MIMI GARRARD discusses her decades of esteemed dance & choreography work

Dreamspace (1974), Choreographer: Mimi Garrard, Dancers: L to R: Gale Ormiston, Mimi Garrard, Irene Jouhet, Karin Levin, Photographer: Peter Moore

Mimi Garrard was a dancer with Alwin Nikolais. He produced her concerts at the Henry Street Playhouse for ten years and then she toured under the National Endowment Touring Program for many years.

In collaboration with James Seawright, her work was commissioned for CBS Camera Three and WGBH Boston television. She created more than ninety works for the stage that were performed throughout the United States and in South America. She received two grants for choreography from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Most recently Garrard is experimenting in new ways, creating dance for video using digital techniques to transform the dance material. Her work in this area is unique and is gaining increasing attention. This work is shown internationally on television, in museums and galleries, and in festivals. It was also shown on the dome of the planetarium in Jackson, Mississippi, and on the BBC BIG screen throughout England. Over the last four years she participated in 2,811 international festivals and won 1,485 first place awards. She won the Distinguished Alumnae Award from Sweet Briar College in 2019.

She has a half hour monthly television program on Manhattan Neighborhood Network in Manhattan, New York that is streamed live at the time of broadcast (254 programs to date). She received a life-time achievement award from the INSTITUTE OF ARTS AND LETTERS in Mississippi for her outstanding achievement in dance both for video and for the stage. 

Mimi Garrard of Mimi Garrard Dance Theatre and Collaborators presents Dark and Light on Saturday, April 26, 2025, at 2 pm at The Rubin Museum, 150 W. 17th Street, NYC. Dark and Light is explored with five videos directed by Mimi Garrard.

***This event is by invitation only, and there are ten tickets available to the first ten INTERLOCUTOR readers who contact us - if you are interested, please email info@interlocutorinterviews.com

Interview by Catherine Tharin

Talk to us, please, about your childhood and your upbringing. You’re from Mississippi. When did you know you wanted to be a dancer?  What gave you the drive to move to NYC and pursue dance? Did you know with whom you wanted to study? 

I learned a lot growing up in a racist town in Mississippi. First and foremost, I learned to think for myself. I also learned how important it is to find something meaningful to do with your life.

As a child, I studied ballet and acrobatics. I loved dancing but did not think of it as a career at the time. I knew nothing about modern dance or dance in New York City. After college, I moved to New York City to study occupational therapy at Columbia. I immediately began studying dance at night. After one semester, I quit the program at Columbia and decided to concentrate on dance.

You danced professionally with the great choreographer Alwin Nikolais. In what ways did Nikolais influence your choreography and your filmmaking? And, in what ways did your choreography influence your filmmaking? 

I loved studying and dancing with Nikolais. He emphasized the importance of understanding space, shape, time, and motion. What he taught was so natural for me. It made perfect sense at the time and still does today. From the beginning of my training with Nikolais, I knew that choreography was my first interest and main concern. He loved my early studies in choreography. That was very reassuring. He also produced my concerts at the Henry Street Playhouse, NYC, for ten years. 

I still think about space, shape, time, and motion in video. It needs to be applied in a different way. Using different distances from the camera can create magic in video. The image, of course, gets larger as you get closer to the camera. That is a powerful tool to use. Shapes can be manipulated in many ways in video. Time is totally flexible.  Slow motion can be very useful, as well as faster motion. Nikolais’ work always depended on illusions you could create. Video, as I use it, is the art of illusion; illusion can create a new reality.

You took classes for many years at the Erick Hawkins Dance Company studio. What attracted you to this technique and in what ways have you integrated the Hawkins principles in your work? 

I began studying technique at the Erick Hawkins studio when I wanted something easier on my body than the Nikolais technique. Nikolais had left the Henry Street Playhouse, and he spent most of his time on tour. I loved the Hawkins technique and aesthetic from the beginning. It worked well with my training with Nikolais.

Nikolais started from the outside and worked inward. Hawkins started from the inside and worked outward. In Hawkins’ technique, you need to find the deeper muscles so the other muscles can be more relaxed. This is very difficult, but it was something to work toward. This knowledge was wonderful and helpful in creating work that showed the nuance of the dancers. I also loved Hawkins’ choreography. I miss seeing it.

You have choreographed over 90 dances for the stage. You are also known for your magical dance films, having won numerous awards. Do you approach choreography for the stage the same way you approach the creation of a film? Explain your attraction to live dance versus your attraction to dance film. Have you created film for live dance?

We have won 1,485 first place awards in international festivals and participated in 2,810 festivals. It is a privilege to have our work seen in so many countries. I love making dance for video. I feel that I am working in a new way, and it is gaining increasing attention around the world. I am also very grateful to have made many works for the stage. 

I have also made work for live dance and video in numerous concerts shown at New York Live Arts. This is another skill altogether. However, in all of my work I can use what I have learned from both Alwin Nikolais and Erick Hawkins. Nuance in the dancers is important, as well as understanding the importance of space, shape, time, and motion.

Mimi Garrard’s Urban USA – A Ritual (1989) with Catherine Tharin and Katherine Duke. Photo: Peter Moore

Mimi Garrard’s Walking on Gravel (1990) with Larry Fortunato and Catherine Tharin. Photo: James Seawright

Your dance films create abstract, some say psychedelic, worlds. You compose for your films, but accompany your films with favorite composers, such as Joao Castro Pinto. You speak about “replicating” the dancers to add dynamics to the piece and about the dancers and the background having equal importance.

