Clarence Brooks performs at the Library of Congress’ Coolidge Auditorium

by Polly Burks | Tuesday, May 28, 2019
Clarence Brooks

Clarence Brooks (FAU Department of Theatre and Dance) was one of five performers that was asked to participate in “The Legacy of the New Dance Group” at the Library of Congress’ Coolidge Auditorium in April 2019. Brooks presented Talley Beatty’s (1918-1996) “Mourner’s Bench” (1947). Beatty was part of an artist collective formed in 1932 by a circle of accomplished American modern dance pioneers who sought to use their voices in the fight for social justice. They coined the phrase “Dance is a weapon” and established a center offering low-cost dance classes for disadvantaged students. The performance was followed by a panel discussion that featured  personal reflections from two of Beatty’s former soloist dancers, Delores Browne (84) and Eloise Anderson (94). Brooks has reconstructed several early African American dances, or dances that spoke of/to the Black voice. One of the co-chairs of the National Arts Club saw Brooks’ May 2018 performance of “Mourner’s Bench” in New York city and invited him to perform at the Library of Congress as part of this celebration.

Image: Dance: “Mourner’s Bench” | Choreography: Talley Beatty | Dancer: Clarence Brooks | Photo: Jonathan Hsu| Location: Library of Congress 

 


Warning: simplexml_load_file(): I/O warning : failed to load external entity "/export/apache/htdocs/new-artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.xml" in /export/apache/htdocs/artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.php on line 103

Notice: Trying to get property of non-object in /export/apache/htdocs/artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.php on line 104
RELATED


Warning: simplexml_load_file(): I/O warning : failed to load external entity "/export/apache/htdocs/new-artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.xml" in /export/apache/htdocs/artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.php on line 114

Notice: Trying to get property of non-object in /export/apache/htdocs/artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.php on line 115

Fatal error: Uncaught exception 'UnexpectedValueException' with message 'RecursiveDirectoryIterator::__construct(/export/apache/htdocs/new-artsandletters/news/): failed to open dir: No such file or directory' in /export/apache/htdocs/_resources/php/blog/blog-functions.php:122 Stack trace: #0 /export/apache/htdocs/_resources/php/blog/blog-functions.php(122): RecursiveDirectoryIterator->__construct('/export/apache/...') #1 /export/apache/htdocs/_resources/php/blog/blog-functions.php(641): get_files('/new-artsandlet...', Array) #2 /export/apache/htdocs/artsandletters/news/clarence-brooks-mourners-bench/index.php(117): display_related_tag('/new-artsandlet...', 3) #3 {main} thrown in /export/apache/htdocs/_resources/php/blog/blog-functions.php on line 122