Joan Gavaler
Professor of Dance (on leave 2024-2025)
Email:
[[jsgava]]
Office:
Phi Beta Kappa Hall 204
Phone:
(757) 221-2785
Webpage:
{{https://www.ACPhysicalTheatre.com}}
Areas of Specialization
Dance choreography and performance; Theatre direction and devising; Physical Theatre creation and performance; Contact Improvisation; Arm balancing methods; AcroYoga; Alexander Technique
Courses Taught
Dance Composition Foundations
Dance Composition Solos, Duets, and Collaboration
Introduction to Physical Theatre
Mind-Body Unity in a Fractured World: An Introduction to the Alexander Technique
Modern I through IV
Ballet
Performance Ensemble
Dance Practicum
Independent Projects in Dance
Student Mentoring
Dance Minors, Interdisciplinary Studies Majors, Orchesis Dance Company, William & Mary Theatre
Background
Joan Gavaler is a Professor of Dance and Artistic Director of Aura CuriAtlas Physical Theatre. The company is known for its innovative blend of dance, theatre, and acrobatics. Their work embodies the qualities of lightness (Aura), curiosity (Curi), and strength (Atlas) to find enchantment in ordinary situations presented in unusual ways. Since 2014, Aura CuriAtlas has toured DREAM LOGIC, A Life With No Limits, and The Fool and The World to communities large and small in the Midwest, East Coast, and Southern United States. In pivoting during the Pandemic, the company offered free online guided movement workshops for a year and premiered a digital work, S L. Feemster's ConFront(ed). Continuing in new directions Joan Gavaler and Ada Hao co-created a Williamsburg-London digital performance collaboration entitled asathoughtfallsthroughthegapsoftranslation, and the company premiered a new play, The Zombie Life: A Seminar for Humans Seeking Conversion. Her current project is a physical theatre piece inspired by Jill Bolte Taylor's book My Stroke of Insight.
As a choreographer and movement director, Professor Gavaler has created 85 original works and been a driving force behind four performing companies. She relishes collaborative discovery and has worked with poets, visual artists, composers, musicians, actors, directors, acrobats, and physicists on dance and theatre projects. She has been invited by over 80 organizations to present and teach in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, including presentations on the Alexander Technique in Lugano, Switzerland, a dance residency at Beijing Normal University, performances for American Dance Guild showcases in New York City, and movement consulting for the Virginia Shakespeare Festival.
Her professional expertise is sought for external program and faculty reviews and performance adjudications. She served as a Fellow in the Studio for Teaching and Learning Innovation, 2021-22. She served as Head of Dance from 2000-2009, as Department Chair for Theatre, Speech, and Dance from 2009-2014, and as Director of Dance from 2015-2017. She co-leads the W&M Dance Program with two Dance faculty colleagues.
