The Mask of Survival: Black Performance in Dance

Choreographer Camille A. Brown and her namesake company, Camille A. Brown & Dancers, use dance theatre to explore culture, race, and identity in today’s urban America. Brown’s ongoing performance “Trilogy” grapples with internal and external perceptions that Americans have based on identity, and the right and need we all have to claim space in society. What does it mean for a person of color to be manipulated by another power, what does it mean for a person to claim their own power, and how do communities and individuals claim power accessing both ancestral and contemporary vocabulary? By melding these questions and concepts together, the trilogy highlights the resilience and creative genius of African-Americans.