For The Multidisciplinary Collaborator
Influential & Inspiring People
The IIP Series, also known as the Influential and Inspiring People Series, was created to showcase the many talented, hardworking, and innovative individuals I have had the privilege of knowing. I want to be able to share their stories while inspiring others to build their own paths along the way. My goal is to interview and photograph a list of (so-called “ordinary”) individuals who, in my eyes, are extraordinary. Many of them are making an impact in this world through their passions, and I want their stories to be heard. This one is FOR THE MULTIDISCIPLINARY COLLABORATOR
Francesca Penzani
I’ve had the honor and privelege of working with Francesca throughout my time at CalArts as not only a teacher and mentor, but as a friend. She is a spunky woman with an energetic soul ready to jump on the next big idea of hers. She is filled with so much light and vibrance, her energy is big enought to fill the earth. Her personality feeds her creative mind through genuine connections with artists from various backgrounds and disciplines. At CalArts, she left a lasting impression of gratitude as the creator of Dance for Camera as well as Play Labs which allowed the unity of camera, dance, music, and tech to come together as one.
Francesca’s roots are from Italy, making her hospitality and welcoming nature my favorite thing about her. As she invited me over for tea, we sat down and had a long awaited conversation about her trials and tribulations growing up in the projects of Italy and finding her curiosities in the art world which later took her to London, California, and back to Italy with a new perspective on life. Let me introduce you to Francesca Penzani.
Do You Remember How Old You Were When You First Started Dancing/ Got Interested In The Arts?
With dancing I was late. I’ve always been interested but I wasn’t allowed. We didn’t have any possibilities and money that allowed me to take dance classes. Coming from a working-class family and growing up in the housing projects… even though my grandma was a Montessori teacher and had an artistic background, during WWII they lost everything, my mother was working all the time, but I do remember that the nuns were organizing theater around February when there was Carnival. A few times a week, I was allowed to go with another girl to rehearsals. That’s where I was able to act and realized I had something there. My grandparents couldn’t come to see me but I enjoyed the performance part. The dancing I always loved and running up the small apartment corridor pretending to dance.. or in the streets.
I took my first dance classes through a community organization. I was working in a factory printing t-shirts and stickers when I was 18. On Saturdays, I would pay to attend the Jazz classes but everyone else had trained since they were three years old and I didn’t. But when the music started (I remember it was Jorge Benson on Broadway) I was like okay and would go home and practice.
The teachers there were married and had their own dance company. They said, “come with us… we want you to train more” but the owner of the studio didn’t want me to go because I could only pay one class and everyone else was coming from a better financial background.
I went to London, deep down because I wanted to dance but I wasn’t saying that. I made the excuse that I had to learn English. I knew it was possible to make a living there. I started to take dance classes in the evenings. I started to work and took evening dance classes in the community center and evening classes at the London Contemporary Dance School. Eventually four years later, I auditioned for the London Contemporary Dance School. I had a scholarship so I didn’t have to pay for my education. It was three years of school and on the third year they sent me to CalArts as an exchange student. It was the first time they were doing an exchange with London Contemporary Dance School and California Institute of the Arts during the fall of 1989.
There was a class at CalArts called Video for Dance, in the E110 room.
I went back and they asked me to stay a fourth year; it’s by invitation because they create a student dance company. Then I started working independently teaching creative dance for children at The Place. It seems like every place I go to study, I end up teaching there. The head of the Critical Studies and the Dance School offered me to do an M.A. in dance and film because they could see that I was doing my own women's show choreographing and making my own dance films. I was supposed to go to CalArts for one year and go back to London to give my final dissertation.
In London, I started to establish myself as a video/ dance maker. I got commissioned by choreographers to film their residencies and make documentaries, but I dropped everything to come to CalArts.
