How An Akron Organization Is Using Data And Research To Help Dancers

Plie and pie charts? At the National Center for Choreography in Akron, dance and research go hand-in-hand. Since it began in 2015, the organization has been a space for dancers to collaborate, think and find resources — but with the idea of using data and research to help build effective creative processes and strengthen the local dance community. “We’re helping dance knowledge get generated,” says executive and artistic director Christy Bolingbroke.

“So it’s not just what the finished product looks like, but everything that was learned along the way.” That means creating a space for artists to ask questions about how they like to work, how they wish they could work and then finding solutions to let them work that way. Last summer, the organization was awarded a $750,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to address administrative problems in the dance industry and put artists first.

With those funds, NCCAkron plans to start a three-year artist think tank with about 20 artist teams with individuals participating from across the country. Bolingbroke hopes to build processes and best practices for creating business plans and fundraising tools, as well as figuring out ways to address concerns about job security, creative exploration and how to embody anti-racist and equality work.

“If there’s a thought partner from Seattle that gets to chime in and tune into these conversations, their lived experience is reciprocal,” says Bolingbroke. “It’s not just what they bring to the relationship, but also what they learn and glean from it, too.”