DESMA 9 Post 1

 In Victoria Vesna's essay, "Toward Third Culture", she mentions that, "in fact both artist and scientist are involved in the work of intuiting change in perception and materializing it for others to experience, see, and ultimately change." After reading this, I couldn't help but begin to draw parallels between her statement and ballet's relationship with science.
This week's topic particularly resonates with me as I am both a professional ballet dancer with Los Angeles Ballet and a Communications student here at UCLA. My life and the path I have taken in my education and professional career seems similar to the bridge metaphor Vesna was using, and how working towards a third culture requires an active dialogue between humanists and scientists. I have found that there are actually many similarities between the professional ballet world and my experience with academia.

http://calfoto.zenfolio.com/p616996092/eafac0f0 photo of myself performing the part of Spanish in Los Angeles Ballet's production of Swan Lake! :)

First of all, as artists the goal is to communicate with the audience through movement, and to make it look absolutely effortless. In my marketing class at UCLA, we have been learning how to communicate and brand a product seamlessly by knowing your audience demographic to be able to connect with them on an emotional level.
As Vesna mentions in her essay, the "two cultures" essay made famous by Snow refers to the divide between the sciences and the literary humanities and frequently what was originally analogized to science - art. As a metaphorical "bridge" between the two cultures present in my life, I have found there are also many similarities between art and the science/mathematics culture that can be found in ballet. For example, the work the corps de ballet does involves many aesthetically pleasing geometrical shape shifting patterns, that can be viewed from the balcony. The patterns the corps de ballet performs are not possible unless they follow these strict mathematical rules.

                 members of the corps de ballet execute a geometrical pattern in the 4th act of Swan Lake. http://calfoto.zenfolio.com/p702655420/h301d3179#h31bf4017

Physical movements in ballet are also reflections of mathematical equations. Below is a photo taken of me that the photographer realized fits perfectly into the Golden Spiral! Lots of artistic possibilities here.

Technology has also come to the forefront in ballet in the form of these awesome new pointe shoes that can electronically trace dancer's movements!

            http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/17/lesia-trubat_n_6148618.html 

sources:

Snow, C. P. “Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution.” Reading. 1959. New York: Cambridge UP, 1961. Print.
Vesna, Victoria. “Toward a Third Culture: Being in Between.” Leonardo 34.2 (2001): 121-25. Web.

 Brooks, Katherine. "High-Tech Ballet Shoes Hypnotically Trace The Physical Movement Of Dancers' Feet." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com. Web. 04 Apr. 2016. 

 "These High-tech Ballet Shoes Visualize a Dancer's Movements as Works of Art." Tech Times RSS. 2014. Web. 04 Apr. 2016. 

 Hutchinson, Reed. http://calfoto.zenfolio.com/p702655420/h301d3179#h31bf4017