Tom Bell
I’m a partner in and co-founder of Chronicle and the owner of MineCart. I’m also the co-founder and founding program director of the AJC Decatur Book Festival, one of the nation’s largest literary events. For several years, I was the book editor and dance critic for Creative Loafing. I’m currently on the board of Emory Friends of Dance.
I study and perform with Crossover Movement Arts and work ad hoc with several other choreographers. I also study aerial dance with The D’Air Project. I have three times attended advanced movement and choreography summer intensives with Pilobolus. I’m also active in the contact improvisation community.
I came to dance late and through a side door. I was a competitive cyclist at Carleton College, in Northfield, Minnesota. Looking for a way to keep my legs strong in the winter, I recalled an episode of “The Brady Bunch.”
Actually, it turns out that my memory made a mash-up of episodes of both “The Brady Bunch” and “My Three Sons.” But in my memory, at least, there was an episode in which Peter, wanting to get better at running the hurdles, was convinced by Mean Joe Green to take a ballet class, after which he became an adept hurdler. Now, check IMDB all you want; you won’t find this episode, but the point is: Mean Joe Green was telling me to take ballet to become a better cyclist. So I did. And it did indeed help. I was a pretty good cyclist. I was not a good ballet dancer. At all. But I kept taking it anyway, and slowly I got a little better. Also: I started enjoying ballet for itself, not just as cross-training. Then I took a class in modern dance, and I liked that even more, so I kept doing it.
After college, I went to grad school and ended up afterward in Atlanta, writing for Creative Loafing and covering dance. Inspired by George Plimpton, I sometimes wrote about dance from the inside. To write about the Tango community, I took every Tango class that would have me… A story on the resurgence of breakdancing? I hung out with the B-boys and learned what I could.
Then, in 2005, I wrote a story about contact improvisation, an improvisational dance form that emphasizes partner movement and weight sharing. I fell in love with the form and kept doing it. Much to my own surprise, my continued presence in the contact improv scene led to invitations to perform in the works of several choreographers. Those performances led to other invitations. And eventually invitations not only to perform but to choreograph. None of this was part of my plan, but it has, much to my delight, become a very important part of my life.
All thanks to Mean Joe Green… or something.
I study and perform with Crossover Movement Arts and work ad hoc with several other choreographers. I also study aerial dance with The D’Air Project. I have three times attended advanced movement and choreography summer intensives with Pilobolus. I’m also active in the contact improvisation community.
I came to dance late and through a side door. I was a competitive cyclist at Carleton College, in Northfield, Minnesota. Looking for a way to keep my legs strong in the winter, I recalled an episode of “The Brady Bunch.”
Actually, it turns out that my memory made a mash-up of episodes of both “The Brady Bunch” and “My Three Sons.” But in my memory, at least, there was an episode in which Peter, wanting to get better at running the hurdles, was convinced by Mean Joe Green to take a ballet class, after which he became an adept hurdler. Now, check IMDB all you want; you won’t find this episode, but the point is: Mean Joe Green was telling me to take ballet to become a better cyclist. So I did. And it did indeed help. I was a pretty good cyclist. I was not a good ballet dancer. At all. But I kept taking it anyway, and slowly I got a little better. Also: I started enjoying ballet for itself, not just as cross-training. Then I took a class in modern dance, and I liked that even more, so I kept doing it.
After college, I went to grad school and ended up afterward in Atlanta, writing for Creative Loafing and covering dance. Inspired by George Plimpton, I sometimes wrote about dance from the inside. To write about the Tango community, I took every Tango class that would have me… A story on the resurgence of breakdancing? I hung out with the B-boys and learned what I could.
Then, in 2005, I wrote a story about contact improvisation, an improvisational dance form that emphasizes partner movement and weight sharing. I fell in love with the form and kept doing it. Much to my own surprise, my continued presence in the contact improv scene led to invitations to perform in the works of several choreographers. Those performances led to other invitations. And eventually invitations not only to perform but to choreograph. None of this was part of my plan, but it has, much to my delight, become a very important part of my life.
All thanks to Mean Joe Green… or something.
