Saturday, June 29, 2013

22/9

Thursday marked a new record for BalletCollective: the completion of a 22 minute ballet in just 9 days! 


In preparation for our August premiere at the Joyce Theater, 

we moved into the Ailey Theater (just for two hours) for an informal workshop performance. Troy and Brandon arrived at the theater early in the morning to "tech" through  (a technical rehearsal to run through the lighting cues) the ballet's lights. Ellis, the musicians, and the dancers arrived at noon to "walk" through (a quick rehearsal to acclimate in the new dimensions) the ballet in the Ailey space. 

For BalletCollective,

this was the start of many "firsts." "Firsts" is a word my finance and I use for the first time we experience something new together. With Brandon manning the lighting board, Ellis conducting the music, and Troy running the rehearsal, we dancers danced the ballet, The Impulse Wants Company, section by section. This was the first time that all elements of this collaboration were together performing our individual parts live. Previously the dancers were rehearsing to an electronic track of the composition. 

Shortly after the rehearsal began, 

BalletCollective's patrons, friends and family, trickled in for the workshop showing. As they arrived, Cynthia Zarin (the poet who wrote the libretto for The Impulse Wants Companygave them some information about the work including an excerpt of the poem. The audience got a sneak peak of the rehearsal process as we finished working out the kinks. 

Once all parts were in sync,

 Troy welcomed the audience, introduced his collaborative team, musicians, and dancers. The lights went dark and we were off. A second first for BalletCollective: a complete run-through of the ballet without stopping. We all remembered our steps, for the most part! It was a great chance for Troy to see the overall picture of the finished ballet, a rough glimpse of what it will look like in August at the Joyce. 


Photo: Archival film screen shot


After the ballet ended, 

the collaborative team, dancers and musicians had a chance mingle with our guests and see their reactions to the new work. It was an amazing feeling to see BalletCollective's vision realized. From here, we can take it further...

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

CR Fashion Book Shoot

BalletCollective has had many great opportunities to collaborate with artists from other genres. One of my favorites was when BalletCollective was asked to participate in a shoot for Carine Roitfeld's CR Fashion Book Issue 2. Carine was the editor-in-chief of French Vogue for ten years and is about as high as it gets in the fashion world. Recently, she left to pursue her own artistic vision and started CR, a beautiful, richly illustrated magazine.

Luckily for us, Issue 2 was dance themed and it showcased famous dancers from all over the world. As an emerging dance company, all of us at BalletCollective were extremely honored to be a part of this esteemed group, wearing up-and-coming fashion designers' clothes. In our shoot, BalletCollective's dancers framed three stunning models wearing mainly Armani plus Bentley, our chimpanzee co-star. Yes, a chimpanzee! Carine shared with us that it was always a dream of hers to include a chimp in a fashion shoot. 

The shoot took place downtown at Industria Superstudios bright and early on a Saturday morning in December. I remember this day like it was yesterday. We were in the middle of Nutcracker at City Ballet. I luckily had the matinee off so I could stay at the shoot 'til 5:30 pm. The day began with a manicure and pedicure for all the 'talent'. I have done my fair share of photo shoots but never have I been given a spa manicure and pedicure! It was pure bliss! 

Next was hair and makeup. My hair was pulled up into a high pony tail. Then the hair elastic was wrapped with leather to make the pony tail stand tall. I was giving the task of whipping my pony tail to create movement during the shoot!

BalletCollective's spread was a five page feature. Here are my two favorite shots.



CR Fashion Book, Photo: Paul Maffi




CR Fashion Book, Photo: Paul Maffi


What I love about these two photos is the movement quality and energy they exude. As each dancer, model, and chimp execute individual movements, together as a collective whole they create symmetry, beauty, and fun.  


The colors of the overall look of each shot are cohesive. Though the outfits we wear are each unique and different, the dance gestures draw the group into an intriguing, seamless design flow. This allows the movements and shapes to shine. The genius of Carine.

We were lucky to share the space with three graceful models. They, like us, have beautiful movement qualities and an ability to move with such ease that is showcased nicely in these shots. Even though I dance for a living I had a hard time relaxing into poses and keeping the energy alive. The models are able to easily stay looking comfortable with the more complicated movements, especially the model with her leg extended. That is a hard position to be in, let alone having Bentley (heavier than he looks) sitting on your thigh!

