Safos Dance Theatre

I’ve spent the last few weeks, maybe even the last couple of months, filming and photographing a new dance company in Tucson called Safos Dance Theatre. For my advanced photojournalism class we had to do a “picture story” and put together a three to eight minute piece with photos, video and audio to tell a newsworthy story- using Final Cut.

No matter what I do or where I go, I am always drawn to stories that deal with the border and Latino culture. This picture story was no different. Safos Dance Theatre uses movement to music, spoken word and poetry, all to portray issues communities in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands face. The small group comes from a diverse dancing background, including ballet, jazz, modern and folklorico. That, along with different experience levels, is combined to create their personal style.

The word Safos comes from José Antonio Burciaga’s definition of the chicanismo Con Safos in his book, Drink Cultura. Literally it means with safety, and the term is widely used to mean respect- you might not like an idea or a piece of art, or even a dance from Safos, just respect it as someone’s own.

Safos Dance Theatre was founded in February 2009, by Yvonne Montoya. I took a class from Montoya in the fall 2008. Her class (The Chicano Movement- MAS 351) was probably one of the most demanding that I’ve had at UA. It was also a class that I learned the most from- funny how that works. After some budget cuts, Montoya didn’t return to UA, she instead decided to start a dance company, something she always wanted to do.

The inaugural show, Deserted Scripts, is coming up on May 8. It features work inspired by news stories of immigrant deaths in the desert, conflict in the Tohono O’dham nation and more.

Also… if you’re wondering about my video, please give me $60 to upgrade to WordPress premium, or something to that effect, so I will be able to upload videos. OR, just check back to Safos Dance Theatre site, it should be up there when I give them the video.