts are to society, creatives who make up the arts community don’t share equally in fruits a first-tier culture offers.  Adequate affordable health care is one benefit that continues to allude too many in the professional dance community.  That absence helped lead Chicago Dancers United to broaden the scope of its Dancers’ Fund two years ago.  Sandi Cooksey, CDU board member and a former dancer with several prominent dance companies, recalled how she and other board members began having conversations about how the absence of preventive care was affecting dance professionals.  The Dancers’ Fund Critical Health Needs Grants are making a real difference as they help people cope with career interrupters like appendicitis, joint replacement and injury.  The Ensemble Espanol’s Olivia Serrano’s gratitude for the ability to turn to The Dancers’ Fund when she tore her ACL in March induced tears. She’s also confident “other dancers find comfort and support knowing there is an organization dedicated to helping us”. 

Aiming to help the dance community more proactively take care of itself, the Dancers’ Fund umbrella of assistance opened a little wider two years ago.  In 2020, it began offering General Health and Wellness Grants to dancers and other professionals in the field; giving them the means to address preventative care needs and tackle issues before they became major concerns.  “We’re hearing from people who haven’t been to the dentist,” Cooksey disclosed.  The scarcity of reliable safety nets also causes dancers to put off addressing seemingly minor injuries.  Like the CDU’s grants targeting critical care needs, the General Health and Wellness grants are one time and short term.  Their maximum award is $1000.   Greater awareness of the Dancers’ Fund’s expanded reach, and real need in the dance community, are pressing the Funds’ ability to keep up with demand.  With another quarter  remaining in the calendar year, the amount of money the Dancers’ Fund has contributed to the care of its community this year is already 78% more than it was in 2021.  The importance of its impact is indisputable.   Although there are significant individual and corporate contributors to the Dancers’ Fund, the exuberance and spectacle of Dance for Life is still its chief fund raising catalyst.

When Chicago Dance Crash, Deeply Rooted Dance Theater, Ensemble Espanol Spanish Dance Theater, Giordano Dance Chicago, The Joffrey Ballet, NAWJA Dance Corps and Trinity Irish Dance Company unleashed the power and magic of dance on the Auditorium’s stage on the 13^th, they again manifested Keith Elliott’s goal of bringing dancers together in support of one another.  This year’s Dance for Life performance offered yet another opportunity to show how beautifully the pursuit of perfection can be interpreted in the language of dance.  

To contribute to the Dancers’ Fund, visit: https://chicagodancersunited.org/the-dancers-fund