And lastly, I love Bentley. He is such a character and portrays such humor through these shots. I particularly find the first shot of Bentley crouching pure brilliance. I'm actually being lifted in the back (I'm in white, seen only from the waist down) and had no idea Bentley was posing like that! It is really cute!

Participating in CR's Issue 2 was an amazing experience. From the royal treatment to dancing with Bentley to meeting Carine and her crew, especially our photographer Paul Maffi, I will never forget that day! 

Monday, June 24, 2013

Meet the Artist Monday: Brandon Baker


Photo: Kendra Samson
Brandon Baker is BalletCollective's resident lighting designer. Baker's lighting for dance has been commissioned by NYCB, Limón Dance Company, Havana Ballet (Cuba), Guggenheim Bilbao (Spain), Edinburgh Festival (Scotland), The Joyce Theater, New York Choreographic Institute and the Los Angeles Music Center.  

Here is my Q and A with Brandon:

Me: What does Balletcollective mean to you?

Brandon: The collective is an extremely creative and intimate opportunity to collaborate with incredible dancers, choreographers, composers and visual artists.

What do you enjoy about working with Troy?

I love that the work we create continues to be developed over time. Especially with our upcoming season at the Joyce. It’s exciting to work with someone that’s not afraid of change and equally inspired to try something new with an existing work.

How do you go about designing the lighting for a ballet?

Lighting Design for me always begins with the music. The music helps me understand the tone and energy of a ballet. After listening, I join the rehearsal process and speak with the choreographer about the overall structure and concept of a ballet. During the rehearsal process I begin looking for visual clues on how a stage space is being used (Is the choreography symmetrical? Is this a piece about individuals or ensemble? Where are the dancers coming from and is there a strong connection to music?) These are a few details that help me find a “visual voice” for a ballet and I begin taking notes on color, shape, intensity, direction, rhythm and musical timing. The shape of the design continues on paper as I begin to sketch out my ideas, create a light plot, pick color and eventually create lighting cues in the performance space. 

What inspires you?  

I am truly inspired by artists that want to make a difference in the work we create together. I like to surround myself and collaborate with honest, positive people that continue to surprise me. 

What's your favorite way to pass time?

I spend a lot of time at the cinema and museums all over the city. I really love having a “neighborhood escape” from time to time.  

What are you reading?

“Flappers & Philosophers” by F.Scott Fitzgerald. I’ve always been fascinated by the 1920’s jazz era. Also reading “Catching Fire” (guilty pleasure). 

What's the most recent song/album you've downloaded?

The new album by Har Mar Superstar “Bye Bye 17” is pretty wonderful.

If you could die and come back as an animal, what would you be?

Sea turtle…?

Your greatest influence?

I am always inspired by so many artists and individuals. I’ve been very fortunate to find many mentors in life post-college that continue to inspire me everyday. My family, friendships, collaborators and opportunities to travel all over the world. 

Anything else you'd like people to know about you...

Before I began my career as a “lighting designer” I spent eight years recording music and playing bass guitar in bands all over Los Angeles. It all feels like another past life, but my love and passion for music continues to be a major part of the work I create today. 

This year's new work will be Brandon's fourth ballet with BalletCollective. He is so creative with his design and always takes into consideration how the lights will affect the dancers. If the lights are too bright and are angled on level with our eyes, it makes dancing very difficult. Brandon tries to avoid this blinding effect and will make adjustments when necessary.  It has been great working with Brandon!

Saturday, June 22, 2013

11 Things Troy has in his Choreography Bag

Everyone knows that dancers carry bags filled with sweaty lambs wool and toe pads, Dr. Scholls toe condoms, bruised bananas and Salonpas for sore muscles. But did you know that a choreographer would also carry a bag? Here's what I found in Troy's choreography bag:



Photo by: Ashley Laracey

  1. Dr. Dre Beats. He always wants to be able to plug in his headphones to listen to the music (whether on the train, walking on the street, or in the back of the studio). The creative ideas come at all times of the day.
  2. iPod/iPad. He stores all of the music tracks for The Impulse Wants Company on the iPod. 
  3. Jambox. The Jambox allows Troy to project his music from his iPod in smaller spaces. It is the most amazing invention, a mini speaker that functions just like those good old boomboxes!
  4. Altoids. For always fresh breath.
  5. Sketch pad and pen. Troy carries his sketch pad everywhere, his choreography book. Everything gets written in the sketch pad. He has a new sketch pad for each new work.
  6. i5 Chocolate Protein Shake. Just in case he gets hungry. 
  7. Aleve... Just in case.
  8. ThinkSmart pills from Whole Foods (ha! To keep his mind functioning throughout the rehearsal hours).
  9. Tennis Ball. To get limber before choreographing.
  10. Zico Coconut Water. To hydrate and prevent muscle cramping. Did you know that coconut water has more potassium than a banana?
  11. The Score to whatever ballet he’s working on.

