Dance company examines our multiple selves in Wichita performances

We all have multiple selves, Regina Klenjoski says.

And the founder of her eponymous Wichita-based dance company wants to explore that concept in “The Multiplicity of Us,” premiering this weekend.

“I’ve always had a real deep connection to my heritage and almost a sense of loss that I don’t experience it the way my cousins or my parents do,” Klenjoski, a Macedonia native, said. “I wanted to explore what it was that creates a sense of self for someone. How do I deal with multiple selves? Everybody has that in different ways.”

Through her own thoughts and that of the members of her company — through prose, poetry and journaling — those ideas were turned into dance, with recorded and live dialogue playing a large role.

“As I got deeper into the process, another question that popped up was ‘Are we really these independent identities or are we one identity that is flexible and pulls from the different aspects of our lives?’” she said. “So much language says we wear multiple hats, we have multiple identities. But I really think that language is impactful. We are oneself, and what is our internal dialogue versus our external dialogue when we think about how we move through the world and interact with one another.”

Performing will be company dancers Aviance Battles, Rile Reavis, Rhiannon Vieyra and Elleigh McClelland, and apprentice Tim Portwood.

“The Multiplicity of Us” is not only the Regina Klenjoski Dance Company’s spring performance, but also Klenjoski’s master’s thesis for a MFA in dance and creative writing from Wilson College in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.

The dancers will perform to recordings of an original score by Aurélie Webb, a British composer who Klenjoski found while networking and looking for female musicians.

“Since I was thinking about femininity and womanhood, I wanted a female collaborator,” said Klenjoski, who has been collaborating with male composers for 23 years. “I made it a mission to find a female composer, and it was hard. There weren’t that many.”

The venue for “The Multiplicity of Us” is a new one for the company — the ballroom inside the Lux Building in downtown Wichita.

Seating will be limited to 50 per performance.

“I wanted them to be close,” Klenjoski said of the audience. “I wanted them to hear the dancers talking and breathing and feel the energetic exchange between the dancers and the audience.

“It’s just a perfect venue for this piece,” she added.

‘THE MULTIPLICITY OF US’ BY REGINA KLENJOSKI DANCE COMPANY

When: 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 22; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 23

Where: Lux Ballroom, 120 E. 1st St. N, Wichita

Tickets: $20, from rkdc.org, 290-9284 or at the door