Take us through your process: What do you look for in dancers? Do the dancers make up the movement or is this a collaboration between you and the dancers? Do you have an idea in mind or do wait to see what the dancers will bring to the process? Once you have the footage, how do you create the film? What software do you use?

I have worked in different ways in my film dances. When I first started, I created a work that could have been performed on a proscenium stage, and then I used digital techniques to make a different piece for video. At times, I would film from the loft in my studio space.

Now, I create material with the dancers in a short period of time. Then, I can take as long as I like to edit the material. I prefer this way of working. In my film dances, I start with the music. I let my dancers hear the music before we begin, and we talk about the idea or ideas that the music conveys to us. We do not use music when we are shooting.

I usually begin with the upstage space. Then, we expand the space a little with each shoot. I work on benches for a better camera angle and to eliminate the proscenium look of the space. The dancers can look at the material in the camera as we work. This is very important since what you feel as a dancer is often not what the camera sees. The dancers usually improvise around an idea and for a particular space.  Sometimes, I will suggest a movement. I often suggest ways of altering the improvisation. Things just happen when improvising. Things come together in ways you don’t expect. I’ve trusted my intuition for so long that ideas just spill out of me. This is the result of a long time of working. Ideas flow.

Now, I use Premiere Pro for editing.

Making a piece for live dance and video is the most difficult of all the work I do.  The dancer needs to understand the part the video is playing and be able to feel the entire space with video. Most of my work in this area has been with the dancer, Austin Selden. 

I no longer do dance for the stage without video. However I don’t rule out doing it again at some point.

Gone - Directed by Mimi Garrard - Dancer: Samuel Roberts - Music: Jonathan Melville Pratt - Costume: Mindy Nelson

Through Ashes We Rise (February 2025) - Directed by Mimi Garrard - Music: Joao Castro Pinto - Dancers: Tim Bendernagel and Cynthia Koppe - Costume: Mindy Nelson

Emigrant - Directed by Mimi Garrard - Music: Jose Halac - Dancer: Samuel Roberts - Costume: Mindy Nelson

You developed one of the earliest computerized lighting systems with your husband, esteemed sculptor James Seawright. Jimmy’s artistry was also based in technology, as is yours. What was the early attraction you both had to technology? Did technology have anything to do with bringing you together? Tell us about the lighting system, please. 

One of Jimmy's first jobs in New York was working for Nikolais.  He mostly helped with sound production. He was also helping me in my productions. One of my first works was on a 16-foot see-saw that Jimmy built. Then, we worked together on an abstract film background for a dance.  At the same time, he began creating kinetic sculptures. He had been studying at the Art Studio League but had nothing to do with the sculpture he began to make.

In 1970, he began working on a computer-controlled lighting system with Emmanuel Ghent. The lights and music were created at Bell Labs. Our lighting system at the time was play-back only. Jimmy built the playback system. The first work we created was Phosphones. We performed it for many years throughout the United States. The lighting could be as complex as the music and could be played in any compositional relationship with the music. We eventually made a revised computer controlled lighting system that had compositional capacities. I began creating the lights myself during the process of creating the dance. 

Phosphones is the first work created with the Cortli Computer Controlled Lighting System that was developed by Emmanuel Ghent, James Seawright and others under the sponsorship of the Mimi Garrard Dance Company. Choreography: Mimi Garrard Music - Lighting: Emmanuel Ghent

In SoHo, NYC, you and Jimmy for many decades each worked in large studios in your home. In fact, you ran your own black box theater. You have since moved to rural New York where you’ve again built a studio in your home. Does your physical setting influence your work? Why or why not? Has it changed from city to country? 

I do more meditation now that I live in the country. That has a big influence on my work. I feel more and more that ideas come to me. I trust the intuitive creative process and allow the universe to help me. 

Mimi Garrard of Mimi Garrard Dance Theatre and Collaborators presents Dark and Light on Saturday, April 26, 2025, at 2 pm at The Rubin Museum, 150 W. 17th Street, NYC. Dark and Light is explored with five videos directed by Mimi Garrard.

***This event is by invitation only, and there are ten tickets available to the first ten INTERLOCUTOR readers who contact us - if you are interested, please email info@interlocutorinterviews.com

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CATHERINE THARIN choreographs, curates, teaches, and writes. She danced in the Erick Hawkins Dance Company in the 1980s and '90s, was the Dance and Performance Curator at 92NY, NYC, for 15 years, and was a senior adjunct professor at Iona College, New Rochelle, NY, for 20 years. She writes dance reviews for The Dance Enthusiast and The Boston Globe, articles about dance for Side of Culture, and reports on dance for WAMC/Northeast Public Radio. She curated a 2024 dance season at Stissing Center, Pine Plains, NY. She continues to teach the Hawkins philosophy, technique, and repertory as an artist-in-residence. Her latest dance is a collaboration with jazz composer Joel Forrester and filmmaker Lora Robertson. Says Fjord Magazine of her work presented in November 2023: "gentle and precise movement contained to a small range, a good deal of floor work...cast a net of whimsical translucent sheen over it all. The evening was consistently charming, well-crafted and paced."