I thought I was going to do Integrated Media and join the Film School, but I was not allowed. I am self-made and self-taught for everything. The bureaucracy of CalArts, it’s understandable that they don’t have places for everyone. I was pissed that I couldn’t do it. I actually found the other day, from the papers I was throwing away, that I wrote down in 97’
“I am here and all I want to do is to make dance films… how am I going to do that…”
Even if I was auditing, I found my way to do it. I had the support of some rebels from the technical faculty. I have been thrown out of the editing sweet… you know… those things. I was laughed at and insulted by certain people who were running the Film School questioning what a dancer is doing here, we don’t need a dancer.
My dream was to create a program, dance film - dance for the camera, for the lenses. Last year with Covid all classes and performances were for the camera basically.
What Work Are You Interested In Creating When You Go Back To Italy?
I wanted to go back to Italy to create residencies for artists and filmmakers and collaborations and bring the Play Labs that I created here and bring them over to Italy. Play Lab started from my wanting to create classes that worked interdisciplinarily and collaboratively. The Dance School joined the Winter Session in 2017 (CalArts) and I experimented with playing around, bringing parachutes, and getting Simon Greenburg to do the sound. I didn’t want to just give another editing class. We wanted to work with the projector. I proposed a collaboration with the Music School that was opened to musicians, dancers, and the entire institute. The second time, I brought in a former student, so I started inviting graduate students and alumni to collaborate and co-teach with me.
I realized in 2019 there were so many students that I could not handle everyone and I needed help. In 2020, I invited Spencer Theoberg, Lilia and Justin to join me. They jumped in and everyone collaborated and last year we did it all online.
In Italy, I need a break from everything and be with my mom which is very important. It’s been very hard to let go of this chapter of my life. I’ve been at CalArts 24 years (2 as a student and 22 as faculty.)
Did You Ever Feel Any Doubt About Pursuing A Career In The Arts?
I didn’t know I was going to be a dancer, choreographer, and film maker; it was a desire. It all started from theatre. I couldn’t speak English so I started with mime and movement. The dream was to dance but I always thought I was too late. By the time I went to dance school I was 24, so I had to catch up with everyone else. Once you put your mind to it, even if you break something, you go ahead and do it. It didn’t mean I didn’t have normal jobs. I had to sacrifice a lot - I was a secretary in an office, a chamber maid and night porter in a hotel, I waitressed in a jazz club until 3 in the morning. It was really, friken tough never having enough money to pay for dance classes. When I was a night porter in London, they would pay me 14 pounds/ week and all the money was going towards the dance classes and the bus so I would eat the eggs, bread and butter they were giving me.
It was a lot to sacrifice never buyin the things that you like, living in a situation with broken windows. It was adventurous at the same time. My love life and social life - forget about it. Even though I didn’t completely believe in myself I had to do it. Then you find that support around you in teachers, mentors, and friends. People started to see the talents and fire I had in me that they started to search for me.
Have You Ever Gotten Artist Block, Not Feeling Inspired To Create? What Do You Do To Get Out Of That?
The practice of meditation, yoga, walking in nature, and writing in journals. The journals have been helping me a lot. It sees like everytime I have to do a piece, it has come out from a necessity. I remember from “Double Up",” I was suffering that semester at CalArts a lot because I felt unappreciated. I was going to a therapist for a few weeks because I was so depressed.I remember watching La La Land and remember imagining Nedra there playing the base. Everyone hated the movie because the protagonists could not dance, but I thought it was quite sweet. I was not there to judge that they could not dance. The film was nice. I thought, I would like to feature Nedra. I had this idea straight away. Everyone was telling me, you are going to hate the movie. I asked for inspiration and was inpsired by La La Land. There was this voice telling me what to do. It was that creative voice calling out and things started to fall into place within a few weeks. After that, I haven’t had an artist block.
Now I have curiousity for what’s next. It feels like that chapter is done. I enjoyed all the dance films but I’m also done. Maybe I’ll do it later on, but I started to see so many not so experimental. I started to realize that the last CineDanz with Mavera, we have to make it more experiemental otherwise it becomes a cliche of the beauty itself. It’s so easy to film a beautiful dancer and now you have equipment that there’s no problem. You have a phone that can make a beautiful film. I didn’t have any of that. For me, it has always been about what it is you want to say and that’s what has always been for me dance theatre. I started because I was inspired to watch Pina Bausch so that’s where I come from. With that, I’m like, what’s next. I want to go towards more experiemental and take away the beauty. I want to challenge intellegence or curiosity. It doesn’t necessarily need to have a message. There’s a challenge of the way you see things and how you perceive them. You go against the currant. If I’m starting to become so overcritical, it seems like I’m saturated. I’m done for right now. When you give feedback and not everyone is accepting of them, they feel judged but I’m asking what are the other perspectives?
