Lizzie Leopold is a Chicago-based artist/scholar and the Executive Director of the Dance Studies Association (DSA), an 900+ member international organization of dance scholars, artists, and pedagogues. In addition to national and international conference gatherings, DSA publishes Dance Research Journal, Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies, and Studies in Dance book series. As an independent researcher, Leopold is currently co-editing a two volume anthology entitled Dancing on the Third Coast: Chicago Dance Histories. Under contract with the University of Illinois Press, Leopold and co-editor Susan Manning are organizing 48 essays spanning from the Chicago World's Fair to the present moment, across genres and geographies. She received an interdisciplinary PhD in Theater and Drama from Northwestern University. Her research focuses on the political economy of choreographic production and circulation, asking questions about the intersection of cultural and financial value. Her essays have been published in Perspectives on American Dance (University Press of Florida), Oxford Handbook to Shakespeare and Dance (Oxford University Press), and forthcoming Futures of Dance Studies (University of Wisconsin Press, Studies in Dance History series). Leopold is also a choreographer and the director of the Leopold Group, a 2018 Links Hall Co-Mission Resident Artist.
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Courses
TAPS 10800 Contemporary Dance Practices
This studio-based course with a seminar component offers an overview of the formal practices and contemporary trends that shape dance as an art form. The class is designed for students who seek to gain a working knowledge of dance and deepen their physical skills. A range of contemporary dance forms and practices will be covered. Topics may include modern dance, hip hop, partnering techniques, social dance forms, improvisation, somatic practices, dance composition, and more. Lectures, viewings, and discussion will support experiential practice components. No previous experience with dance or performance is required. This course meets the general education requirement in the arts.
TAPS 10800 Contemporary Dance Practices
This studio-based course with a seminar component offers an overview of the formal practices and contemporary trends that shape dance as an art form. The class is designed for students who seek to gain a working knowledge of dance and deepen their physical skills. A range of contemporary dance forms and practices will be covered. Topics may include modern dance, hip hop, partnering techniques, social dance forms, improvisation, somatic practices, dance composition, and more. Lectures, viewings, and discussion will support experiential practice components. No previous experience with dance or performance is required. This course meets the general education requirement in the arts.
TAPS 26265 Dance, Labor, and Economics
What is a dance worth? This course offers a critical look at practical skills and structures, with an aim to understand how embodied art is valued (both culturally and financially). How have art markets and cultural ideologies collided within the performing body itself? Case studies come from taxes levied against strip clubs, museum acquisitions of conceptual and choreographic art, artistic estate planning, performance licensing and copyright, and twentieth century mail-order dance instruction. Students take on both historical case studies and tackle contemporary questions of nonprofit management, performer compensation, and market valuation. Students will engage these questions through readings, viewings, and discussion, as well as practical exercises.