Dance Alum Brings Artists, Audiences Together with Art Bath Salon Series
Dance alum Elizabeth Yilmaz ’08
For Dance alum Elizabeth Yilmaz ’08, the chaotic years of the pandemic had at least one silver lining: innovation born of necessity.
In 2020, when Covid brought live performances to a halt and forced the city’s cultural institutions to suspend their programs, she and her friends looked for ways to keep their local artistic community going. Yilmaz, who has danced with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet for more than a decade, helped arrange virtual dance classes and Zoom meetings with her fellow ballerinas, though they longed for the magic of in-person audiences and face-to-face collaborations. “We were saying, ‘we all miss each other. Is there any way we can do a concert?’” she recalled.
It was a daunting question, but she and Met dancer Mara Driscoll got to work, tapping their networks to find a solution. In March 2021, they produced a socially distanced one-hour show at an East Village studio featuring Met dancers, orchestra, and chorus members. With Covid safety measures in place, they had an audience of just 16 people; still, the Wall Street Journal praised the event as a return of artists to performing for in-person spectators.
Moreover, Yilmaz and Driscoll were so inspired by the experience and the rawness of performing in a smaller venue that they used the show as a launching pad to produce additional showcases in the city, bringing together a mix of dance, music, and visual art in intimate settings.
Although those performances started as a response to the pandemic, they continue to this day as the art salon series Art Bath. Only instead of one-hour programs, events span whole weekends. Recently, they have gone international: Over the summer, Art Bath made its first foray outside of New York City with a petit salon in Paris. And though Art Bath shows are often hosted independently at the historic Midtown art gallery the Blue Building, cultural institutions are increasingly looking to partner with Yilmaz, Driscoll, and their team for co-productions.
Indeed, in April, Art Bath partnered with the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, staging an immersive performance for the church’s spring banquet, which raises money for art programs. A similar event with the cathedral will take place this fall. In June, Art Bath teamed up with the photography museum Fotografiska New York to curate performance selections for Pride.
Even as it expands, however, the series’ original goals remain intact. “We still want to keep it a place for community and a place where artists feel comfortable trying new things,” Yilmaz said. That means retaining the layer of vulnerability that has been present since the first show, with artists using Art Bath’s smaller venues to “try something new that they might want to take out into the broader world,” Yilmaz said or collaborate with other artists they had never worked with.
Among other things, Yilmaz said she was proud that Art Bath had been able to pair Devon Teuscher, a principal dancer with American Ballet Theater, with Jodi Melnick, a contemporary choreographer, and Quamaine Daniels, a Brooklyn-based master of the street dance Flexn, with the Met Opera Chamber Ensemble for performances. Daniels and the ensemble went on to perform their piece at Carnegie Hall.
“These are people I’ve always admired from afar and just really respected their work,” Yilmaz said. “And now I’m working with them firsthand and seeing their ideas and wishes come to life.”
Audiences feel the specialness of it as well, she added. “Sometimes you see people get emotional. That Mara and I have created a space where artists can make something, and audiences are having this reaction—that’s my favorite arc of it.”
Maximizing MMC Connections
Since the beginning, Art Bath has incorporated MMC students and alums in a myriad of ways. As part of the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine performance, Xin Ying, a Martha Graham Dance principal dancer, modeled a custom gown with a 25-foot train created by Mondo Morales ’12, a Dance alum and MMC’s Assistant Director of Visual and Performing Arts Admissions. Yilmaz’s classmate, dancer, and producer Jenna Liberati Sherman ’08 serves on Art Bath’s advisory board. And MMC Dance students and alums are often part of Art Bath’s team of volunteers who assist with production setup, ticket taking, and coat check under the direction of volunteer coordinator Evelyn Johnson ’24.
“Dancers can do anything, so they’re wonderful to have in the building,” Yilmaz said. “When we set up the lights and sound or lay down the Marley [flooring]—they’re the worker bees that help the show happen seamlessly.”
Though a strong 71st Street presence is, in some ways, a natural result of the reach MMC’s performing arts programs have in the city, it’s also a reflection of the place the College holds in Yilmaz’s heart. Studying Dance at MMC, she said, was a wish fulfilled.
Yilmaz’s love for movement came early; her mother owns a ballet studio near the family’s Roswell, Georgia home, and Yilmaz grew up dancing and surrounded by dancers. Her dream was to study at a school in NYC, with MMC at the top of her list. “Marymount’s Dance department has such a wonderful reputation, and I just had to be in New York,” Yilmaz said. “There really wasn’t another option for me. That was my heart’s desire.”
At MMC, she was exposed to modern dance and, in her first year, was accepted into the MMC Dance company, helping her to clarify her career aspirations. “At first, I didn’t have any bigger ambitions than being in a show and getting paid to dance,” she said. “But MMC sharpened my taste, and I began to say, ‘Oh, I’d like to tour with a company.’”
After graduating, she joined Ballet Hispánico of New York, where she got to teach master classes and realized she was as talented an instructor as she was a dancer. She continues to teach dance throughout the country and is on faculty with the 92nd Street Y and the Joffrey Ballet Trainee Program.
She has been an active MMC alum ever since, serving as the nominating chair of the College’s Dance Advisory Board and staying in close contact with faculty such as Associate Professor of Dance Nancy Lushington and Katie Langan, MMC’s interim vice president for academic affairs and dean of the faculty who previously served as chair of the Department of Dance. “MMC has enriched my life in so many ways, and I’m honored to be a part of the community,” Yilmaz said. “And Katie and Nancy are pillars in my life and also in the dance world.”
They’re cheering her on not only with Art Bath but her next big project: This month, Yilmaz begins a semester-long program at Harvard Business School. Titled “Crossover to Business,” it’s designed to help professional athletes build business acumen and recently began to admit dancers. Yilmaz applied on a whim a few months ago after meeting program alums through Art Bath. “I’m looking forward to seeing what I can learn and glean from the program,” she said.
As MMC students navigate their own new semester, she offers this advice. “Be kind to yourself and everyone around you because those are the people you’re going to be working with someday,” she said. “And follow your intuition and those little passions on the side—you never know what they’ll blossom into.”
To volunteer with Art Bath or support its events, email Yilmaz
Published: September 18, 2024
