How does one navigate a faux pas? What is the nature of communication when the medium of expression is the body, poetry or visual art? How do we formulate our identities, and what forces shape this formulation? 

These are just a few of the enigmatic questions explored in this year’s 2013 Spring Dance Concert, featuring original contemporary dance works by students, faculty and a guest artist choreographer.

The Dance Program in the College of Arts & Sciences’ Department of Drama will present its Spring Dance Concert in four shows: Thursday and Friday at 8 p.m., and Saturday at 2 and 8 p.m., all in the Helms Theatre.

Using the medium of movement as their major mode of expression in their original works, the artists on the program challenge notions of etiquette, communication and control in engaging and unique ways.

In her new work, “Only from What’s Broken,” second-year dance student Erika Choe uses poetry, movement and body imagery to demonstrate what she calls the “redefining psyches fractured by misunderstanding” and how this can be explored both individually and in community.

Tara Bonanno, a fourth-year student in the U.Va. McIntire School of Commerce and a dance minor, describes her piece, “, conveyed differently,” as “an exploration of the connections between visual art and movement combining both on stage.” 

Stéphane Glynn, a fourth-year student in the College working on his dance minor and majoring in both media studies and psychology, combines film and live dance on stage in his work “re: | BOUND,” an exploration of stress and whether that stress is imposed from the outside, internally or both.

Guest artist Christopher K. Morgan will perform the concerts’ final piece, “Faux Pas.” He is the artistic director of Christopher K. Morgan & Artists, a contemporary dance company located in Washington. In April 2011, Morgan was profiled in Dance Magazine as one of six breakout choreographers in the United States.

“‘Faux Pas’ was created specifically for this cast to both showcase and challenge them,” Morgan said. “The work abstractly explores the idea of being in and out of line, and differentiating oneself from a group.

“My original dance piece is also a play on the notion of faux pas – that is, false steps or social errors – of literal ‘false steps,’ starting something that one doesn’t finish, leading someone forward you don’t intend to see to the end of the journey or impeding another’s path.”

Tickets can be purchased online, by phone at 434-924-3376 or in person at the U.Va. Arts Box Office, located in the lobby of the U.Va. Drama Building.

Tickets are $10 ($5 for U.Va. students, children, faculty, staff and alumni). Free parking on performance nights is available in the Culbreth Road Parking Garage, located next to the U.Va. Drama Building.