We live in a culture that believes the mind and body to be separate entities and treats them as such, driving a wedge between two halves of whole, which only serves to stress and weaken our power, health, and soul. We grow stiff yet flabby in action and thought, losing the simply joys of movement that allow us to reconnect with our inner spirit.
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In the same way, we are taught to climb the short ladder of success, for the path to bourgeois accomplishment came easily be accomplished early in life. And once we reach the top—there’s nowhere to go; we can either stay put and block the flow of life, or we can let go and start afresh.
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XiaoChuan Xie (a.k.a. Chuan) discovered the pathless path by virtue of coming full circle to where it all began. She began her began her career as a dancer in the Nanjing Jinling Arts Organization in China before coming to New York in 2009 to join the legendary Martha Graham Dance Company, and was described as a “scene stealer” by The New York Times. In 2013, she appeared on the cover of Dance Magazine’s November issue and nominated for the Clive Barnes Award.
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After this auspicious start, she went on to star in Tony Award-winning production of The King & I on Broadway, as part of the Lincoln Center Theater’s 2015 Revival. While dancing on Broadway, Chuan became exhausted. She took a break to begin a recovery that would change her the course of her life.
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Through her study of the mind-body connection, Chuan discovered her calling as a healer. The applause on stage could not compete with the gratification she received helping her fellow dancers heal from stress and injury, and she left the stage in pursuit of her dreams.
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Chuan has always dreamed of opening a wellness and arts center so when the opportunity arose, Chuan took the change, and moved forward with plans to open Spec-Chuan Movement & Arts (SCMA) at 8810 Whitney Avenue in Elmhurst, Queens. The name “Spec-Chuan” comes from Latin word “specter” and sounds like the English word “spectrum.” The name represents acceptance and inclusiveness of all peoples, all cultures, all styles, and all traditions.
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A Certified Movement Analyst from Laban/Bartenieff Institute of Movement Studies, Chuan is pursuing a M.S in Dance/Movement Therapy at Sarah Lawrence while honing her talents and skills at SCMA. SCMA provides dance and movement classes, performances, and special events that honor the native traditions of people from all walks of life. Body conditioning classes include Yoga, Pilates, Bartenieff Fundamentals, and Mindfulness Practice weekday mornings and evenings.
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Every Saturday morning, World Dance Series highlights traditional dances from all corners of the globe, drawn from the different ethnicities that call Queens their home. SCMA showcases Bollywood, African/Caribbean, and Chinese Folk Dance. Classes are taught by leading experts in the field, and offer a safe, loving environment for people of all ages from all walks of life. SCMA will also host free movement-based arts events, including the Movement Choir, for communal moving and sharing every Friday evening.
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Chuan speaks with us about her transformation from performer to healer, and the ways in which SCMA is an extension of her life and philosophy.
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Photo: Paul B. Goode
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I’d like to begin with your life in China, growing up as a dancer and being committed to the art of movement from such a young age. Many Westerners have “ideas” about Chinese medicine, but those are usually filtered through a Western perspective. I wanted to ask if you could speak about what you see as the ethos of the Chinese approach to health, and the way in which movement is central to this, in so much as it can be conceived of as a form of medicine.
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Chuan: Growing up in China, I never felt that Chinese medicine was that different or special until I came to know New York culture. Traditional Chinese Medicine was considered as the “four olds” that was suppressed during Mao’s era. The interesting thing about culture is that no one is able to strip one’s culture.
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Chinese medicine is how Chinese people live. I grow up eating certain food in certain seasons and in certain times of the day because we believe that nature provides us the best nourishment. If I ever wake up with a tummy ache or cold, my parents would tell me that I might have caught some negative energy at night because we believe that Yin (negative energy) dominates night and we are the most vulnerable at night. If I have any muscle pain on my body from practice, my mother would take me to see doctors and they would tell us that the circulation is blocked in that area and I need to massage it and make it circulate again.
My parents often teach me how to find certain meridians on my body and stimulate them in order to prevent or help relieve some pains. I still remember why my mother sent me to gymnastics class when I was four years old: She said that I used to get sick very often when I was little, so she thought I needed to get stronger by training my body.
