{"id":36703,"date":"2018-03-16T21:20:17","date_gmt":"2018-03-17T03:20:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/?p=36703"},"modified":"2025-02-19T09:07:08","modified_gmt":"2025-02-19T16:07:08","slug":"joan-woodbury-always-in-motion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/joan-woodbury-always-in-motion\/","title":{"rendered":"Joan Woodbury: Always in Motion"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2013,\u00a0Joan Woodbury was selected by 200 of her peers as one of \u201cUtah\u2019s 15 most influential artists.\u201d The following profile appeared in\u00a0<\/em>Utah\u2019s 15: The State\u2019s Most Influential Artists, published by Artists of Utah in 2014.<\/p>\n

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Photo by Zoe and Robert Rodriguez.<\/p><\/div>\n

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\u00a0<\/em>We almost lost Joan Woodbury to New York. That\u2019s where all the dancers seem to go \u2013 and that was her plan. When she was only 24 years old, Woodbury, newly graduated from the University of Wisconsin and planning a new life in the Big Apple decided to make a quick trip to Salt Lake City first to visit her family and to show the courtesy of an interview for a teaching position at the University of Utah. As luck would have it, she took the job. What happened next was a series of moves that would play out to have a profound influence on dance in Utah.<\/p>\n

A proud Utah native, Woodbury was born Joan Jones in Cedar City to a family of ranchers. Her father ran a grocery store and a farm machinery business while her mother was an accomplished pianist. Those were two basic, but significant influences that would continue to inform her life: her father with his love of the land, and her mother with her love of music. \u201cMother played for everything. All the kids took piano lessons whether they wanted to or not,\u201d says Woodbury. \u201cShe had quartets and played for the church and the opera in Cedar City. You\u2019d wake up in the morning and someone would be taking a piano lesson.\u201d Musicality and rhythm are essential components to dance so this musical influence was crucial for her. \u201cI like musicality in dancers and in myself, but what I really loved to do was move,\u201d she recalls. \u201cI was always outside on the farm either climbing down haystacks or fences or following my dad.\u201d When she turned 5, her family moved further into Cedar City where a teacher who taught tap-dancing lived. Woodbury\u2019s mother enrolled her, and to this day tap has been one of her loves.<\/p>\n

Woodbury\u2019s mother played for the Cedar City Opera Company and eventually the young Joan began to perform with them. She sang in\u00a0Aida<\/em>,\u00a0La boh\u00e8me<\/em>, and she was a street urchin in\u00a0Carmen.\u00a0<\/em>\u201cI had a pretty good voice as a young child and I loved being on the stage and thought that might be what I would do, but I had a fragile voice,\u201d she explains. By the time she reached high school, dancing became more of a serious pursuit. One of her teachers was particularly encouraging. \u201cLaVeve Petty loved to dance so she had everyone dancing in school \u2013 not much contemporary dance but dancing. She made a company of about eight of us doing dances from the \u201820s. We danced the Charleston and One-step and Two-step; we\u2019d perform around town and do assemblies. We\u2019d sing and make up acts and improvise and then we\u2019d dance. I realized I really loved it.\u201d<\/p>\n

All of Woodbury\u2019s brothers and sisters went to the University of Utah, but LaVeve Petty encouraged Woodbury to attend the University of Wisconsin, which happened to have a wonderful modern dance program (called \u201ccreative\u201d dance back in the day). Her father wondered why she would want to study dance, as it was no way to make money. \u201cMother talked him into letting me go,\u201d Woodbury explains. \u201cIt surprised me a lot. Once I got there, I cried all night. I was so scared and lonely, but that school was incredible for me.\u201d She studied under Margaret H\u2019Doubler. \u201cShe was a botanist really, but she loved the human body and how it functioned. She believed dance was for everyone and always taught with a skeleton; how the body moves what it can do what it can\u2019t do, what is sequential movement, etc. It gave me the urge to really carry through with dance for the masses. Everyone can dance and has the province of being creative and dance was a great way to be yourself and put things together. It couldn\u2019t have been a happier thing for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Once Woodbury finished her schooling in Wisconsin, she planned to move to New York City, but Elizabeth Hayes, the chair of the dance department at the University of Utah, intervened. Woodbury came back to talk to her about a position at the University. After meeting people in the theater and music department and talking with the students, she ended up staying. \u201cI was 24 and right out of school. I had experience teaching kids and adults at this point and I thought \u2018I can really explore and experiment with dancers and I could really learn how to choreograph.\u2019\u201d She taught technique, improvisation, swimming, golf and tennis. \u201cI could never hit a ball but I had a good-looking swing,\u201d Woodbury jokes. \u201cAnd I never taught tennis with a ball in my hand, but I knew how to move and I knew how to get kids enthused about playing so they all improved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soon after Woodbury began her career at the University, Elizabeth Hayes approached her with a suggestion. \u201cBetty told me there was someone I should really meet. She had attended the U, and then went to NYU and was now teaching at BYU.\u201d Joan Woodbury finally met Shirley Ririe the following year. They had the same philosophy about creative human beings, about exploring and finding things, improvisation, choreography, wanting to dance. \u201cSo the first thing we did was make a dance together. It was called \u2018On the Boards,\u2019 and we were two vaudeville performers trying to outdo each other and I on one roller skate,\u201d she remembers. \u201cShirley would do this wonderful stuff and I would skate across the stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 1952 Joan married Charles Woodbury. Two years later she decided she wanted to study with Mary Wigman in Berlin. \u201cI wrote to the Fulbright Commission. I didn\u2019t go through the University, I did it at large, but I told them my plans and what I wanted to do. Lo and behold I got it! They wrote me in the spring of 1955 and invited me out. I was pregnant with my first child. At the time my husband was coaching at Morgan High School. I said, \u2018I applied for a Fulbright scholarship, if I got it would you go to Germany with me for a year?\u2019 and he said, \u2018Yes\u2019 and I said, \u2018Good, because I got it.\u2019\u201d She talked to Elizabeth Hayes, suggesting that Ririe teach for her while she was gone, and that is exactly what happened.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came back after a year and Shirley and I decided we both wanted to teach. So we held hands and marched over to President Olpin\u2019s office just like the Bobbsey Twins and said \u2018We\u2019d like to job share.\u2019 And he said, \u2018What\u2019s that?\u2019\u201d Joan Woodbury and Shirley Ririe shared one salary for 10 years. Together, Elizabeth Hayes, Woodbury, and Ririe built the dance department. They upped the class times and the number of classes. It grew and grew until the University decided it was time to pay them each a full salary. In the meantime, they had formed a little company. \u201cShirley and I put money in to make costumes for the year, and then if we made any money we\u2019d pay the dancers.\u201d In 1963, they invited a choreographer to come lead their summer workshops. Woodbury had met him when she spent time in Chicago during her schooling in Wisconsin. He was a choreographer and a philosopher, which struck a chord with Woodbury, as the philosophy of dance is something that would drive her throughout her career. He taught her to mold things to say what you want to say and how to improvise so you can discover things in yourself that you didn\u2019t know you had. His name was Alwin Nikolais.<\/p>\n