After reviewing the contents of his choreography bag, I was surprised to find that he brings the score of the ballet to all his rehearsals. Troy is very musically inclined and likes to see the musical notes/counts on paper.  I have never worked with another choreographer who does this.

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Day 1: Dany Studios

Monday was BalletCollective's first day of rehearsals for The Impulse Wants Company (tentative title, to be premiered this August at the Joyce Theater). At the start of rehearsals in DANY studios, Troy, poet Cynthia Zarin, composer Ellis Ludwig-Leone, and lighting designer Brandon Baker gathered the dancers together and introduced themselves, discussing their roles in the creation of the piece, their inspirations and ideas behind the new work. 


There are seven characters. I use the term 'characters' loosely, as they are all based on those of us in the cast as people (to a certain extent) and we won't be 'acting'. Characters include: 

  • a peaceful, nostalgic woman
  • vibrant boy
  • three chatty girls
  • a married couple

I am one of the three girls.



Photo: Ellis Ludwig-Leone


Troy outlined the ballet's premise, "Our ballet focuses on you as a group as you arrive and spend a day in a place of heightened interaction. Here everything is magnified and you all are more exposed to one another."  

He then said that we would start with the second movement. And it went like this:

Troy began the rehearsal by working with Kaitlyn and David (peaceful woman and vibrant boy).  Not before long he called on the three sassy girls (Lauren, Meagan, and me). We enter with a jumping passage, very reminiscent of dolphins frolicking in the ocean. Soon we were all sliding like Shamu! It was a good time! Moments later the couple (Taylor and Harrison) enter and we as a group learn a complicated, but exciting combination of steps. I am excited to see, dance and learn more as the collective's concept turns into movement.  

Monday, June 17, 2013

Meet the Artist Monday: Lauren King

Photo: Troy Schumacher
Lauren King is an original member of BalletCollective. Her sparkling presence transforms her movement into an exemplar of purity and strength. 

Here is my Q & A with Lauren:

Me: What does BalletCollective mean to you?


Lauren: BalletCollective is unique in its process of bringing together talented artists from all different art forms and forming cohesive works which incorporate the perspective of each. 


What do you enjoy about working with Troy?

I am inspired by Troy's musicality and thoughtfulness in his choreography. Our similar background style from NYCB makes it easier for me to understand his thought process and work ethic. I also am motivated by the collaborative atmosphere while working on new pieces or reworking old ones. 


After a hard day of dancing, what is your favorite meal?

I enjoy eating almost everything, so it really depends on what I am craving that day. However, I typically prefer to eat dinner before I perform at night and after the show I will have a snack or a big bowl of ice cream. 


What's your favorite way to pass time?

I love making things and starting new creative projects with any free time I have. Sometimes I only have time to cook, or bake up something new and sometimes I take on a larger project such as painting my shower curtain or making a large tree on my wall of cork and glass.


What are you reading?

I am currently reading The Black Count by Tom Reiss. It is all about the real life inspiration for the stories from The Count of Monte Cristo (favorite book!) and The Three Musketeers. 


If you could die and come back as an animal, what would you be?


Lion


Your greatest influence?

All the teachers I have had have impacted me in some way. I try to get something from every and any source: teachers, peers, other artists, my students, books, everything. 


Do you have any pets?

I have a bunny named Mishu and a red and orange corn snake named Naga.


Lauren and I have known each other for a long time. We studied at The School of American Ballet together and were just promoted to Soloist together. I love dancing with Lauren in our pas de deux from Troy's Epistasis!

Sunday, June 16, 2013

A Wikipedia Collaboration: Ballet

At the center of BalletCollective's process is the act of true collaboration. But what does it truly mean to collaborate? As I was searching the web I came across Wikipedia's page for Collaboration; "A collaboration is working with each other to do a task. It is a recursive process where two or more people or organizations work together to realize shared goals, by sharing knowledge, learning, and building consensus." After making my way through Wikipedia's introduction I came across classical and contemporary examples of collaborations. Classical examples include 'Classical Music', 'Academia', and 'Project Management' to name a few. Then I moved on to the Contemporary examples that I found, including collaborations in 'Arts', 'Music', 'Education', 'Entertainment', 'Publishing', 'Science', 'Medicine' and 'Technology'. 

