We were lucky to catch up with Charlotte Telfer-Wan recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Charlotte, thanks for joining us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

My family has always been a huge supporter of all my practices, whether they be prosperous or not. My mom is a graphic designer who went to art school in her late twenties, shifting her career from ad agencies to become an artist. My dad was a cvil engineer working for the city of Toronto and shifted his career in his mid twenties to work for non-profits. They are both incredible people and successful in business by perservering and following their passion for arts and humanities. When making huge decisions that impact my future my family knows that supporting ventures I am passionate about over perhaps what is most financially savy is more than okay. They are continuously listening and trusting my brother and I with our decisions to pursue art, and encouraging our entrepenureal spirits.

When choosing an undergraduate degree I was torn between investing myself in an academic subject or choosing to go to art school. I chose to pursue a bachelor of fine arts in dance with the support of my family. It was difficult but landed me in an incredibly fruitful career. I continued to obtain a minor in Kinesiology during my undergrad degree and start working as a Kinesiologist. I also continue take part in shows and dance contracts as well as run a small arts collective with a couple friends.

Charlotte, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

In my career I have many ventures that include arts and active health. In my artistic career I am primarily a dancer. I perform in shows in Vancouver BC. and abroad and produce a multidisciplinary arts collective Clala Project. The collective creates and performs work, leads workshops, and researches various subjects often relating to diaspora and our past and present relationships to culture. As an artist I create work that is dance focused and interactive often in the form of installation art. I am interested in creating art that creates a significant relationship between the performers and audience.

I am also a practicing Kinesiologist. I work in a healthcare clinic alongside physiotherapists, RMTs and other healthcare professionals to rehabilitate those injured and in pain. My practice mosty focuses on helping the client become independent and understand movement and exercise that will help them recover. I also have a manual therapy practice in Fascial Stretch Therapy and teach clinical pilates in the clinic. My intention is to build my profile as a dance specific rehabilitator, focusing on movement efficiency, functional movement and injury education. I am motivated to build sustainability in dancer’s careers physically and financially by working with the clients to best suite their induvidual needs.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I graduated from dance school during the first couple months of the Covid-19 pandemic. This was incredibly challenging as I had wanted to enter into a dance career that was based around live performances. At this time no one was performing, no one was hiring, and starting a career was virtually impossible. During the first year of the pandemic I decided to shift and complete the necessary credits to become a Kinesiologist. This was not easy as all the classes I needed to complete were online, the requirements were changing and I had less then a year to complete this. After overcoming hurdles I was able to complete the credits and start my career as a practitioner in one year. This change helped me realise my capability to help people in pain as well as have a flexible career that supports my work as an artist.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

Communication is absolutely key when working with clients, or a team. I have experienced so many different personality types that come with many barriers. I need to be aware of my clientel’s mental health, fatigue levels and learning capacities. Communication doesn’t always mean being clear, it means listening, understanding, reading facial expressions, giving people space, maybe telling personal anecdotes to create a safe space to share. After understanding where a person or group is at it is much easier to meet them there and continue a session with ease and even excitement. Sessions in my practice are often very imperfect but each moment is a moment to learn from. As well, I love having fun at work and often that includes letting go of the pressure to reach goals, it means improvising, being open to change, and letting go of expectations.

Contact Info:

• Website: charlottetelferwan.ca, clalaproject.com
• Instagram: @charlotte_tw @clalaproject
• Other: vimeo: charlottetelferwan

Image Credits
Photo 1: Lula-Belle Jedynak Photo 2: Lula-Belle Jedynak Photo 3: Kevin Quigley Photo 4: Lula-Belle Jedynak Photo 5: Charlotte Telfer-Wan