\u201cNikolais taught about being present in dance and present in your life,\u201d Woodbury explains. \u201cHe said you should transcend yourself and become bigger and faster than you are, changing your body so you can be expressive with yourself and communicate with someone else.\u201d He came to the university for five summers and he critiqued the dances performed by the small company Woodbury and Ririe had been working on. \u201cHe\u2019s the one who told us we should call our company by our own names,\u201d recalls Woodbury. \u201cWe decided Ririe-Woodbury was the easiest to say, and in 1964 we founded our company.\u201d Ririe-Woodbury began performing Nikolais\u2019 works in 2003 and had the privilege of performing his works in Europe.<\/p>\n

In the late 1960s the National Endowment for the Arts started pilot programs around the country. They took a dance company into select schools and had them work as if dance was the core curriculum and then English and math and history were satellite courses. They found these kids learned more because they were energized. And they could talk about other subjects in relationship to dance. Then in 1972 the NEA announced two programs: Artists in the Schools and Dance Touring. Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company went to New York and auditioned for the program and they got both of them. \u201cShirley and I had always believed that every child should dance,\u201d says Woodbury. \u201cNot everyone is going to be a dancer, but when you understand your body and feel comfortable inside yourself, you can create anything. You might be a writer, a poet, or a designer but you have a sense of your self-worth. It\u2019s what dance brings to everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n

Woodbury believes the state has a remarkable amount of artistic talent. \u201cI think everyone should get out of Utah and come back and realize what we have here,\u201d she explains. She feels lucky to have been able to stay in Utah and believes it is the people who have stayed that made all the difference. \u201cA lot of Jewish people came out when the Mormons did. They under- stood fabrics, music, singing and drama so already the state was infused with a great amount of talent. And there were people that came out and stayed,\u201d she begins. \u201cMaud May Babcock came out to the University campus. People came to the theater department and the art department and architecture department and they stayed. I\u2019m one of the young ones. Betty Hayes, Noni Sorenson. They all came out and stayed. Betty got dance in all the schools. Every high school in Utah has a dance teacher because of her and that is unheard of. No other state has that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dance isn\u2019t a career for Joan Woodbury; it\u2019s a lifestyle. Just as her parents influenced her, Woodbury\u2019s lifestyle deeply influenced those of her children, of whom she is very proud. Her daughter, Jena, was a beautiful dancer and currently works as the managing director of Ririe-Woodbury and they have a wonderful working relationship. \u201cIt\u2019s been fabulous,\u201d says Woodbury. \u201cI\u2019ve been very, very lucky and happened to be in the right places at the right time.\u201d Of course, she is being modest. The dance department wouldn\u2019t have been the same without her. She was instrumental in the establishment of the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center \u2013 one of the premiere venues for modern dance in the United States and abroad.<\/p>\n

Creative people always seem to find each other. For Woodbury, surrounding herself with talent has motivated and inspired her to do great things. She is a dancer, teacher, ambassador, and innovator. Whether it was connecting with choreographers like Alwin Nikolais or partnering with a kindred spirit in Shirley Ririe, Joan Woodbury\u2019s dance career \u2013 although challenging at times \u2013 has been a charmed one. When discussing dance, Woodbury describes movement and motion as two different things: \u201cMotion is movement with intention,\u201d she says. If so, Joan Woodbury\u2019s motions have been impeccable, leaving a legacy for us all to enjoy.<\/p>\n

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Photo by Zoe and Robert Rodriguez.<\/p><\/div>\n

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In 2013,\u00a0Joan Woodbury was selected by 200 of her peers as one of \u201cUtah\u2019s 15 most influential artists.\u201d The following profile appeared in\u00a0Utah\u2019s 15: The State\u2019s Most Influential Artists, published by Artists of Utah in 2014. \u00a0We almost lost Joan Woodbury to New York. That\u2019s where all the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":781,"featured_media":36704,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_piecal_is_event":false,"_piecal_start_date":"","_piecal_end_date":"","_piecal_is_allday":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,14],"tags":[1886,1400],"class_list":["post-36703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artist_profiles","category-visual_arts","tag-joan-woodbury","tag-utahs-15"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/2014-01-15-Joan-Woodbury-for-Utahs-15-9087-1955-final-edit-AdobeRGB.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-05 23:02:31","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/781"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36703"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90539,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36703\/revisions\/90539"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/artistsofutah.org\/15Bytes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}