ABOUT
NICOLE
CHARLTON GOODBRAND
is a dance artist based in Moh’kinsstis (Calgary, Alberta). She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Dance from the University of Calgary, a Bachelor of Arts graduate diploma from The School of Alberta Ballet, and a Professional Dancers’ Postgraduate Teaching Certificate from the Royal Academy of Dance (Berlin), where she graduated with distinction. Nicole has performed with La Caravan Dance Theatre, Corps Bara Dance Theatre, mixOLOGYdanceMine, J-SIK Movements, O2 Dance Company, Surge Co., Dancers’ Studio West (DSW), Project InTandem, WM Physical Theatre and with choreographers Davida Monk, Linnea Swan, Barbara England, Sylvie Moquin, Melissa Monteros, Wojciech Mochniej and Pamela Tzeng.
She has presented her choreography in DSW’s Annual Alberta Dance Festival and Quick+Dirty Festival for Emerging Choreographers and Ideas, To The AWE, WiLDDOGS International Screendance Festival, Dance Montage, Nextgen Festival, Skylines Dance and Film Series, Springboard Performance's Fluid Fest, ArtsCommons TD Broadcast Series and Amplify Series, BodiesIndivisible's Generations and has been commissioned by Ember Dance Company. She is the Artistic Associate of the WM2 Dance Company and a performer with W&M Physical Theatre. She has been a part of DJD Creative Residency Program 2021/23, The Grand Creative Residency 2021/23, W&M Physical Theatre’s Artist in Residency Program 2017/23, and ArtsCommons' TD Incubator 2021/22.
Nicole is a dance educator and certified teacher with the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD-RTS), teaching contemporary, modern, and classical ballet technique at North Calgary Dance Centre. She also teaches as a sessional instructor at the School of Creative and Performing Arts at the University of Calgary, and has been a guest instructor for Surge Co., The School of Alberta Ballet, Ember Dance Company, and O2 Dance Company.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Every time I am on an airplane, I find myself looking down at the tiny homes and cars below and yearn to peel open every roof, like tiny sardine cans, and glimpse into the private and intimate moments of someone else’s life. To know the conversations, the behaviours, and the unresolved stories that these spaces, and their inhabitants, possess. I want to taste the food they make, I want to see the items they cherish, and I want to observe the intimate and bizarre habits that they reserve for private.
As a Calgary based dance artist, choreographer, and dance educator, I am interested in creating work that is heeded by curiosity and that highlights the magic that can be found in the mundane. I value art that is engaging and inquisitive, and that can focus an audience’s attention to a foreign, yet familiar landscape.
The subject matters I explore emphasizes the everyday narrative of humans and their relationships to one another, to themselves, and to the environments they construct. I use dance and performance art to create both solo and ensemble work that illustrates the layered complexities of surreptitious human behaviour and distorted personal realities. I am particularly interested in examining the contradictions of a person’s thoughts and behaviours in public vs. private, and seek to investigate how we all justify our own morality while often judging that of others.
NICOLE CHARLTON GOODBRAND
PERFORMING
TEACHING
TEACHING
CREDENTIALS
Registered Teaching Status- Royal Academy of Dance, 2015-Present
Professional Dancers' Postgraduate Teaching Certificate, Royal Academy of Dance, Berlin, Germany
Bachelor of Arts University of Calgary, Calgary, A.B.
Bachelor of Arts Graduate Diploma, School of Alberta Ballet, Calgary, A.B.
PHILOSOPHY
OF TEACHING
My role as a dance educator is to engage students in a physical practice that generates original thought and equips students with the appropriate skills to develop a strong understanding of movement technique, to refine their individual artistic voices, and to promote a pursuit of life long learning. By keeping the whole dancer – body, mind, and spirit – as the priority, students of all ages, physical and cognitive abilities, and levels of training are capable of finding enjoyment and success within their own dance journey. My primary focus is to ensure that each class offers students an equitable environment that facilitates their individual pathways to learning and aids them in becoming a highly knowledgeable, healthy, and technically proficient dancer.
As a classically trained dancer and contemporary dance artist myself, I have spent years studying, teaching, and performing in a range of dance styles. My dance teaching methods pull from my breadth of work and experience, including classical ballet disciplines, such as; the Royal Academy of Dance, Cecchetti, and Vaganova, modern dance disciplines, including; Limon, Graham, and Laban analysis, as well as Gyrokenesis and Gyrotonic, yoga, Feldenkrais method and somatic bodywork. I have also studied contemporary dance extensively with Davida Monk, Melissa Monteros, Wojciech Mochniej, and Maya Lewendowsky. These experiences have influenced my teaching vocabulary to incorporate classical modes of technique with improvisation, conditioning, athletic cross training, mental visualization, and use of imagery.
Initially, in my early years of training, I had a difficult time understanding the connection between classical ballet and contemporary dance technique. I was under the impression that each style of dance directly contradicted the other in training and in performance. Years later, when I began to look at movement as a series of universal principles that underline all physicality and modes of movement, I became acutely aware that movement, regardless of genre, is derived from the same basic principles of bio-mechanical understanding and personal expression. I discovered how to apply weight, spiral, gravity, swing, and poise into both my ballet and contemporary training, and learned how to incorporate the aforementioned principles of movement into my teaching practice by utilizing the innate movement functions of a student’s body to instinctively inform them on how to best employ their natural abilities to achieve sustained artistic expression through movement. Functional posture, alignment, core strength, line, weight placement, along with classical aesthetic values of simplicity, balance, and harmony, are at the forefront of my teaching practice and are used regularly to help inform dancers on how and why they are moving. It is also used to strengthen their ability to perceive, feel, sense, and perform with an elevated level of integrated embodiment.
Every aspect of movement is integrally human and, therefore, is inherently expressive by default. Personal choices, such as, employment of speed, dynamic quality, weight, musical responsiveness, and directionality, facilitate a dancers’ ability to utilize their technical and physical capabilities and helps them to convey their internal dialogues and emotional landscapes. No dancing body is the same, which is why the art of teaching relies on a collaborative exchange between the teacher and student. This collaboration promotes an optimal learning environment that keeps the students’ motivation, physical and cognitive abilities, and level of investment at the forefront of their education. I teach to inspire personal discovery and to encourage curiosity, experimentation, and accurate anatomical function. I support the harmonious exchange of learning between teacher and student by encouraging continual feedback and self-improvement, and by designing a class that can meet the individual needs of each student.