Contemporary examples[edit]

Arts[edit]


A piece of collaborative art created by students in Currier House at Harvard University
Collaboration—or joint production by two or more artists—is a common style among musicians and performance artists. It has not been so popular, on the other hand, in the world of art, and especially in modern art. But the strong sense of individualism long possessed by artists of fine art began to wane around the 1960s, and some artists working in units have emerged and become widely known along with the development of new media based on the advances in information technology. They have changed the concept of art into something that can be engaged in by more than individual artists alone.

Art groups[edit]

Fluxus
An international network of artists, composers and designers noted for blending different artistic media and disciplines in the 1960s. Fluxus encouraged a do it yourself aesthetic, and valued simplicity over complexity. Like Dada before it, Fluxus included a strong current of anti-commercialism and an anti-art sensibility, disparaging the conventional market-driven art world in favor of an artist-centered creative practice. As Fluxus artist Robert Filliou wrote, however, Fluxus differed from Dada in its richer set of aspirations, and the positive social and communitarian aspirations of Fluxus far outweighed the anti-art tendency that also marked.
Just Buffalo Literary Center, CEPA Gallery, and Big Orbit are three nonprofit arts organizations in Buffalo, New York, that have shared space and certain administrative functions since 2005. Just Buffalo offers an array of literary arts and arts-in-education programs. CEPA Gallery presents contemporary photo-related art and supports working artists. And Big Orbit has an art gallery and programs in the fields of experimental theater, literary performance, new music and sound art.
Once they co-located their administrative offices they quickly started to realize a number of advantages. Financial savings was an obvious one (they share equipment, a software contract, phone and Internet services and more). Physical proximity also helped the three executives develop a strong sense of trust and respect, and they soon looked for other ways to collaborate, such as hiring a shared grant writer who brings in grants for all three organizations.
There have been many benefits: financial savings because of their shared space, increased donations, and improved artistic programming. Beyond the tangible benefits, there are important intangibles. The agency directors share information and ideas, and they coordinate mailings. Perhaps most important, the organizations have increased their creativity; being in the same space has led to a "think tank" atmosphere. One of the three directors notes that "We work so closely … it's helped us come up with new thinking to expand our capacity and create a built-in brain trust and support system for problem solving and practical help."
Situationist International
The Situationist International (SI) was a small group of international political and artistic agitators with roots in MarxismLettrism and the early 20th century European artistic and political avant-gardes. Formed in 1957, the SI was active in Europe through the 1960s and aspired to major social and political transformations. In the 1960s it split into a number of different groups, including the Situationist Bauhaus, the Antinational and the Second Situationist International. The first SI disbanded in 1972.[18]

Business[edit]

Collaboration in business can be found both inter- and intra-organization[19] and ranges from the simplicity of a partnership and crowd funding to the complexity of amultinational corporation. Collaboration between public, private and voluntary sectors can be effective in tackling complex policy problems, but may be handled more effectively by committed boundary-spanning teams and networks than by formal organizational structures.[20] Collaboration between team members allows for better communication within the organization and throughout the supply chains. It is a way of coordinating different ideas from numerous people to generate a wide variety of knowledge. Collaboration with a selected few firms as opposed to collaboration with a large number of different firms has been shown to positively impact firm performance and innovation outcomes.[21] The recent improvement in technology has provided the world with high speed internet, wireless connection, and web-based collaboration tools like blogs, and wikis, and has as such created a "mass collaboration." People from all over the world are efficiently able to communicate and share ideas through the internet, or even conferences, without any geographical barriers. The power of social networks it beginning to permeate into business culture where many collaborative uses are being found including file sharing and knowledge transfer.
A plethora of studies have shown that collaboration can be a powerful tool towards higher achievement and increased productivity since collective efficacy can significantly boost groups’ aspirations, motivational investment, morale, and resilience to challenges.[22] However, a four-year study of interorganizational collaboration by Fischer and colleagues at the University of Oxford, found that successful collaboration can be rapidly derailed through external policy steering, particularly where it undermines relations built on trust.[23] [24]

Education[edit]

