DANCE

Faith

by Pat Graney

at the Emerson Majestic Theatre

October 29, 30 and 31

If you flip through the brochure of Dance Umbrella, multiculturalism and political correctness will slap you in the face. In an age where "diversity" seems to be the key word, Dance Umbrella's boundary-breaking agenda has allowed it to become the largest showcase of contemporary dance in New England.

This year's season includes an ensemble of Native American dancers, a group that traces images of women throughout history, two women who explore the Japanese American internment during World War II and a Jazz Tap/Hip Hop Festival that features both up-and-coming rap dancers and Broadway tap artists.

In the last 11 years, Dance Umbrella has presented dance from every continent except Australia. Every season, Director Jeremy Alliger sets the organization's political agenda. He then chooses from a pool of stellar companies and combines them to deliver his message to the public.

"We use dance to address issues of importance," says Alliger. "We work with artists who have vision, and artists who are pushing the boundaries between art forms and challenging people's definitions of what dance is...and what dance can be."

Last year's production of Bill T. Jones' Last Supper at Uncle Tom's Cabin/The Promised Land illustrates Dance Umbrella's political aims and ground-breaking forms of art. Jones's piece addressed issues such as AIDS, racism and faith by synthesizing dance, music, visual art, costume and dialogue. The cast included Boston residents of different cultural backgrounds. To complement the performance, Dance Umbrella conducted outreach programs to communities of diverse religion and ethnicity.

In fact, Dance Umbrella's ambitious mission includes far more than performance. Alliger wants the public to understand dance and to be able to use it as a means of communication.

To bring dance to more people, the Umbrella runs outreach activities such as movement classes in public schools, post-performance meet-the-artist sessions, artist-in-residence programs with local dancers and participation in the "Human Services Personnel Collaborative," which funds a variety of multicultural non-profit organizations throughout Boston.

Now in its 12th season and with an endowment exceeding $1 million, Dance Umbrella has grown significantly since its humble beginnings in Cambridge. It owes its success to the zealous enterprise of Alliger.

Alliger's genius stems neither from an illustrious dance background nor a business degree. At Emerson College, he studied television, theater and photography, and graduated with a self-designed degree in Visual Design and Communication. He worked a number of odd jobs--as a cab driver, a cook for a Jewish nursing home, a graphic arts manager--all in an attempt to support his fledgling photography business.

But an experience one night in 1976 introduced Alliger to dance and changed his direction in life.