TEACHING
I teach and develop work in response to spatial, geographic, and cultural environments, to boldly encourage artists and media to push and examine issues through the lens of local vs. global paradigms, interpretations, and emotions. With my students, I aim to develop the individual artist in their own right, and to prepare them broadly and specifically for a career with diverse potential in our challenging but exciting and relevant profession. I am interested in the body’s response to climate, geography and politics, and in the development of art and artists that move people, emotionally, physiologically and neurologically.
CONTEMPORARY DANCE TECHNIQUE
I strongly believe and seek that students feel safe to explore and take chances creatively and they should be able to trust the process and be allowed to be fearless, vulnerable, and encouraged to uncover and develop strong creative voices.
In my technique classes, I have a continuous, rigorous research into form, and I have aspired to integrate into the vocabulary I work with a physical, emotional, and of course intellectual awareness of contemporary social and political issues. The body in all its complexity, limitations, power, and vulnerability is at the forefront of the movement that I teach. I strive to encourage students to expand their physical reach and push physical boundaries through rapid level changes while maintaining clarity in the spatial directionality of the body. My Contemporary technique classes incorporate elements from release technique, action/reaction, fall/recovery, contemporary ballet and more.
IMPROVISATION/CHOREOGRAPHY
In my choreography classes, I consistently focus on movement generation through the use and implementation of improvisation, somatic practices, sound, and dance imagery concepts with an emphasis on the extremes of tempo, expression, and motivations. Movement invention and exploring different kinesthetic modes of engagement is at the core of what I teach and how I work creatively. I am consistently working on getting students to articulate and present fully developed movement vocabulary and, through movement, to generate powerful kinesthetic responses. I am continuously addressing embodied articulation in both technique as well as through improvisation and compositional classes.
In my more advanced compositional classes, I address spatial design through the exploration of site-specific work fueling the creation of innovative and paradigm-shifting choreography. As an example of this line of thought, I have created and offered together with Architect Nathan Webster and our company NOW-ID, a site-specific, interdisciplinary workshop and process titled Space as Collaborator to students and professionals in dance and other creative fields.These classes are exploratory and examine how space serves as an additional collaborator in the choreography process.
Images from NOW-ID’s workshop Space As Collaborator (Salt Lake City, UT), Nashville Ballet (Nashville, TN), Simon Fraser University (Vancouver, BC), Ballet West Academy (Salt Lake City, UT), The University of Richmond (Virginia), Texas Tech University, (Texas), Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company (Salt Lake City, UT), Cornish College of the Arts (Seattle, WA).
Charlotte has taught at Universities and Conservatories internationally for many years. She was the Associate Director of the School of Theatre and Dance at Texas Tech University for four years where she created a new BFA degree in dance with a focus on interdisciplinary performance and choreography. She also directed the Dance Department at Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, as an Artist-in-Residence and Visiting Associate Professor helping to refocus the Dance Curriculum, create partnerships with the Tech community in Seattle and move the Department from the historic Kerry Hall to the main campus.
REVIEWS
Dance Magazine writes:
"Charlotte Boye-Christensen has a choreographic Knack that transcends medium...Rhythmic finesse, whimsy and a gift for conciseness make Christensen's images delightfully unique...wherever they are seen."
Politiken in Denmark writes:
"...Powerfully expressive"
The Salt Lake Tribune writes:
“…the gestural vocabulary she has developed in combination with her explosive movement style tells a unique story within each piece."
University response
"Working with Charlotte Boye-Christensen during her creation of Feast was innovation at its best. Feast exemplified the meaning of contemporary performance. The process was organic, intelligent and exhilarating. Charlotte approaches choreography with a specific voice she has developed during her career. Invention, originality and current are the descriptions of her process that immediately come to mind. Collaboration was easy, patient and visionary. We all grew from this remarkable 'dinner date' and look forward to a repeat effort in our near future."
– Nicholas Johnson, Former Director of Dance (Wichita State University)
"Charlotte has a wonderful way of making movement look startling unexpected and original yet totally organic. She is rigorous in her expectations as well as being encouraging and positive with those she is teaching. As a result, the students are pushed in a way that enlarges their movement range and capabilities while allowing them to dance fully and freely."
– Kay Cummings - Former Chair of Dance at Tisch School of the Arts, New York University.
"Charlotte Boye-Christensen is a master teacher/choreographer/performer. She truly has emerged as a dynamic, unique, soulful artist. She brings to a workshop setting years of discovery. I knew she would inspire, challenge and create an environment for creative synergy. Watching her work with our students was a gift. The students knew they had to rise to the occasion, and with Charlotte's professional way, they did just that. I think they were surprised at how much they grew in only a weeks time. The outcome was magical. It empowered the students with a sense of accomplishment and a desire to improve. If you get a chance to work with Charlotte you will be highly rewarded."
- Kay Andersen, Former Chair of Dance - Southern Utah University.
Charlotte in rehearsal
"Our residency with Charlotte was excellent in every way! Charlotte’s choreography and approach to the work helped the students to grow artistically, emotionally, and intellectually as well. Charlotte expects a great deal from her dancers including specificity in movement and intention. The result is that we all have had an exceptional experience that we will not soon forget! The University of Richmond’s Department of Theatre and Dance presented Charlotte’s original work, “Unsettled” at the Mid-Atlantic conference of the American College Dance Association at West Virginia University and the work was selected to appear in the conference-closing gala concert. Charlotte’s residency provided a unique and very valuable component to our student’s education. We look forward to working with Charlotte again!"
- Anne N Van Gelder, Director of Dance (The University of Richmond, Virginia)
"I have known Charlotte for nearly 15 years. First as invited faculty to the Universidad de las Américas Pueba where I had the pleasure of working with her in residencies from 2002 to 2006 and for the last ten years as an invited choreographer to the profesional company of contemporary dance (“Compañía de Danza Contemporánea” -- CODACO) in the University Cultural Complex (CCU) of the Benemérita Universidad Autónoma (BUAP) de Puebla, Mexico. We have commissioned six works by Charlotte over these years, each one of them a terrific success and she mounted all or them with stunning efficiency and artistic integrity. I sincerely believe that Charlotte is a creative genius and a trailblazing artist and above all a great human being. It is always a pleasure to work with her and witness her creative process being always in the midst of demanding detail and at the same time being very human and understanding to all."
- Rip Parker, Director of Compania de Danza Contemporanea (BUAP, Mexico)
"Charlotte is an artist who is, at once, a definitive craftswoman and adept as an educator. The TCU School of Classical & Contemporary Dance has engaged her to re-stage two of her dances for the BFA majors. Her work has such well-defined edges; it cuts through space and asks the performers to be precise and yet never bound by that precision. Her work is highly physical both in its demands to convey range and endurance and the way in which it draws dancers into its nuances, requires them to be fully present in the moment – aware, alive, vibrant. In staging her works, Charlotte shows up as a choreographer who is consistent in her standards and challenges dancers to be fully on and attending to detail throughout process. She is, at the same time, generous, encouraging: one who is able to facilitate emerging performing artists to trust in themselves and from there, rise to the demands of the choreography."
- Susan Douglas Roberts, Professor of Dance (TCU School for Classical and Contemporary Dance)