Generally defined, an Educational Collaborative Partnership is ongoing involvement between schools and business/industryunionsgovernments and communityorganizations. Educational Collaborative Partnerships are established by mutual agreement between two or more parties to work together on projects and activities that will enhance the quality of education for students while improving skills critical to success in the workplace.[by whom?]
Collaboration in Education- two or more co-equal individual voluntarily brings their knowledge and experience together by interacting toward a common goal in the best interest of students for the betterment of their education success. Students achieve team building and communication skills meeting many curricular standards. Students have the ability to practice real-world communication experiences. Students gain leadership through collaboration and empowers peer to peer learning.[third-party source needed]
When collaborating in education, according to ISTE NEST-S and NEST-T standards, there is cultural understanding by engaging learners with other cultures and develop technology in enriched learning environments.[third-party source needed]
Societal changes that have taken place over the past few decades allows new ways of conceptualizing collaboration, and to understand the evolution and expansion of these types of relationships. For example, economic changes that have taken place domestically and internationally have resulted in the transformation from an industry-dependent economy to an information-centered economy that is dependent on new technologies and expansion of industries that provide services.[25] From an educational standpoint, such transformations were projected through federal reports, such as A Nation at Risk in 1983 and What Matters Most: Teaching for America’s Future in 1996. In these reports, economic success could be assured if students developed the capacity to learn how to “manage teams… and…work together successfully in teams”.[26]
The continuing development of Web 2.0 technologies, such as wikis, blogs, multiplayer games, online communities, and Twitter, among others, has changed the manner in which students communicate and collaborate.
See also :

Music[edit]

Musical collaboration occurs when musicians in different places or groups work on the same album or song. Collaboration between musicians, especially with regards to jazz, is often heralded as the epitome of complex collaborative practice. Special websites as well as software have been created to facilitate musical collaboration over the Internet resulting in the emergence of Online Bands.
Several awards exist specifically for collaboration in music:

Entertainment[edit]

Collaboration in entertainment is a relatively new phenomenon brought on with the advent of social media, reality TV, and video sharing sites such as YouTube andVimeo. Collaboration occurs when writers, directors, actors, producers and other individuals or groups work on the same television show, short film, or feature length film. A revolutionary system has been developed by Will Wright for the production of the TV series title Bar Karma on CurrentTV. Special web-based software, titled Storymaker, has been written to facilitate plot collaboration over the Internet. Organizations such as Orange County Screenwriters Association bring together professional and amateur writers and filmmakers in a collaborative manner for entertainment development.

Publishing[edit]

Collaboration in publishing can be as simple as dual-authorship or as complex as commons-based peer production. Technological examples include Usenete-mail listsblogs and Wikis while 'brick and mortar' examples include monographs (books) and periodicals such as newspapers, journals and magazines.

Science[edit]

Though there is no political institution organizing the sciences on an international level, a self-organized, global network had formed in the late 20th century.[7]Observed by the rise in co-authorships in published papers, Wagner and Leydesdorff found international collaborations to have doubled from 1990 to 2005.[7] Whilecollaborative authorships within nations has also risen, this has done so at a slower rate and is not cited as frequently.[7]

Medicine[edit]

In medicine the physician assistant - physician relationship involves a collaborative plan to be on file with each state board of medicine where the PA works. This plan formally delineates the scope of practice approved by the physician.

Technology[edit]

