Reflections of Havergal: 1994-2019

SCHOOL LIFE

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ARTS

the school. For these reasons, the 2014 Torch article asserts that [w]e are proud of Havergal’s ongoing commitment to providing an exceptional arts program that supports our many talented students. Some of our students go on to attend prestigious visual and performing arts programs across North America and beyond, while others will pursue professions in science, math, business and technology, to name a few. For these graduates, the creative thinking that their involvement in the arts has fostered will inform their professional and personal lives and ensure their continuing love of the arts—both as artists and as those who appreciate them.

Dance

Dance Video

The annual dance show that never fails to dazzle its audiences was an outgrowth of the fashion show popular in the 1980s. In its earliest incarnation, the dance show was not a club per se: choreographers worked independently to develop routines that reflected their interests in, for example, Indian or Caribbean music. The choreographers auditioned their own dancers, and eventually the various groups coalesced into an always exuberant production emceed by the school captain. In those early years, the dance show took place in what is now called Brenda Robson Hall, making use of an extended stage like that used for the fashion shows. With the opening of the new wing in 1999, however, the dance show moved into the Legacy Theatre. Since then, students and their advisers have made innovative use of the many spaces in the school with productions that have challenged conventional conceptions of dance. Dance Moves , a production in March and

Dance show poster “Cyrk,” 2009.

December 2007, was inspired by Dusk Dances , site- specific performances created by Sylvie Bouchard. Fall 2008 saw the creation of the Havergal Dance Troupe, predicated on the ideal of a community of dancers with a wide range of skills. More intentional in nature than earlier incarnations, membership in the troupe provided students with an education in dance under the tutelage of visiting choreographers such as Kathleen Rea, whose workshop focused on contact dance improvisation. Decisions about performance

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