Attending CalArts As A Student And Faculty, What Has It Taught You?
The bad experiences were not being taken seriously, but then I had to remember that there were other people that did take me seriously. Some of the heads of the departments did not respect me so much. I realized after the years, I am a female. Now there are many women doing it. When I started, there was not. I am Italian, so I have an accent and I am a dancer…. I was not taken seriously. I didn’t realize that I was a kind of pioneer but for me, pioneers were Pina Bausch and my former teachers. Maybe people are frightened by the energy and power that we can have and we don’t see, but they see. It’s that resilience from my background doing any other jobs that you carry on and you find a way. If my work was not appreciated, I concentrated on not the politics of the school but the students; and that was my creative outlet. When teaching, you also have individuals that don’t want to hear or be challenged. That became an inspiration for me to get something from somebody who didn’t want to do dance films. My artistic outlet was to allow other artists to flourish. I had a student from Lebanon that would say to me, “you see what you are, you are an artist maker helping the other artists become.” [facilitating artistic growth] The classes became the playground.
I love collaborations - I love it more when we are working together. I never had help with the production and distribution of my own work, so I end up having to do three jobs (that’s my fault for undermining myself) finding the money to pay everyone else, and never paying myself. Sometimes you get faculty development grants but it’s little and it’s not sufficient.
Teaching is more satisfactory in that sense because you have it throughout the year and it’s a consistent thing. Though I love creating my own work and collaborating I don’t have time to run after people; it’s another job.
My mom was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, so I chose to dedicate myself for that. She’s my future. To go through the healing for both of us. She’s still independent, but it’s time to be home. Going back to the housing projects, it’s going to be a totally new life for me. No bedrooms, no space, a lot of noise and neighbors. I want to move but it’s going to take some time and money. Learning about patience. I have to keep on writing. The thing is, I just got certified with my Yoga Teacher Training of 200 hours. I’ve been doing Yoga for 20 years. Incorporating movement in a creative way, going back to the body.
It’s possible to create some residencies there with outreach. Italy, politically is really crazy right now and we don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s the wrong time to go to Europe right now. The question is what can I bring with who I am, over there… after almost 40 years of being abroad. I was going to throw everything and start new, but my friends convince me to do the archival of my work.
I’m interested in the metaphysical and studying the lines of energies in the ground and in the skies. I was born on the top of a hill in Italy, and there was a church from the 1400’s and only two apartments. The area is now a sanctuary. It is a sacred place. It would be lovely to go live around there.
I’m curious, I am free, I don’t know, it’s scary, going up and down recently. I have to say goodbye on my own terms. That free spirit I am, I had to run away from it originally, now I am going to go back.
I realize that I am free to BE and start all over again. It’s the third chapter of my life.
What Advice Would You Have For Anyone Wanting An Artistic Career?
Not to get caught into the idea of labeling a “successful artist” depending on how many likes you have on social media. Question the artfortm that you want to do. The art form isn’t just about oneself, but about being able to share. If you don’t have a job straight away as a dancer or movement maker, find other ways how you express it. You can go and teach and work with kids, that’s also an art form. If you want to be on stage or need to be on stage, question whats the thing about being on stage. I am not into any more of the proscenium stage - its just a division. What is it that you really think even if its politically correct or not. It may be something really controversial, but the core of the art, for me, is about sharing your energy with others and with that there is an exchange that can create conversations. Forget about the me me me and start to think about us.. and then you might make money someday.
website: https://www.francescapenzani.com
vimeo: https://vimeo.com/user6130533
instagram: https://www.instagram.com/franpenz/
