After seeing the video clip of Spiral Dances on YouTube and being told by Chas that he couldn't identify me in clips of the first one in 1979, I found this still from the same event. I don't know who shot it: I suspect it may have been Kevyn Lutton. Here you can see me on the right (second person in, about a third of the way down from top of the photo), wearing a velvet and brocade robe and leaning back a bit because Deirdre's on my hip, but you can't really see her, or her bald father, the late Rod Wolfer. I think the woman in the right foreground is Glenn Turner.
The dancer in the big white Maiden mask in the video is Diane Baker, co-author of Circle Round. The three goddess masks were made by Medea Maquis and weighed a ton. They are now in a private collection. The Elements masks, which you can't see but are also big heavy suckers, were made by Eleanor Myers.* They were clay and I think that over the years all of them have broken.
I remember Selene Kumin Vega dancing one of the goddesses. Forgive my senior mind for not recalling exactly which one -- Mother, I think. It was a long time ago. Selene is slender and graceful. She choreographed the Goddess dance at one Spiral Dance (at the SF Women's Building) in which I dance one of three crones (the late Judy Foster being another). Selene has the ability to bring out the best in people. She never made me, who's not much of a dancer, feel clumsy or awkward, just magical. Or "priestessly," if you will.
* If anyone knows Eleanor's current whereabouts, I would dearly love to know too. Please contact me at herself@machanightmare.com if you have any information.
Even though it's a old appearing photo, it shows us just how new many of the core/key events supporting Neo-Pagan Craft actually are. It's a new movement, still growing in energy, encompassed by the ongoing lifetimes of many of its participants.
ReplyDeleteFWIW, I think that Glenn Turner's the one in the front, too.
Now I see you! I will have to look at the video again.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful pic. Remembering my first Spiral Dance was more of sleeves-on-fire affair :P
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh, I just discovered this post! (I googled myself with the "Kumin" in the middle, which I'm returning to). I actually did not dance one of the goddesses (that's why you couldn't remember which!) - I was one of three "muses," wearing a red sari wrapped in a non-sari way, and a wonderful red headdress - that's me in the middle, just to the left in the photo of where you were. I led the spiral dance that first year.
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