5 Things you Didn’t Know About FWDC Outreach Director, Alison Gerardot
1. If I were on death row I would ask to eat
- – a pepperoni and green olive pizza from Pizza Hut
- – a box of Kraft macaroni and cheese
- – a Sausage McMuffin with Egg from McDonalds- none of which I can eat because I am celiac
2. I collect Martha Stewart books and magazines.
3. I dislike spiders, bread and butter pickles and most all 80’s music
4. I volunteered at the zoo and the Lincoln Museum in high school
5. I played tennis year-round all throughout high school
In 2012, I am the one who brought Gallim Dance up to Liz to submit to our Artist Panel (per the process of selecting our guest Artist residency). At that time, Andrea Miller, their Artistic Director, was everywhere in the larger dance world – constantly covered in the New York Times and on the cover of Dance Magazine (they still are covered a lot). And if I’m being really honest, as soon as they were chosen, I was less than thrilled. I don’t know. I wasn’t sure if they were going to be able to bring in a new audience for us, or if they would be “too weird.” Sometimes big city art can seem intimidating. Even if I always love it.
Maybe it’s where I’m at artistically in my journey – craving something new – but I slowly became really interested, for myself, in studying the process that is Gallim. Sometimes when you have such a saturation of commercial dance, as we do in our community, and you – as I do – freelance and create pieces for dancers for competitions, it’s easy to get sucked into that world creatively. But that’s your bread and butter. And don’t get me wrong, I love to create for these amazingly talented dancers, even if it is for competitive purposes. But, at times, it can be very stifling as an artist. Because competitions aren’t the real world, the higher art form that is dance and movement.
So when Gallim came, and I observed classes taught at north side and south side high schools, and I TOOK class it was like a breath of fresh air. A new way of learning. A new way of moving, a new way of creating. A new perspective. The performance was breath-taking, exceeding all of my expectations and then some. And it doesn’t even matter who came or didn’t come to see it. Because it was their loss and our gain. We all grew as people that night. And by the end of the night, at the talk back, I found myself stopping the artistic director, Andrea, choking back tears, thanking her. Because I NEEDED that.
I think that sometimes when things seem inaccessible or not easy to comprehend on the surface level in dance, people have a hard time giving it a chance. But take the time. Challenge yourself. Because you’ll most likely love it.