Legwork on the road from poverty
Dance school gives young Colombians upward mobility

Jens Erik Gould, Chronicle Foreign Service
Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Cartagena de Indias, Colombia -- In a dim practice space tucked into the colorful colonial district of this popular tourist center, a dancer wears a black T-shirt that reads, "Dream as if you'll live forever; live as if you'll die today."

Alvaro Restrepo, 49, who leads his dancers to extend their muscular torsos and outstretched legs to the baroque melodies of Vivaldi's Four Seasons, has taken that quote from actor James Dean to heart.

Dance is precisely what he's using to rescue youths impoverished or displaced by the country's brutal 4-decade-old civil war. Celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, Restrepo's Colegio del Cuerpo, or College of the Body, is part of a growing wave of programs across Colombia that are helping embattled children develop a way out of conflict through love of the arts.

His dance academy has been honored by the United Nations as an alternative for conflict resolution in war-torn areas and praised by the contemporary dance world for its cutting-edge choreographies. Its best dancers have performed across Europe and Latin America, and made their U.S. debut in New York last month.

"They've had the opportunity to become citizens of the world, and this is something that's not usual in this kind of society," Restrepo said in perfect English with traces of both U.S. and British accents.

His program is taking on a crisis that stumps governments and nongovernmental organizations around the world: How to rescue children who grow up in bloody conflicts or destitute poverty. Colombia, which has more than 3 million internally displaced people -- the world's second-largest displaced population, after Sudan -- is a most troubling case.

At an early age, many Colombian children are forced with a terrible decision -- either earn money by joining a death squad or drug gang, or remain poor and vulnerable to such groups.

Some of the academy's young dancers live in Cartagena's sprawling shantytown called Nelson Mandela, named after the South African leader. It is home to thousands of displaced people from the surrounding region, and until recently the slum had no running water, electricity or public transportation. Right-wing death squads have targeted residents and dumped their victims on slum streets.

Restrepo's school is one of the few vehicles for helping children in violent Nelson Mandela escape such poverty.

Take Viridiana Calvo. At 10, criminals killed her father. Soon after, her mother, a cashier, lost her job after the supermarket where she worked was bombed. Out of money, the family moved to Nelson Mandela. Viridiana stopped going to school.

Fast forward eight years and the tall, fair-skinned 18-year-old prances gracefully across stages on several continents. Her dedication to dance has earned her a spot in the school's professional dance company, a scholarship and a monthly salary, which has helped her family move to a safer area.

"I owe all of this to the College of the Body -- to be able to tell you that I believe I can live with dignity," Calvo said.

Victor Cassiani, 17, and his family moved to Nelson Mandela after armed groups fighting over turf forced them to leave their rural farm whose corn, plantains and cassava harvests were their livelihood. "We can't go back because those groups kill," Cassiani said.

Having lost everything, three generations of his extended family now crowd into a tattered wooden shack deep among the shantytown's disorderly hovels and muddy roads. His grandfather, who sells vegetables in the city market, and mother, a maid, said the dance program will bring Victor an opportunity they never had.

"Before you had to have money to be able to pursue a profession," said Eluterio Cassiani, the grandfather. "That's why I tell him to keep going so he'll be a great person who everyone admires."

This depressed area with mainly African Colombian residents is also a stark reminder of the social rift that divides Cartagena, which is essentially two cities in one. The better-known side is the historical walled city that tourists flock to, a UNESCO World Heritage site and vacationing spot for such renowned figures as Colombia's famed author Gabriel Garcia Marquez and the country's mostly-white elite. Between the two is an entrenched racism that still festers in a city whose role as a major slave port once made it a lucrative hub for the Spanish crown, historians say.

The dance school, which includes many African Colombians, aims to mend the divide, and has met resistance not just because of class conflict. Cartagena is used to traditional music such as the cumbia and the Caribbean genre known as salsa -- not the eclectic movements of contemporary dance.

The elites "have tried to ignore it," Restrepo said. "But I think it's becoming more and more difficult to ignore. In a way I think it's a project that's contributing to change the mentality of the city."

Nothing seemed further removed from violence and poverty than contemporary dance when Restrepo, a protege of world-renowned American dancer Martha Graham and other innovators of modern dance in New York, returned to his native Colombia two decades ago.

Restrepo performed internationally until he teamed up with French dance director Marie-France Delieuvin to build the Cartegena academy, believing that "arts were a very good tool for helping kids."

Last year, the Japanese government and the World Bank signed an agreement to give academy students not only dance classes, but courses in ethics, drug prevention and sex education to more than 3,000 of the city's poorest children. Sponsors also include the Swiss UBS bank, a German pharmaceutical company Boehringer Ingelheim and the Ministry of Culture.

Meanwhile, Restrepo and his dancers resist being labeled a social experiment, insisting they be recognized foremost for their high artistic standards.

"When we show the company we don't want (people) to come see a social project," Restrepo said. "We want them to come and see great dancers."