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Molly Shanahan founded Molly Shanahan/Mad Shak in Chicago as the home for her movement and performance research and collaborations with other artists. Her early exposure to dance was in a small town in Ontario, Canada, where she was introduced to tumbling and "Ballet." That first, structured foray into dance was short-lived and frustrating, and her inspiration took hold in the solitude of imagination during hours of watching the trees move and change on the forested bluff above Lake Huron. Shanahan unknowingly began a regular meditation practice of observing the sounds of waves hitting the shore and their transformative affect on her state of mind.
A move to urban Detroit exposed her to 1970s disco, modern dance, and competitive cheerleading--all of which provided an outlet for her emerging discipline and illuminated the distinctions between improvisation and "set" choreography, which remains a vital exchange in her current work. During this time Shanahan learned of her connection to "The Four Mortons," a Vaudeville touring act comprised of her great grandparents and great aunts and uncles. Distinguished as the heirs apparent to the Cohens, "The Four Mortons" developed acts such as "Breaking into Society" -- their semi-autobiographical take on an Irish-immigrant family attempting to navigate American culture. The melancholy, pride, and extreme self-reliance of this hereditary link continue to inform Shanahan's solo and ensemble work.
Undergraduate and graduate study at Denison University and The Ohio State University nurtured Shanahan's burgeoning formal choreographic process and focused her somatic and historic understanding of dance as an art form. Shortly after completing her Master of Arts, Shanahan moved to Chicago to return to the shores of the Great Lakes, an environment elemental to her awareness of self, movement, change and repetition that continues to inform her studio practices and resultant choreography.
Shanahan is influenced by Authentic Movement, Jungian theory, Buddhist concepts of dharma art, and advanced study of the Feldenkrais Method. She is a full-time Lecturer in Northwestern University's Dance Program and teaches throughout Chicago and nationally in residencies associated with the creation and presentation of her work.
I explore the body's internal impulses and its innate potential to express without further explanation. My body, collaborations, and performances serve as related laboratories for research. I value spontaneous composition, vulnerability, and a quiet ego, and pursue a virtuosic access to my memory, capacity for awareness and integration of the occluded aspects of my body and self. I ask questions and am drawn toward those that destabilize my assumptions about performance and the body.
I am fascinated by the collision, marriage, negotiation, and collaboration between knowing and not-knowing; planning and spontaneity; curiosity and control. My process involves research in the studio and in performance that expands my potential to move in a state of awareness where habit and new discovery remain in constant dialogue. “My Name is a Blackbird” exemplifies this approach.
I have stepped outside many conventions of contemporary dance movement, which feels bound by outdated habits that inhibit freedom in the ribs, belly, and pelvis — arguably the most expressive areas of the body. I have softened compulsive holding patterns and in doing so confronted the vulnerability that comes with letting go of parasitic motivations. Through this I discovered an emerging expertise in new movement and a renewed vibrancy to my curiosity about live performance.
Approaching “Stamina of Curiosity”, I find myself on new creative terrain. I am intrigued by what remains to be discovered about my potential to create movement performance that can be shared publicly in ways that inspire and are relevant for observers, regardless of scale.
–Molly Shanahan
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