Design & Chance is a name Deborah Goffe has given to a process she has employed on several occasions since first encountering an event of a similar nature devised by dancer/educator Rebecca Mehan in Hartford, CT some years ago. In the case of Design and Chance, the process begins with invitations for some number people to gather on a designated day. Participants come together prepared with materials they are willing to contribute to the process for the occasion from their own creative processes, others come with no tangible materials but with a willingness to respond to the moment. Over the next several hours, they play, talk, plan, improvise, compose, and score until they have a structure, and a set of options they can share with an audience that evening. The audience, too, is then invited to witness some of those options, and to help make final design decisions in the moment. After a short intermission, the work made together that day is performed. Events like this one have been important spaces for building connection among students, programs, and the wider community. The program offers a counterbalance to students’ high stakes expectations for their own work. It helps to be reminded that there’s potential magic when planning and serendipity meet.
This iteration of Design & Chance was the second offered at Hampshire during its Family & Friends Weekend. Participants included a mix of current students, current Hampshire dance faculty, faculty from other Hampshire programs, retired dance faculty, and recent alumni.
Both the performance of this most recent Design & Chance, as well as the audiences’ decision-making and post-performance discussion, can be viewed below.
all photos on this page by Ben Barnhart
DESIGN IN CHANCE II
Directed by Deborah Goffe
with student and guest performers/co-creators: Daphne Lowell (Dance Faculty Emeritus), Becky Nordstrom (Dance Faculty Emeritus), Dasha Chapman (Dance Faculty), Lailye Weidman (Dance Faculty), kara lynch (Film, Photo, Video Faculty), Rachel Brimmer (alum), Leila Kaplan (alum), Rikkia Pereira (alum), Naomi Cope, Justin Craig, Eleanor Crawford, Quinn Davis, Nora Hammen, Parker Kellner, Daisy Maass, Arabella Magruder, Jillian Oliveira, and Joshua Swift
ENGAGING THE AUDIENCE AS COLLABORATORS