Due to the complexity of today's business environment, collaboration in technology encompasses a broad range of tools that enable groups of people to work together including social networking, instant messaging, team spaces, web sharing, audio conferencing, video, and telephony. Broadly defined, any technology that facilitates linking of two or more humans to work together can be considered a collaborative tool. Wikipedia, Blogs, even Twitter are collaborative tools. Many large companies are developing enterprise collaboration strategies and standardizing on a collaboration platform to allow their employees, customers and partners to intelligently connect and interact.
Enterprise collaboration tools are centered around attaining collective intelligence and staff collaboration at the organization level, or with partners. These include features such as staff networking, expert recommendations, information sharing, expertise location, peer feedback, and real-time collaboration. At the personal level, this enables employees to enhance social awareness and their profiles and interactions Collaboration encompasses both asynchronous and synchronous methods of communication and serves as an umbrella term for a wide variety of software packages. Perhaps the most commonly associated form of synchronous collaboration is web conferencing using tools such as Cisco TelePresence, Cisco WebEx Meetings, HP Halo Telepresence Solutions, GoToMeeting Web Conferencing, or Microsoft Live Meeting, but the term can easily be applied to IP telephony, instant messaging, and rich video interaction with telepresence, as well. Examples of asynchronous collaboration software include Cisco WebEx Connect, GoToMeeting, Microsoft Sharepoint and MediaWiki.
The effectiveness of a collaborative effort is driven by three critical factors: - Communication - Content Management - Workflow control
The Internet
The low cost and nearly instantaneous sharing of ideas, knowledge, and skills has made collaborative work dramatically easier. Not only can a group cheaply communicate and test, but the wide reach of the Internet allows such groups to easily form in the first place, even among niche interests. An example of this is the free software movement in software development which produced GNU and Linux from scratch and has taken over development of Mozilla and OpenOffice.org(formerly known as Netscape Communicator and StarOffice).
Commons-based peer production
Commons-based peer production is a term coined by Yale's Law professor Yochai Benkler to describe a new model of economic production in which the creative energy of large numbers of people is coordinated (usually with the aid of the internet) into large, meaningful projects, mostly without traditional hierarchical organization or financial compensation. He compares this to firm production (where a centralized decision process decides what has to be done and by whom) andmarket-based production (when tagging different prices to different jobs serves as an attractor to anyone interested in doing the job).
Examples of products created by means of commons-based peer production include Linux, a computer operating systemSlashdot, a news and announcements website; Kuro5hin, a discussion site for technology and culture; Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia; and Clickworkers, a collaborative scientific work. Another example is Socialtext which is a software that uses tools such as wikis and weblogs and helps companies to create a collaborative work environment.
Massively distributed collaboration
The term massively distributed collaboration was coined by Mitchell Kapor, in a presentation at UC Berkeley on 2005-11-09, to describe an emerging activity ofwikis and electronic mailing lists and blogs and other content-creating virtual communities online.

Reading this entry, I'm thinking "where is dance? Where is Ballet?"

Since Wikipedia is a collaboration of its own I thought I'd add my two cents about ballet as a form of collaboration. Below is the new and improved Wikipedia page for collaboration.

Contemporary examples[edit]


Arts[edit]


A piece of collaborative art created by students in Currier House at Harvard University
Collaboration—or joint production by two or more artists—is a common style among musicians and performance artists. It has not been so popular, on the other hand, in the world of art, and especially in modern art. But the strong sense of individualism long possessed by artists of fine art began to wane around the 1960s, and some artists working in units have emerged and become widely known along with the development of new media based on the advances in information technology. They have changed the concept of art into something that can be engaged in by more than individual artists alone.

Art groups[edit]

Fluxus
An international network of artists, composers and designers noted for blending different artistic media and disciplines in the 1960s. Fluxus encouraged a do it yourself aesthetic, and valued simplicity over complexity. Like Dada before it, Fluxus included a strong current of anti-commercialism and an anti-art sensibility, disparaging the conventional market-driven art world in favor of an artist-centered creative practice. As Fluxus artist Robert Filliou wrote, however, Fluxus differed from Dada in its richer set of aspirations, and the positive social and communitarian aspirations of Fluxus far outweighed the anti-art tendency that also marked.
Just Buffalo Literary Center, CEPA Gallery, and Big Orbit are three nonprofit arts organizations in Buffalo, New York, that have shared space and certain administrative functions since 2005. Just Buffalo offers an array of literary arts and arts-in-education programs. CEPA Gallery presents contemporary photo-related art and supports working artists. And Big Orbit has an art gallery and programs in the fields of experimental theater, literary performance, new music and sound art.
Once they co-located their administrative offices they quickly started to realize a number of advantages. Financial savings was an obvious one (they share equipment, a software contract, phone and Internet services and more). Physical proximity also helped the three executives develop a strong sense of trust and respect, and they soon looked for other ways to collaborate, such as hiring a shared grant writer who brings in grants for all three organizations.
There have been many benefits: financial savings because of their shared space, increased donations, and improved artistic programming. Beyond the tangible benefits, there are important intangibles. The agency directors share information and ideas, and they coordinate mailings. Perhaps most important, the organizations have increased their creativity; being in the same space has led to a "think tank" atmosphere. One of the three directors notes that "We work so closely … it's helped us come up with new thinking to expand our capacity and create a built-in brain trust and support system for problem solving and practical help."
Situationist International
The Situationist International (SI) was a small group of international political and artistic agitators with roots in MarxismLettrism and the early 20th century European artistic and political avant-gardes. Formed in 1957, the SI was active in Europe through the 1960s and aspired to major social and political transformations. In the 1960s it split into a number of different groups, including the Situationist Bauhaus, the Antinational and the Second Situationist International. The first SI disbanded in 1972.[18]

