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David Roussève Named Chair of the UCLA Department of World Arts and Cultures

David Rousseve has been named chair of UCLA’s Department of World Arts and Cultures (WAC) effective July 1 of this year. A choreographer, writer, director, dancer and actor, Roussève joined the WAC faculty in 1996 as an associate professor and was promoted to full professor in 2001.

“I am particularly delighted to welcome David Roussève to the helm of the Department of World Arts and Cultures,” said Christopher Waterman, dean of the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture. “I have worked side by side with him since we both arrived at UCLA and I can think of no one better qualified — by virtue of experience and sensibility — to take this unique interdisciplinary program to the next level.”

The Department of World Arts and Cultures was created in 1995 from the merger of the World Arts and Cultures program and the Department of Dance. WAC is a gathering of scholars, artists and educators who are dedicated to developing interdisciplinary, multicultural modes of investigation that address the complex cultural and artistic issues inherent in our multi-layered, contemporary world. The department offers a B.A. in world arts and cultures, an M.F.A. in dance, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in culture and performance.

“WAC is about innovation,” Roussève said. “In our unique blend of dance and cultural studies, we are developing new models for educating artists and scholars alike. In becoming more responsive to the ever-shifting needs of the contemporary world, we are committed to developing cultural workers better equipped to meet those needs. This is a particularly exciting time for our department as we continue to hone our curriculum and prepare to return to our completely renovated building in the fall of 2004. I very much look forward to guiding the department through this crucial period.”

Roussève succeeds WAC professor Peter Nabokov, who served as acting chair for 2002–03 while former WAC chair Christopher Waterman served as acting dean of the School of the Arts and Architecture. Waterman was named dean of the school effective June 1 of this year.

Roussève is the artistic director of the New York-based dance/theater company David Roussève/REALITY. He has written, directed and choreographed 11 full-evening works for the company. Commissioned three times by the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival, REALITY has also performed throughout the United States, Europe and South America, including at the Festival Biennale de la Danse in France; the South Bank Center in London; Lincoln Center in New York; the Carlton Festival in Brazil; Internationnales Sommer Theater Festival in Hamburg, Germany; Zellerbach Hall at the University of California, Berkeley; and Royce Hall at UCLA.

He has created works for many dance companies including the Houston Ballet, the Atlanta Ballet, New York’s Ballet Hispanico, Denver’s Cleo Parker Robinson Dance Theater and Pittsburgh’s Dance Alloy. A writer most recently published in the 2002 collection “Envisioning Dance on Film,” he was twice selected as a fellow in the Sundance Institute’s screenwriting lab (1998, 2002). He has received numerous fellowships and awards, including the Irvine Fellowship in Dance, the Cal Arts Alpert Award in the Arts, seven National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship, a California Arts Council Fellowship, a New York Dance and Performance Award (“Bessie”), and a Lester Horton Award (Los Angeles).

He has taught at Princeton University, Bates College Dance Festival, the University of Maryland and Randolph-Macon Woman’s College. He graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University, where he received a B.A. in politics, African studies, and theater and dance.

The Department of World Arts and Cultures encourages interdisciplinary exploration, and students are encouraged to combine rigorous scholarship, creative practice and experiential learning. WAC students have access to audiovisual and digital media technologies, which have assumed an important place in both the documentary and performative sides of the arts.

As one of America’s most diverse cities — culturally, ethnically and artistically — Los Angeles provides many opportunities for cultural studies, public performance and community-based applied work in the arts. Students are encouraged to find field sites in the broader city as well as to work and learn in such settings as schools, community outreach programs, arts organizations, museums and cultural festivals.

The faculty is an interdisciplinary cohort of choreographers and performance artists; scholars from the fields of anthropology, folklore, dance and cultural studies; and specialists from the professional worlds of multicultural arts presentation, documentary media and museum studies. Current faculty include Judith Baca, Donald Cosentino, Lynn Dally, Irma Dosamantes-Beaudry, Simone Forti, Susan Foster, Dan Froot, David Gere, Michael Owen Jones, Angelia Leung, Victoria Marks, Judy Mitoma, Peter Nabokov, Colin Quigley, Allen F. Roberts, Roussève, Marta Savigliano, Peter Sellars, Keith Terry, Peter Tokofsky, Christopher Waterman and Cheng-Chieh Yu.

Thanks to a generous $18 million gift from philanthropist Glorya Kaufman — the single largest individual gift in the history of dance in America — the Department of World Arts and Cultures will soon enjoy completely renovated performance, teaching and research facilities. Opening in 2004, the refurbished Kaufman Hall will offer students an unprecedented array of tools for study and creativity, including state-of-the-art studio and theatrical spaces, multimedia and material culture laboratories, classrooms, seminar rooms, and student facilities.