Dancing Fingers

Many, many years ago, when I was still a classical ballet dancer, I saw a documentary film about a famous dance school for girls in India. What I remember most about the film was the description of the rigorous training the girls went through for years and years before they were considered proper dancers.

Now, I took ballet lessons for three to five hours every day, but the dance schedule the Asian girls had made us look like sissies in comparison.

The most astonishing thing was the fact the girls had to learn how to move/control every muscle in their bodies. They learnt a complete repertoire of facial expressions. They spoke a whole language of expressions just by moving their fingers and wrists.

This seemed such a strange concept, for at that time, a classical ballet dancers facial expression was usually frozen. Your fingers, hands and wrists were only used to extend your arm position or line, and not as a tool of expression.

Todays collage is in homage of dancing fingers, hands, and wrists.