Hollins Dancer: Hannah Miller

This was a busy week for dancers at Hollins University so Hannah Miller, a senior dance major, only had a few minutes between classes and rehearsal for the Hollins Dance Gathering to talk to me about why she dances, the ever-evolving idea of performance art and why Hollins is the best place in the country to learn about both. 
A:What is your astrological sign?
H:I’m a Gemini rising, so I have a lot of Gemini in me and I get along really well with Geminis.
A:And what are you majoring in here at Hollins?
H:I am majoring in Dance, minoring in Art and I’m graduating with an Arts Management certificate and certificate in Leadership.
A:What made you want to pursue dance not just as passion but as a career?
H:I grew up dancing. I’ve been dancing since I was about three years old and throughout my life I have really enjoyed finding ways to express myself through multi-mediums and movement seems to be something that comes really naturally to me and there is something deeply gratifying about finding a way to explore the world through movement and not just analytically or through books and reading…there is a lot more you can find and discover and even research through the body.
A:What is it about the dance program at Hollins that facilitates this idea discovery through movement?
H:Basically it’s a one of a kind program that is very unique in the fact that it does not offer any classes with restrictive titles so instead of just labeling something “ballet” or “tap” or “jazz,” we can explore all those mediums without holding ourselves static through the specificity of those terms. Also, we don’t have what you would call choreography classes. You basically come to Hollins to make work and through the process of four years you build choreography skills through a class called Performance Workshop.[pagebreak] It meets for four hours on Fridays and we all gather to show work and critique, review and discuss each other’s work in a very nurturing and collaborative format.
A:Tell me a little bit about the Fall Dance Gatherings that are finishing up this weekend.
H:This weekend we’ve had three shows, all at eight o’clock. We also have a salon showing in the dance studio at 9:30 which is an informal presentation of works in progress. This year our graduate students are new so they are investigating the ideas that they’ve been discovering over the summer and some undergraduate students will be showing their work as well. We also have two faculty resident artists who are both showing solos. It’s kind of this great magical space and The Hollins Repertory Dance Company actually runs all of it so there are Hollins students running the box office. We print the posters, we advertise, we are backstage running the lights and sound and it’s really an all-hands on deck experience which brings us together as a community and gives us the opportunity to learn more than just how to be on the stage.
A:Are you preforming in the Fall Dance Gatherings?
H:I’m showing my thesis tonight at the salon and I’m performing in the salon as well so you should stop by and check it out!
A:Lastly, it sounds like your favorite thing about the Hollins Dance program is how it is collaborative and creative and focuses on the essence as well as the technique of dance. Is there anything else that you particularly love about Hollins?H:I feel like it’s a very collaborative community in general and through things like Midnight Showings and different art events that we have here, we bring together visual artists and theater artists and music artists together in one space and that is something I am really interested in because I feel that these mediums should be explored together. I also feel like Hollins is a great place for me to get ideas about mixed media art because everyone is already so collaborative and I think that’s where art is going and it’s really important that art classes that don’t have restricting structural labels like “painting” and “music” and “dance” because it’s all art and artists can really learn and grow from interacting across mediums.