(1992) February 7 and 8   Spirit Figures premiered in an evening of concert dances titled Dance for the Earth, Arlington, Virginia.   Dances in the evening-length program of five works, were created in commemoration and honored awareness of planet earth.

(1992) May 20 – June 1, 1992 Spirit Figures choreography was reconstructed with four MWDCCo and local dancers in Brasilia, Brazil prior to the United Nation’s Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, June 3 to 14, 1992.

In Spirit Figures, each dancer carries and performs with a unique physical “spirit figure” as a partner.  In the USA, the spirit figure started with a healthy sized tree limb with a large plastic, inflated head, and other trash (old fabric, bottles, cans, other junk), items that cause harm and destruction to planet earth’s oceans and all life, everywhere. Hilda Thorpe, noted American visual artist, Alexandria, Virginia, was a major contributor to the Spirit Figures  performance in the USA with her beautiful organic homemade paper objects.

In Brazil, a brilliant Brazilian visual artist created the “spirit figures” props like sea creatures using foam rubber and other available materials that were more appropriate for representing discarded/trash in Brazil.  Since there were no trees of any height in Brasilia, where the reconstruction occurred, bamboo poles (abundant in Brasilia) were used instead of tree limbs as the basic spirit figure (partner) to be manipulated by each dancer.  Dancers performed together this beautiful and somewhat awkward ritual with their new redesigned Brazilian “spirit figure” partner.

Four Dance Construction Company dancers toured with Maida to Brazil to participate with international artists for ecology and local Brazilian dancers in the first ever United Nation’s Earth Summit (Eco ’92). We were in Brazil for almost 5 weeks. Our first three weeks were primarily in Brasilia where we taught dance and the environment with elementary school children and performed often on the mall (lawn area) near the buildings housing government officials.

(Find more explicit information about “Spirit Figures” performance in Brazil.)