Dance Theatre of Harlem Artistic Director Virginia Johnson speaks to young dance students from La’Nita Rocknettes School of Dance, Kentucky Center’s ArtsReach, Our Voice Dance Collective and Louisville Ballet School. Photo by Faith Lindsey.
By Faith Lindsey
duPont Manual High School, Class of 2021
After a watching a glorious night of ballet performed by the Dance Theatre of
Harlem (DTH) on Friday, Nov. 9 at The Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts, 23
middle and high school girls woke up early the next morning to take part in a
masterclass led by Virginia Johnson, the company’s artistic director.
In a large room at Louisville Ballet’s Main Street studios that morning was a sea of
black leotards and tight ballerina buns — many worn by students from La’Nita
Rocknettes School of Dance, Kentucky Center’s ArtsReach, Our Voice Dance
Collective and Louisville Ballet School.
Among them was Brown School eighth-grader Malaysia Green, a student of La’Nita
Rocknettes School of Dance, who wore a red-white-and-blue windbreaker and
dyed-bright green crown of coils atop her head. She stood with her shoulders back
and head held high. She commanded attention.
Students from La’Nita Rocknettes School of Dance in a masterclass taught by Dance Theatre of Harlem Artistic Director Virginia Johnson. Photo by Faith Lindsey.
At the end of the class, Johnson took questions. She was a member of the company
from its founding by Author Mitchell and Karel Shook in 1969 after Martin Luther
King Jr. was murdered. She danced with the company until 1997 before returning in
in 2009 as its artistic director.
When Malaysia was given the chance to question Johnson, her question belied the
conviction she seemed to emanate.
“What advice would you give to a ballet student who’s really doubting herself?” she
asked Johnson.
Johnson told the young girl that it was all a game of the mind.
Before Johnson’s 28-year reign as a dancer in the company, she was, as she
described herself, an uncoordinated mess. But, she added her love for the art
transcended those challenges and led to her performing for Presidents Jimmy Carter
and Ronald Reagan, being one of the first ballerinas to perform in the Union of
Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), and having a lead role in the “Creole Giselle,”
which was a groundbreaking piece of work staged from the European “Giselle” in
1984.
Even though Johnson was a founding member, she explained how she once felt she
didn’t belong.
Malaysia, a plus-size black dancer, said later in an interview that she feels like she
continuously is trying to prove her worth.
Institutions such as DTH were created for people like her. The company and its
school in Harlem were made to be accepting of black students in a world that wasn’t
so accepting of them, because their bodies, skin and hair didn’t exactly fit the white
mold.
La’Nita Rocknettes School of Dance’s Artistic Director Harlina Trumbo recalled
hearing dancers at her school in the past “being told that your physique is not
conducive to standing on your toes.” For some black ballerinas over the past
century, their existence seemed to be against many things the traditional art form
stood for.
Meanwhile, over the past 50 years, studios in cities throughout the country — such as
La’Nita Rocknettes School of Dance — helped cultivate professional ballet dancers
including Gregory Jackson, who grew up in the Park Hill neighborhood and danced
with DTH. In recent decades, Louisville has seen other programs including Kentucky
Center’s ArtsReach and Genesis Dance welcome young people of color.
At the national level, DTH has given dancers who have spoken about comments they
received about their bodies a launching pad to the world stage, such as Michaela
DePrince. She joined the company at t 17. A year later, the Dutch National Ballet
hired her. All of this from a young lady born in the war-torn country of Sierra Leone
with vitiligo, a skin disease that causes patches of color loss, and who became an
orphan as a toddler.
Exposing children of color to dance and the arts is not only able to alter the
trajectory of their life, but allows them to define their own worth in the skin their in.
DTH co-founder Mitchell used to make a parallel with singers by asking, said
Johnson, “Can you hit the high C?”
If you can, the message is don’t let anything stop you for reaching for what is already
yours.