Today we’d like to introduce you to Cara Celeste.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Cara. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
My mother used to come home from work and watch ice skating competitions on the sports channel. I loved the music so I would dance to it. Eventually, she bought me a pink tutu and I didn’t stop. My mother found it important to put me in dance classes to learn the art and how to perform.
My mom started me at a very small ballet school, where the artistic director didn’t really know what she was teaching. And at a young age, I saw that money could precede talent when I was soon kicked out of the school for my parents not being able to pay the bill (she also had a student that uploaded a video that went viral under a YouTube mix called “bad ballet”). I had quite all of my extracurricular activities as well determined that I was going to be a professional ballerina.
When all hope was lost a school was presented to me based out of Breneau University, the Gainesville School of Ballet. The artistic director was once a principal with the Atlanta Ballet, and she helped me and my mother a lot. She would allow my mother to work in the office to pay my bills. Even though I was learning and getting stronger, I still saw that ballet schools are still a business, and sometimes you have to cater to some people. I had become obsessed with the Russians method of ballet called Vaganova, and even though I loved Gainesville Ballet, they didn’t teach this method. My mother had found a school in Tennessee where the teacher was a second generation Vaganova student. So I left on a whim.
The Kingsport Ballet School accepted me free of charge and also found free room and board for me. Living here by myself at a young age (16 yr) I learned from many personal experiences. Dance wise I was taught even more. Ballet (no matter what style) is very rigid and you have to be the utmost talented and persistent to the point that it is sickening. My Russian teacher believed in me so much that she would have audition tapes made of me to send out to other schools. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the right body proportions for the job, I was just a little too broad and my booty was too big. Growing up at summer intensives with big ballet companies they would sarcastically complement it. Leading to body issues.
Upon high school graduation, I found its important to go to college because I needed to get my body in order along with my ballet technique before I quit to join a ballet company. My first two years of college I was hitting it off well with my professors, especially with ballet, and was about to quit until I was offered to go to Israel with my school to study a class style created by Ohad Naharin that he calls Gaga. It is like yoga for dance and completely liberating. The complete opposite of ballet. It was something my soul was looking for when it came to dance. When I came back to America, my mentality changed. I finished school, learned all I could about the art form of contemporary dance and let ballet stay the historic dance form that it is.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Dance is never a smooth road unless you have extremely rich and supportive parents. If you don’t have these parents here are some obstacles dancers can face:
Dance is the most under-appreciated dance form in the world (don’t expect to be rich), but know that you are worth more than just exposure. With dance, your body is your instrument. You got to afford fuel for that puppy, so get a chunk of change for it.
Everyone sees fake. I tell my students, “do you so people can appreciate you.” Do art for what you believe in, not for views. Legends never die, and they were real about what they produced.
No matter what your body type is or what your insecurities are, use that to your advantage, because people love that and it makes you look bomb.
In the dance world, ladies have it way harder than men. So I learned very quickly there are a lot more ladies in the industry and for that, we are judged a lot harder when it comes to creativity and dance ability. So, I learned not to care as much how I am judged and just to do what I love and believe in, and make sure that I love the end product versus what others do.
READ YOUR CONTRACTS!
Stay hungry for knowledge and researching what your body and mind can do as they are always coexisting.
EVERYONE CAN DANCE! People don’t realize that holy trinity thing (mind, body, soul/father, son, holy ghost) they learn in every single religion is heavily embodied in dance. If you can’t grasp this concept, one will always feel insecure about their dance abilities.
Don’t lose patience. It’s a virtue. American’s have lost this.
If you feel you will regret it afterwards, do it! or don’t do it! YOUR GUT KNOWS BEST!
IT’S OK TO SAY YES!
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Cara Celeste – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of and what sets you apart from others.
I have many jobs that are not my own but help me in my personal business and future businesses.
First, I am a dancer (moving artist) for a small collective called gloATL, directed by Lauri Stallings (former ballerina and modern dancer for Hubbard Street Chicago). Glo is really intense. We work hard for our art, trying to make it available for everyone. Dancing in public spaces, rain or shine. And being housed at the Goat Farm arts center makes it a little more intense as we don’t have insulation in our studio space. So even though we have heat and air conditioning, it escapes easily making the summers still very “hotlanta” and the winters cold. I am thankful for the Goat Farm though. They help us have a stable home unlike most pick-up companies, and it has taught me to be very self-reliant and understand that my body can cope no matter what.
My official title at my second job is the Ballet Director of a school in Loganville, GA called Onstage School of Dance. It’s a competition school where students tend to hate ballet. These type of schools come a dime a dozen because teachers and business owners don’t need licenses in America to start a dance school (unlike gyms). It’s a money maker type of business and the ballet teachers that circulate in these types of schools are usually raised in schools like this and do not know even the fundamentals of ballet and teach kids from videos. It’s really sad, but it teaches me a lot about how this generation thinks commercially versus how my generation and past generations think now conceptually. With this in mind, I am able to teach my students (who have never had a professional dancer as their teacher before) how their business will be as dancers.
All of this affects my own business as a choreographer. I never thought it would happen right out of college but my small amount of social butterfly, confidence, and out beautiful universe helped me meet some amazing artists in the music industry who are really into dance as visuals for their videos and their music in general. In this line of work, my favorite part is teaching people that they can dance. I come in with movement ideas, the recording artist tells me what they like and don’t like and we compromise to find a good symbol to fit the music. Now the movement isn’t something that has to look a certain way, because the video is their brand, so the dance has to be them, not me, I only help the creative juices flow.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
My future plans are to create my own choreography. I am already collaborating with some of my recording artists friends to create original scores to set to movement belief systems that can be shared originally. Of course, I want to be able to travel the world with this, but I have to be patient at the moment. I am giving myself to a lot of people right now and creatively it is very draining. It is like hosting a party and you make a cake. Of course, more than likely your not going get any cake, you are trying to make your guests happy, so they get first dibs.
My long-term goal is to have my own collaborative arts school. The one thing I learned in college that was so important was the ability to collaborate. It is very taxing to do everything by yourself, it’s amazing, but the saying “two (three, or five) heads are better than one” is such an important saying when it comes to collaboration. All sides have an impute and can make something big and truly amazing. In fact, all great shows, bands, orchestras are the ones that have many musicians, elements, dancers, singers, painters, etc. already that sounds like a treat, and it all starts with collaboration. Getting to know one another and create an understanding of one another’s art forms and experiences is a trait every artist should want to behold. Many of my techniques and ideas that I have accumulated for my dancing has been taught to me through singers, actors, and musicians. It’s amazing to me and so important.
Contact Info:
- Website: caraceleste.com
- Email: caracelestemoves@gmail.com
- Instagram: @carajuku
Image Credit:
Chris House – chrishouseco.com
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