Wearing an Oaxacan huipil, a shirt and blanket pants, a group of young people and adults were seen in the Mexiamora square in the Center of Guanajuato. It was the first presentation of people with disabilities in it Cervantino International Festivalwhere they showed Oaxacan and Michoacan dances.
With artistic training and seven years of experience, Heart Down is a professional company that has found a vein of expression in dance and theater.
“These young people have a great career, they have done several plays. In Guanajuato they presented the musical kiss alley during the Fifth State Theater Meeting in 2023. They have done Beauty and the beast, Vaseline, Charm, Aladdin and The three little pigs”says Paulina Oliva, general director of Corazón Down Centro Psicoeducativo, based in León.
The organization has been looking at the needs and abilities of its members for seven years. “They are very artistic, very sociable, so we started putting on dances among ourselves, this led us to professionally seek support from teachers with great experience and with them we have been supporting each other daily in rehearsals, which are from 4 to 7.”
In the center and in the company there is no age limit, there are 26 people with different disability conditions: Down syndrome, intellectual and deafness.
Paulina says that they also have a very good coexistence among the team of mothers. “It is very important that you support us to give your children a good quality of life, good emotional and social development. With this work, they also develop motor skills.”
The director, who has a nephew with Down syndrome, comments that they are a professional company, since within the institution there are folk dance workshopstheater, body expression, contemporary dance and urban dance (hip hop).
The group obtained the distinctive Guanajuato Brand, which supports local talent and entrepreneurs and thus “we proudly represent our state and that opens up more spaces for us to present ourselves at a national and international level,” adding that they will soon travel to Chile.
Gamaliel Plata is 43 and is the leader of the group, that is, during the dances his companions follow his steps. “We are artists because we are dancers and mothers support their children. I am a leader of my classmates because I am older than them. There is another colleague from Corazón Down who is with the younger ones; and the girls support the teachers and the little children,” she says.
Her partner Celina Ramíres is the leader of the girls, with whom she partners when they dance danzón.
Breaking schemes
Maestro Fernando González Hernández is the artistic director of the group. His training as a graduate in regional dance from the University of Guanajuato and a secondary school teacher has been key in his work with Corazón Down, since he obtained the position a year and a half ago.
“As a dance instructor I had never worked with people with disabilities, so I broke many taboos and schemes that I had and it was quite an education for me. I found a very prepared group because they have catwalk classes because sometimes they are hired to model shoes and clothes in León. They also have classes in body expression, theater; They had an urban dance teacher and before that a folklore teacher, however this work had been interrupted.”
Fernando says that this background has sensitized young people to stage work. “I have worked with little children, adolescents, older adults, young people, all ages, but I realized that with them I had to take a different line.
“They are very spontaneous, I can teach them a dance in one way and in the end they, in the moment, present it how they feel.”
The teacher comments that the young people work a lot on repetition and if he establishes a dance structure for them it is very difficult for them to change it, “so I have to be very clear in the instructions, in the figures, in the sequences, because they memorize it with the song.” and so it is established.”
He adds that one of the characteristics to consider this group as professionals is autonomy. “During the dances there are times when they turn to look at me and I try to remind them of a twist or something, but really they do it on their own. Sometimes due to the logistics of the space they cannot see me and they have to react or guide each other, and I think that makes them more professional because they are capable of improvising and solving.”
Fernando says that there are times when, for example, someone’s partner doesn’t arrive and then they change the person, they leave and enter the scene, “they solve it in the moment. If they apply this in their lives, they are becoming more independent, they know how to solve problems and that is serving as a life experience beyond just dance.”
PCL