Ballet[edit]

Ballet is, almost always, by nature a collaborative art form. Ballet needs music, it needs dancers, it needs costumes, a venue, lighting, etc. Hypothetically, one person could control all of this. But most often, every work of ballet is the by product of collaboration. From the earliest formal works of ballet, to the great 19th century masterpieces of Pyotr Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa, to the 20th century masterworks of George Balanchine and Igor Stravinsky, to today’s ballet companies, such as New York’s BalletCollective, feature strong collaborative connections between choreographers, composers and costume designers are essential. Within dance as an art form, there is also the collaboration between choreographer and dancer. The choreographer creates a movement in her/his head and then physically demonstrates the movement to the dancer, which the dancer sees and attempts to either mimic or interpret - two or more people striving for a connected goal.

Business[edit]

Collaboration in business can be found both inter- and intra-organization[19] and ranges from the simplicity of a partnership and crowd funding to the complexity of amultinational corporation. Collaboration between public, private and voluntary sectors can be effective in tackling complex policy problems, but may be handled more effectively by committed boundary-spanning teams and networks than by formal organizational structures.[20] Collaboration between team members allows for better communication within the organization and throughout the supply chains. It is a way of coordinating different ideas from numerous people to generate a wide variety of knowledge. Collaboration with a selected few firms as opposed to collaboration with a large number of different firms has been shown to positively impact firm performance and innovation outcomes.[21] The recent improvement in technology has provided the world with high speed internet, wireless connection, and web-based collaboration tools like blogs, and wikis, and has as such created a "mass collaboration." People from all over the world are efficiently able to communicate and share ideas through the internet, or even conferences, without any geographical barriers. The power of social networks it beginning to permeate into business culture where many collaborative uses are being found including file sharing and knowledge transfer.
A plethora of studies have shown that collaboration can be a powerful tool towards higher achievement and increased productivity since collective efficacy can significantly boost groups’ aspirations, motivational investment, morale, and resilience to challenges.[22] However, a four-year study of interorganizational collaboration by Fischer and colleagues at the University of Oxford, found that successful collaboration can be rapidly derailed through external policy steering, particularly where it undermines relations built on trust.[23] [24]

Education[edit]

Generally defined, an Educational Collaborative Partnership is ongoing involvement between schools and business/industryunionsgovernments and communityorganizations. Educational Collaborative Partnerships are established by mutual agreement between two or more parties to work together on projects and activities that will enhance the quality of education for students while improving skills critical to success in the workplace.[by whom?]
Collaboration in Education- two or more co-equal individual voluntarily brings their knowledge and experience together by interacting toward a common goal in the best interest of students for the betterment of their education success. Students achieve team building and communication skills meeting many curricular standards. Students have the ability to practice real-world communication experiences. Students gain leadership through collaboration and empowers peer to peer learning.[third-party source needed]
When collaborating in education, according to ISTE NEST-S and NEST-T standards, there is cultural understanding by engaging learners with other cultures and develop technology in enriched learning environments.[third-party source needed]
Societal changes that have taken place over the past few decades allows new ways of conceptualizing collaboration, and to understand the evolution and expansion of these types of relationships. For example, economic changes that have taken place domestically and internationally have resulted in the transformation from an industry-dependent economy to an information-centered economy that is dependent on new technologies and expansion of industries that provide services.[25] From an educational standpoint, such transformations were projected through federal reports, such as A Nation at Risk in 1983 and What Matters Most: Teaching for America’s Future in 1996. In these reports, economic success could be assured if students developed the capacity to learn how to “manage teams… and…work together successfully in teams”.[26]
The continuing development of Web 2.0 technologies, such as wikis, blogs, multiplayer games, online communities, and Twitter, among others, has changed the manner in which students communicate and collaborate.
See also :

Music[edit]

Musical collaboration occurs when musicians in different places or groups work on the same album or song. Collaboration between musicians, especially with regards to jazz, is often heralded as the epitome of complex collaborative practice. Special websites as well as software have been created to facilitate musical collaboration over the Internet resulting in the emergence of Online Bands.
Several awards exist specifically for collaboration in music:

Entertainment[edit]

Collaboration in entertainment is a relatively new phenomenon brought on with the advent of social media, reality TV, and video sharing sites such as YouTube andVimeo. Collaboration occurs when writers, directors, actors, producers and other individuals or groups work on the same television show, short film, or feature length film. A revolutionary system has been developed by Will Wright for the production of the TV series title Bar Karma on CurrentTV. Special web-based software, titled Storymaker, has been written to facilitate plot collaboration over the Internet. Organizations such as Orange County Screenwriters Association bring together professional and amateur writers and filmmakers in a collaborative manner for entertainment development.

