Full Circle Dance Company is celebrating its 15th anniversary. Tell us about its origins.
We started in 2000 as an outgrowth of the Morton Street Dance Center, which is a school here in Baltimore that I co-founded and run. Full Circle was founded initially because we had such talented teachers who were not performing but wanted to. And we’ve attracted other folks who have moved to town and looked for that professional dance outlet.
The anniversary show on October 3 will feature a piece themed around breast cancer called 328-HOPE.
That is the phone number for the Baltimore City Cancer Program that screens uninsured and underinsured women. We will provide the proceeds to the program.
Full Circle performances are often built around a theme, but why breast cancer?
We thought about a number of things—domestic violence was one that I was beginning to settle on when one of the dancers said, ‘I have something even more personal.’ I said, ‘What’s that?’ And she said, ‘Breast cancer.’ I took a deep breath and I said, ‘I’ll do it.’ I had breast cancer two years ago, and I’ve got to tell you, I thought all of these concerts were personal—we’ve talked about religion, we’ve talked about race, we’ve talked about the unconscious mind—but this one is different. Many of the dancers and myself spent some time with women who are in the breast cancer support program of the BCCP. I put out the question and simply said, ‘Tell me what your experience has been?’ and I will tell you a little bit of mine, and we just let them go from there.