Dancing (Part I) – the Artist (Dancer) and the Engineer

Some people seem to agree that being an Artist is quite different than being an Engineer. Although both Art and Science are related to their own specific discipline (#specialisation) and can be looked upon the same general conceptual ideas (#theory), Science has its own specificity, different that Art’s specificity, and vice versa (not to mention the controversy in their inter-disciplinarity: the Science of the Art, especially for the [intutive] artists, and the Art of the Science, especially for the 100% positivist/ technologist-mindset engineers). 

In this blog post (Dancing Part I) I want to make an idea that the Artist needs different mental models to think about Dance and Dancing (on a theoretical, ontological and epistemological level), in order to understand more engineering visions about these topics; in the next blog post (Dancing Part II) I will write about how ’MAPP programme’ can be understood as a decision-support system (for me), in order to get the most out of it, using a specific engineer approach (the 3-gap model).

Even if the Artist (Dancer) and the Engineer are both in-depth ”scientists” after all, they position themselves to reality differently: the way how they think and see things, facts and reality, how they build up their inventory of their world (physically and virtually) (#ontology), the methods and the techniques they use to know (feel/ sense) them, how they point out facts and what they want to show/demonstrate, how they are experimenting ’the’ reality and ’their’ reality, be it a priori and a posteriori  (#methodology), how they think about their engineering and dancing processes (#mental models), how they become efficient/effective objective/subjective decision-makers and problem solvers, how, when, and mostly why they use tools, such as technology, decision supporting systems. [The artist and the engineer John Maeda make very good points on these topics in his great book ”Redesigning Leadership”; he is also known for the ”10 laws of simplicity”]

The Artist and the Engineers are two different entities; I know for fact this: after being an IT engineer for some years (1998-2008), I have decided to turn to art, specifically dancing (Ballroom, and then Argentine Tango – Social and Stage) (2008-now). The more I dance and study about dance, the more data and more information I get, the less I feel I know, getting me very humble. In a world of an overwhelmingly crowded information and data noise, in a world of dance where there is not a ’golden standard’ (such as ’the perfect technique’ or at least none that I know of), where each and every one of your preferred dance teachers/masters/ mentors has their own dance style, technique, vision, paradigms, no wonder that I, as a (tango) dancer, feel like lost (#dance data mining).

Ironically, the further away I go from the inner engineer-guy (in time), the more I need him in my dance theory and practice: systemic views, mental and process models, decision-making concepts, systems theory. Just an example: supposing that I want to become A BETTER DANCER (or a better dance teacher, which are two connected, but different things!), there are some inherent questions:

Where to start? Which dance path or model is the best to follow? Whom I have to give my trust in order to receive personalised dance guidance? What does ”better” dancer mean? And what a dancer/ dancing even mean? Why become a better dancer (what is the in-depth motivation)? What are the real consequences of becoming a real dancer? How do you evaluate when you have reached your desired level? Which is the criterion to assess that better dancer you have become? Who is testing you: is self-assessment objective enough? etc, etc.

[to be continued with Dancing – Agreeing on disagreement through a 3-gap Model for MAPP (Part II)]