Publishing[edit]

Collaboration in publishing can be as simple as dual-authorship or as complex as commons-based peer production. Technological examples include Usenete-mail listsblogs and Wikis while 'brick and mortar' examples include monographs (books) and periodicals such as newspapers, journals and magazines.

Science[edit]

Though there is no political institution organizing the sciences on an international level, a self-organized, global network had formed in the late 20th century.[7]Observed by the rise in co-authorships in published papers, Wagner and Leydesdorff found international collaborations to have doubled from 1990 to 2005.[7] Whilecollaborative authorships within nations has also risen, this has done so at a slower rate and is not cited as frequently.[7]

Medicine[edit]

In medicine the physician assistant - physician relationship involves a collaborative plan to be on file with each state board of medicine where the PA works. This plan formally delineates the scope of practice approved by the physician.

Technology[edit]

Due to the complexity of today's business environment, collaboration in technology encompasses a broad range of tools that enable groups of people to work together including social networking, instant messaging, team spaces, web sharing, audio conferencing, video, and telephony. Broadly defined, any technology that facilitates linking of two or more humans to work together can be considered a collaborative tool. Wikipedia, Blogs, even Twitter are collaborative tools. Many large companies are developing enterprise collaboration strategies and standardizing on a collaboration platform to allow their employees, customers and partners to intelligently connect and interact.
Enterprise collaboration tools are centered around attaining collective intelligence and staff collaboration at the organization level, or with partners. These include features such as staff networking, expert recommendations, information sharing, expertise location, peer feedback, and real-time collaboration. At the personal level, this enables employees to enhance social awareness and their profiles and interactions Collaboration encompasses both asynchronous and synchronous methods of communication and serves as an umbrella term for a wide variety of software packages. Perhaps the most commonly associated form of synchronous collaboration is web conferencing using tools such as Cisco TelePresence, Cisco WebEx Meetings, HP Halo Telepresence Solutions, GoToMeeting Web Conferencing, or Microsoft Live Meeting, but the term can easily be applied to IP telephony, instant messaging, and rich video interaction with telepresence, as well. Examples of asynchronous collaboration software include Cisco WebEx Connect, GoToMeeting, Microsoft Sharepoint and MediaWiki.
The effectiveness of a collaborative effort is driven by three critical factors: - Communication - Content Management - Workflow control
The Internet
The low cost and nearly instantaneous sharing of ideas, knowledge, and skills has made collaborative work dramatically easier. Not only can a group cheaply communicate and test, but the wide reach of the Internet allows such groups to easily form in the first place, even among niche interests. An example of this is the free software movement in software development which produced GNU and Linux from scratch and has taken over development of Mozilla and OpenOffice.org(formerly known as Netscape Communicator and StarOffice).
Commons-based peer production
Commons-based peer production is a term coined by Yale's Law professor Yochai Benkler to describe a new model of economic production in which the creative energy of large numbers of people is coordinated (usually with the aid of the internet) into large, meaningful projects, mostly without traditional hierarchical organization or financial compensation. He compares this to firm production (where a centralized decision process decides what has to be done and by whom) andmarket-based production (when tagging different prices to different jobs serves as an attractor to anyone interested in doing the job).
Examples of products created by means of commons-based peer production include Linux, a computer operating systemSlashdot, a news and announcements website; Kuro5hin, a discussion site for technology and culture; Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia; and Clickworkers, a collaborative scientific work. Another example is Socialtext which is a software that uses tools such as wikis and weblogs and helps companies to create a collaborative work environment.
Massively distributed collaboration
The term massively distributed collaboration was coined by Mitchell Kapor, in a presentation at UC Berkeley on 2005-11-09, to describe an emerging activity ofwikis and electronic mailing lists and blogs and other content-creating virtual communities online.

Ballet, like music, technology and the arts, exists through the collaborations of artists, dancers, choreographers, poets, graphic designers, costume designers, and many more. It's reliant on collaboration and should be its greatest stalwart!