This past Saturday, dancers from McCallum performed at the first annual Day of Dance presented by MINDPOP, AustinISD Fine Arts and the Creative Learning Initiative. Although the McCallum Youth Dance Company was unable to perform, McCallum was well represented with performances from Ballet Folklórico , McCallum Youth Dance Company director Natalie Uehara and her daughter Giobella, and BLU3 Dance Crew, a K-pop dance crew. The event also featured performances with dancers from other schools, including Lamar Middle School, as well as various studios, professional companies, and soloists, showcasing a wide range of styles and techniques. Additionally, Day of Dance offered various showcases open to anyone, with the ultimate goal of celebrating and enjoying the art of dance.

For co-founder Allyson Morales, the inaugural Day of Dance has been a longtime dream since she first imagined it in college.

“I was at UT, and I was at an event. I just saw people dancing for fun, and I thought, wow, wouldn’t it be amazing if this could be a really large-scale event?” Morales said. “Then I started working at MINDPOP, and they also had a similar idea.”

MINDPOP is a local performing arts nonprofit that helps make dance more accessible to the community. As part of its goal to expand dance access across Austin, MINDPOP collaborated with Austin ISD and gave life to Day of Dance. When deciding who to feature at Day of Dance, Morales felt that it was important to leave the applications open to the public to ensure a variety of dances.

“Putting the call out wide, so that it wasn’t just people that I knew meant that it was about people who saw the call and wanted to be part of Day of Dance,” Morales said. “We have K-pop, Zumba, tango, movement and ballet—we have a whole genre—and I think it’s because of the public openness.”

In total, Day of Dance featured performances from 25 different groups with about 70 performers, as well as 24 classes open to attendees of the free event. According to Morales, the high number and variety of performances show something important about Austin’s performing arts community.

“I think it says that we are diverse,” Morales said. “That we have a lot of different voices and that they’re all really important to uplift.”

Through the open application process, and free performances and classes, MINDPOP has certainly achieved its goal of uplifting a variety of dance styles through Day of Dance. And the organization hopes to continue to do it annually.

“We’re going to do this again next year, hopefully even better, with more people,” Morales said.

We are proud to display our gallery of photos from the first annual Day of Dance as this week’s Tuesday Top 10.

Gallery • 12 Photos

Dave Winter

DANCING THROUGH GENERATIONS: Dance director Natalie Uehara and her daughter Gia perform at the Day of Dance event this past weekend. Uehara explained the meaning behind the piece "Me and My Shadow," which shows the relationship between a mother and her daughter, which made making the dance with her daughter a meaningful and special experience. “It has some steps in the dance, which are historical, so it was fun to put those together,” Uehara said. “I picked the song ‘Me and My Shadow’ because it represents the relationship between a mother and a daughter.” Uehara said all the practice felt worth it once they performed. “I think the show went well, and it was super fun,” Uehara said. “The eye contact we held in the show meant a lot to me telling me we were both having a good time” Overall, Uehara said she appreciated every moment she spent with her daughter and hoped people saw the meaning behind the dance and the choreography. Caption by Eva Sanchez.