We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Dahyun Kim. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Dahyun below.
Alright, Dahyun thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
Recently I have worked with professional dancers based in Atlanta for a Choreographer Residency at Fall for Fall Dance Festival. Fall for Fall is a dance festival that is recognized within the Atlanta dance community for building strong connections between Atlanta and New York dancers. During my residency, I had the privilege to teach their pre-professional dancers, as well as create original choreography with new people. Every aspect of the residency was a challenge designed to push myself out of my box, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. From the preparation I made it a mission to make my classes and rehearsal process intentional. I did not want to create out of my old habits and wanted to focus on something that has been capturing my attention recently which is A.I. development and its impact on creative workers. Researching about the topic itself was extremely insightful in my creative process, understanding how it is a pattern in any arts industry for creative workers to be exploited systemically and where the cause of the problem is-greedy business practices that eliminate competition. Discussing about the topic was enjoyable, gaining insight and seeing the whole picture on the topic of A.I. This project was especially meaningful for me, because the creative process was highly collaborative. I received so much insight from my sessions with my dance community in New York, and based on that experience I was able to make the process smooth for the dancers, especially in partnering and group works. I felt most connected to the people involved within the process, and I will cherish this experience and the lessons I have learned moving onto my next chapters.
Dahyun, 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?
My name is 김다현 or Dahyun Kim, and it means ‘A Royal Tea’. It is pronounced as [Da-hyeon Khim] and while many people struggle to pronounce it, my name is a representation of my culture and ethnicity. I am a dancer, choreographer, and educator from Seoul, Republic of Korea, and I am currently based in NYC. I have recently received by M.F.A. in Dance at Tisch School of the Arts & M.A. in Dance Education at Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development NYU. I have received my B.A. in Dance & Kinesiology at Penn State University.
I am currently a company member of Umami Playground, WADE Dance Inc., and Gotham Dance Theater. I mainly dance contemporary, but my passion also lies in house and my strength lies in versatility in how I am trained in numerous different styles at a professional level. In all my creative works, I value creating a culturally responsive and research-based practice. I have had a broad range of performances working with acclaimed choreographers, such as Ronald K. Brown, Jesse Obremski, Luna Cenere, Kaya Wolsey, Shakia Johnson, Deborah G Damast, Aquila Kikora Franklin, Michele Dunleavy, J Austin Eyer, Yurie Ono, David Cartahena Lee, Anna Caffarelli & Crimson Moeller, Esl Kim, Yerin Kang, and Yunjung Jang. I am currently a company member of WADE Dance Inc. and Gotham Dance Theater, being a part of their productions throughout their seasons. As a performer, I bring sincerity to the movement and to bring forth the choreographer’s intentions to the stage. I strongly believe that a performer’s intention can make or break a choreography, and hence where my mind lies is as important as what my body is doing. This includes having an awareness of what lineage the movement follows, which culture it comes from, what role I play in the world the choreographer created, and having clear execution of the movement.
As a choreographer I have had the privilege to work internationally in Seoul Fringe Festival (2021), SAC Jazz Dance Festival (2020), Shinchon Water Gun Festival (2019), and D-Party (2018) at Republic of Korea, and PORCH Finale Showcase in Stolzenhagen, Germany. In the U.S. most recently I have created works in Fall for Fall Dance Festival (2023), Queensboro Dance Festival (2022-23), Access Arts (2021), What We Carry Showcase (2023), WADE Vision Benefit, and Fertile Grounds Showcase (2023).
As a Korean woman in a foreign country, I have been forced to realize how my culture and people are commonly misunderstood and stereotyped. Even a simple thing as my name has caused struggle and tension for people because of its foreignness. Hence, my creations have grown to reflect my experiences around my cultural identity, as I have dedicated my craft to sharing more about the intricate and diverse beauty that lies in Korean art forms rather than the one dimensional image people have in their minds. This can be seen in my works, ‘흥 | Joy’, ‘수심가 | Depth of Water’, ‘Tearaway’, ‘일엽편주 | Paperboat’. I will continue creating these works so that my audience would appreciate many different characteristics that lie within my culture.
As an educator, it is important that the student feels welcomed to take risks, and they become the leader of their own movement. In order to reach that state, building awareness of one’s own breath, mind, and body is paramount. Hence, I incorporate Pilates principles and movement into my classes, starting from breathing in an efficient manner that brings focus to the body, calms the nervous system, and engages the core, to using exercises that directly help dancers facilitate better muscle engagement and movement mechanics when dancing. My hope is that my classes would help the dancers understand what is needed outside of ‘dance technique training’ to be able to have a stronger body and sustainable practice, which in turn would give dancers freedom in movement.
Having started my dance journey at 21, my dance experience has been unique and vastly changing from season to season. It has taught me to be vigilant, to work twice as hard so that I could be recognized as a professional, but also to be compassionate to my own desires and imaginations so that my love for dance (which brought me to start this journey) would continue throughout my whole life. My career I have built in itself is a feat against all odds, and I wish to inspire my audience and prove that dance indeed is for everyone.
What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?
Reprogramming the current company model to aim for a competition oriented environment is crucial for creative workers to start to have a more sustainable business. Current company model aims to dominate the market by controlling supply and even demand from the clients/audience. This makes creative workers susceptible to being a victim of an exploitative system that makes their product cheaper for the big companies to attract more demand, and gives less revenue to the artists. This phenomenon can be seen in how historically in the music industry artists are paid so little while they created hit albums, in how Amazon makes book prices incredibly cheap and keeping publishers tied as most of their clients purchase through Amazon, and this will inevitably affect the dance industry when the time comes. Creative workers must be given a business ecosystem where they are paid their fair sum for the work that they have created. They must be given credit properly for the great art they have created, and art must be recognized for its value that it gives to our society, not the monetary value people can profit off of.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
The fact that we can live out our wildest imagination is something no outer system, worldly measures, or monetary value can impact. This is both why a lot of us start out on our artistic careers, and what we hold onto amongst tough challenges that we face as creatives. I learn something new about myself each time I create a new piece, because it is an honest process where I look into what I am most interested in now, and how I communicate this in my dance. It reflects what movement I feel most comfortable with, what my imagination consists of, and what story I wish to tell or not tell. It is a very empowering thing to still be able to live out your imagination to the fullest, and as an artist I believe that if I am not going all out on my vision, my art means very little. As adults we are constantly forced to be in reality and conform to what we disagree with. Art allows us to realize our wildest dreams and bring forth the world that we wish to see.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.dahyukim.info
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dahyun_dancer/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC2M0kDTBZSuy9ULeiTJAgbg
Image Credits