Dancer uses her art as therapy

AirDance New Mexico is an alternative performance company that combines elements of dance, theater, circus arts and rock climbing. Founder Debra Landau has been involved with dance for more than 27 years. She didn’t discover her love for the art form until college. She also owns a movement-therapy practice in which she works with neurological movement disorders as well as sexual abuse victims. She holds a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from UNM.

Daily Lobo: How and why did you first get involved with dance?

Debra Landau: I didn’t dance as a child. I was studying biochemistry and I got pretty close to finishing that degree, but I had some health and personal issues. I just suddenly had that sinking realization that just because I’m good at this and I kind of like it, it might not be what I want to do with the rest of my life.

Also, all the chemicals were making me ill. I’m asthmatic and all that time in the lab just turned out to be bad. You can only take care of so many fumes, and I think emotion and stress didn’t help. I started getting out of the lab and took a couple theater and dance classes to relieve stress, be active and have a little fun.
DL: So how did it turn into your career?

Landau: There was this practical side in me, and part of it was my family, that was like ‘Well yeah have fun, but you can’t do that.’ Long story short, I did do that. I was just really encouraged and I thought ‘Okay I didn’t dance as a child so I can get into dance, but I’ll be a choreographer, I won’t be a performer.’ I transferred to UNM, got my bachelor’s in fine arts, and became a performer.

DL: What is your profession?

Landau: Movement therapy is the meeting place of physical therapy, occupational therapy and maybe a little psychotherapy. A lot of my clients are sexually abused folks … It’s not psychotherapy but I do work with them in terms of helping them feel more comfortable with their bodies, how to move those bodies and live with those bodies.

Some people really are able to recapture a childlike quality when spinning on the trapezes or sitting on them, hanging on them. For the sexual abuse victims, especially people who were abused as children, that can be very helpful for their self-esteem.
DL: How are you still doing aerial work with 20-year-olds when you’re in your late 40s?

Landau: One of my dance mentors used to say ‘It doesn’t hurt until you stop,’ so it’s like ‘Okay, then don’t stop.’ It does hurt, but I do know if I take a break it hurts more. I’m trying to cut down; it’s almost like an addiction.

DL: Does your movement therapy work ever transfer into your AirDance work?

Landau: I started working with surgical tubing as a physical therapy tool. I attached my wrists and ankles to surgical tubing so I had the bounce of bungee, and suspended without the harness. I would have dreams of this awesome choreography because my pelvis is free from a harness, and then I would also have nightmares that I would drop down on the first drop and I’d be drawn and quartered.