Boston Conservatory’s Dance Division Challenges the Status Quo with Its Spring Concert, Limitless

“I ask a lot of questions,” says Aszure Barton, sought-after choreographer and now artist in residence at Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Over the past 25 years, her choreography has been commissioned by Mikhail Baryshnikov, Martha Graham Dance Company, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, American Ballet Theatre, Nederlands Dans Theater, and practically every other prestigious dance institution in the world. Yet, after decades of accomplishment, what continues to inspire Barton are things she can’t entirely explain. Through her work, she hopes to learn why we move the way we do and how our physical habits form patterns, rhythms, and shapes that create meaning—often without our conscious awareness.

“My fascination is the intelligence of the body,” she says. “I like to dismantle and break that down and move through coordinations that feel really awkward initially. And then somehow, over time and with patience, it creates a language that’s really beautiful and new.”

This past March, Barton began a new partnership with Boston Conservatory that will bring the choreographer and her creative team to campus for two weeks every spring semester through 2027. She will teach dance students at all levels, from first-years through seniors; and in collaboration with students, she will choreograph a new work or reconstruct a previous one for the Dance Division’s annual spring dance concert, Limitless. 

From April 25 to 28, Boston Conservatory dancers will present this year’s iteration of Limitless, featuring Barton’s piece LIFT along with a world premiere by Associate Professor Adriana Suarez and Professor Gianni Di Marco, and contemporary works by Dwight Rhoden and Dan Wagoner. Also featured on the program will be a masterwork by Mexican choreographer José Limón, The Unsung, reconstructed by Associate Professor Kurt Douglas and performed—for the first time ever—by a cast of all women dancers.

Seeing the Bigger Picture

Originally from Alberta, Canada, Barton trained at the National Ballet School in Toronto—though her choreography bears little resemblance to classical ballet. When creating new work, she taps into the strengths and idiosyncrasies of individual dancers; and her approach is non-hierarchical, refusing to rank company members as soloists, principals, and corps de ballet.

Barton created LIFT in 2013 for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. The reconstruction for Boston Conservatory’s Limitless will be the first time it has been performed since its original staging with the Ailey company. Set to a rhythmically intricate score composed by Curtis Macdonald, the work challenges dancers with completely different movement patterns for the upper body versus the lower body. 

Barton’s method for teaching LIFT requires that each dancer learns every step, understanding the piece in its entirety. “Everyone is learning everything in this process. They’re all changing roles and stepping outside of their comfort zone,” she says. “It demands that you actually have a bird’s-eye view of the thing, so that you can see the bigger picture.” 

Such a holistic approach takes time, which is why Barton was drawn to a longer-term relationship with Boston Conservatory students. “You can’t communicate all these things in just a few days or a few weeks,” she says. “I’m more interested in partnerships that go deeper because then there’s a little bit more time for things to seep in.”

Barton has worked with Boston Conservatory students twice before, staging her work for Limitless performances in 2017 and 2023. Collaborating with the Dance Division on a deeper level seemed like a good fit because of its institutional knowledge of the artform and commitment to nurturing young dancers, she says. 

While preparing students for their performance of LIFT, Barton urged them to make the most of their time at the Conservatory. “That’s why you’re here. Get the training and focus on the foundation because that is what distinguishes a really solid dancer… Limón and Graham and all of that stuff that a lot of young dancers don’t have access to—that knowledge is so important.” 

Entering Uncharted Territory

Barton cites Associate Professor Kurt Douglas (with whom she has collaborated in the past) as “a huge reason” she decided to establish a residency at Boston Conservatory. While on campus to stage her work Happy Little Things in 2017, Barton says she witnessed a level of dance instruction that she had not seen elsewhere. 

“His commitment to education is like no other,” she says. “When you see that people care that much, they’re willing to look at the big picture and willing to respond to what’s in front of them … to really teach dancers and not just go through the motions.”

Douglas is supremely qualified to reconstruct Jose Limón’s masterwork The Unsung for Limitless. An official reconstructor for the Limón Foundation, he performed with the company for 15 years and has danced four out of The Unsung’s eight solo roles on stages around the world. Barton cannot emphasize enough how lucky students are to be learning from a teacher who knows the work so expertly. “To have someone like Kurt at their disposal, teaching them Limón—are you kidding me?” she says.

Limón created The Unsung in 1970, drawing inspiration from his Yaqui ancestry. An homage to indigenous people and their stewardship of the land, each of the eight solos represents a historical leader of a North American indigenous community. The work was originally choreographed for dancers who identify as men; but for the first time ever—and with the support of the Limón Foundation—Boston Conservatory will stage the work with dancers who identify as women.

The Unsung has been reconstructed many times since its inception, and with each subsequent staging our understanding of it grows richer and more complex, Douglas says. “The longer a piece has through time and space to be reconstructed, the more information is gathered because you’re restaging around different bodies, different communities, and different cultures.”

Masterworks are not meant to be preserved in amber, but kept alive and engaged with the world as it exists now, Douglas says. “This is an attempt to untether ourselves from what has always been and not be afraid to enter into uncharted territory when it comes to storytelling.”

Ultimately, the question becomes irrelevant whether a woman or man is dancing the role of Metacomet, Sitting Bull, Tecumseh, or Pontiac, because each of these leaders were intended by Limón to represent an entire people and their relationship to the land of their origin.

“When you watch it, you’re not thinking this is Geronimo’s life. You’re watching someone rise against adversity, play in and out of gravity, take risks, activate subtlety, put emphasis on the breath—all of those things that allow us to be human,” Douglas says. “You see yourself represented as a human body moving and experiencing.”

There is something about the Limón technique—its relationship to gravity, and its emphasis on fall and recovery—that gets to the core of human expression, according to Barton. “I’m working with the Limón company right now, actually, and when I see them I just think, wow, that is the foundation,” she says. “There is a use of weight and wisdom in the body that is so difficult to achieve, but somehow it makes the work so much more poignant.”

Limitless will run from April 25 to 28 at the Boston Conservatory Theater on 31 Hemenway Street in Boston. Tickets can be purchased online or in person at the Berklee Box Office. Learn more and purchase tickets here.