Senior Luou Zhang will travel to China for the second summer in a row, this time with a team of dancers in the world’s second largest international dance competition, only behind the Olympics.
Zhang, who participated in DukeEngage in Zhuhai last summer, and 11 Duke dancers were selected from thousands of international applicants to represent one of two dance groups performing during the 10-day Summer Universiade, also known as the World University Games. Organized by the International University Sports Federation, the biannual sporting event features college athletes from around the globe. The students will present an hour-long performance of self-choreographed pieces, each showcasing the diverse training and styles of each of the individual dancers.
Held in Shenzhen, the cultural venture rounds out the University’s push toward expansion in China, which includes study-abroad programs in the region as well as a Duke campus in Kunshan. After the DukeEngage arts education program in Zhuhai, the Universiade marks the second arts-related engagement the University has undertaken in China.
The dancers are involved with student dance groups, the Duke Dance Department or both. Zhang, artistic director of Duke Chinese Dance, said the composition of the team directly reflects his aim in performing at the Universiade.
“Duke has such a diverse group of dancers, and when we dance we already fuse different styles,” Zhang said. “I really want to start the next evolution of dance styles similar to the unifying theme of the Olympiad. We’re celebrating unity yet also the diversity of dance.”
While in Zhuhai last summer, Zhang worked with the other DukeEngage participants and program director Hsiao-Mei Ku, a professor of the practice of music, to introduce arts engagement practices in Chinese schools. The Duke group found that these schools prized backbreaking competition and memorization of academic material, instead of critical thinking and intellectual openness, Zhang said.
“We took the creativity, collaborativeness and constructiveness of the performing arts and brought it into the classrooms,” he said.
The Duke team hopes to echo the same artistic and social principles in their performance at the Universiade.
In this way, the students will embark on a unique opportunity to showcase Duke’s—and by extension the United States’—cultural dimensionality, said Ku, who is also a member of the Ciompi Quartet.
“[The performers] are going not just to dance but to become ambassadors—to be there, to be visible, to tell [the Universiade participants and spectators] about Duke University and the opportunities the University provides,” Ku said.
Before leaving, the team will spend the semester perfecting their three-piece set, which demonstrates the intersection of ballet, hip-hop, jazz, modern and breakdancing styles.
Zhang noted, however, that there is a lot more to this performance than just the dancing itself.
“We have to conceptualize the idea and bring it halfway around the world,” Zhang said.
In addition to the artistic vision, Zhang and the dancers must consider the travel expenses, costumes and accommodations while in China. The group has a great deal of administrative assistance, partially from Vice Provost for the Arts Scott Lindroth.
“Since this is not a departmentally sponsored ensemble, [the group] needs some support,” Lindroth said. “But what appealed to me is that this came about from a student’s initiative. [The group have been chosen to perform] is a tremendous recognition of the talents here generated by students.”
It’s this universal passion that motivates Duke student artists to work through logistical issues, Zhang said. As the University continues to work on integrating the arts, academia and social life, the dancers must conduct a balancing act of their own in order to maintain the importance of art in their lives.
“For Duke students, it’s often practicality versus passion,” Zhang said. “But you can do both. I pride myself in proving the conventional wisdom wrong. I want to show Duke students that opportunities [to balance these ideas] are out there.”
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