Dancer alone feels the tingling tension building, reaching a crescendo in tandem with the music, and then the sudden flurry of release. Only in the dancer's heart, eye, mind, and muscle reside the universal yet too-often ignored impulse to move freely through space, connecting with invisible overwhelming forces of soul and spirit. Answering melody and mental imagery as if engaged in deep conversation, the dancer responds with rehearsed perfection or unconscious recollection of body memory. Through dance, we react to momentary stimuli, willingly acknowledge their power over us and succumb with pleasure. Yet the solid and enduring force of dance thrives precisely because it is a dialogue.
Though often solitary or in monologue form, dance simulates human intimacy and spiritual communion. Dance therefore has value on a personal level: the art form has the ability to transform the mind and body of the performer in ways meaningful only to him or her. Yet any inner transformation creates indelible indirect impacts on the outside world. When the dancer feels the intensity of a piece, he or she imparts that knowledge and experience through subsequent performances. We dancers offer our inner wisdom wordlessly as any visual artist would. Our bodies are our canvases; what we bring to the world approximates no less than the tears that well up in the eyes of the beholder of a Vermeer or a Caravaggio.
When part of a performance art piece and offered in full for a hungry or curious audience, dance engages the viewer. Movement invites him or her into the creative, dynamic process of dance, which presents unique and specific physical ideas of both dancer and choreographer. Its value lies most obviously in its dramatic beauty and subtle or overt sensual allure. Dance as an art form has inherent value: at once personal and social, dance is one of the few art forms that involves the body so thoroughly and yet at the same time enables us to transcend physicality.