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Overall, I think Chinese medicine culture taught me that: 1. The body is so powerful and wise that if we pay attention to its signals, we don’t need unnecessary interventions; In other words, Chinese medicine is about prevention, self-care/self- cure.
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2. In Chinese, the word “movement” or “exercise” means “progressive movement” also “the universal revolutionary movement.” Therefore as long as the earth still spins and circles around the sun dancing with other planets, our fluids, organs and energy are moving, our bodies need to be active/mobile/flexible to adapt this ever-moving environment.
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3. Our bodies are related with each other and the environment.
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Photo: XiaoChuan Xie, courtesy of SCMA
I’m very impressed by your growth within the art, as I remember being so impressed with you as a dancer. It seemed to me, as a member of the audience, that you were not simply dancing, but fully embodying the roll, becoming an actor so that we didn’t just see the movement but we felt the expression of it on an emotional level. What made you realize that performing was no longer your destiny?
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Chuan: Performing on stage was never just dancing on stage for me. I early treated performing as an accomplishment and celebration for the long and tough training that I had had in dance school and later in the Red Army dance company.
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Later, I doubted about this rewarding pattern, which is when I got into modern dance. Then I felt that performing was cathartic, the stage is where I could express fully and experience different feelings. I did a speaking/dancing part in Annie B. Parson’s choreography, I discovered that I love the feeling of being able to communicate with the crowd. From then on, performing on stage is about communicating and connecting. Performing repertoires, or Broadway shows are very rewarding, however my body is burning out through intense repetitions and they can’t fulfill my desire of communicating and connecting.
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In 2015, due to a hip injury, I took two months off from the show to heal. During this recovery time, I began being exposed to many kinds of healing methods, such as Physical Therapy, Acupuncture, Emotional Freedom Technique, Body-Mind Centering, Expressive Arts Therapy, Reiki, etc. I have been a long time meditation and Buddhism practitioner. So it was quite easy for me to get into those healing practices. It was the first time ever in my life that I really took a great look at my body’s being and start appreciating its function and support.
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It was a breakthrough. I began understanding more about my posture, physical habits and functions. I relearned how to walk properly with my PT; I learned about certain meridians that run through our bodies also affect the emotional side of us; I experienced that how body can restore so many of our childhood traumas and memories without the conscious mind knowing it.
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I found out that I would unconsciously lock my arms close to myself as a result of locking my ribcage as well, as if I was over-protecting myself; I discovered that my tail bone was always tucked under first because of my ballet training, second I believe it’s because the female protection (I am still studying this fact, which is fascinatingly happening to a lot of females); I also explored that I could connect with my organs, fluids and nerves when moving so I would be more fully supported.
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When I went back to the show, I was able to utilize those methods to help me get through eight shows a week and even help other cast members feel better in their bodies. That’s when I knew that being a healer and body/mind advocate is my calling. Now I see performing is a way through which I could help people heal, stimulate their senses and serve their needs.
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I love that being a dancer was a stop on the path to being a healer, and the way in which you have incorporated aspects of art and movement to focus on the mind- body connection. Could you speak about why this is so important, particularly in our age of hyper digital communications?
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Chuan: I think dancing has been the journey to know myself, to know my own body, my mind, and my spirit. As I mentioned above, through dancing, I was able to re-locate my body-mind connection. I personally think being a professional dancer might not be the healthiest, however, everyone is a dancer in nature.
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Dancing makes me to be able to connect this modern me with the ancient me, as if it’s a time machine that takes me way back to our origins. Dancing/moving is such a primitive act that we start as a fetus. We are living in the world that we have technologies to sense, feel and act for us. We are losing our primitive senses (sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch; and senses for temperature, kinesthetic, pain, and balance).
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However, we are still humans, which means that we still have feelings and emotions. Therefore, the consequences of disconnection between modern living and human body are that we have lots of substances abuses, life style/diet related diseases, mental health crisis, and dare I say: environmental issues.
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When our basic senses are heightened, we become more sensible and perceptive to our own bodies and the world around us. If we start paying attention to our bodies’ wisdoms, we would respect this mortal body; if we respect the body, we would nourish the body instead of harming it; if we understand that our body is just a small reflection of what’s going on in the bigger world or universe, we would respect and nourish the others, the other forms of beings, and the environment.
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Therefore the messages, or the educational part of all somatic practices is that it brings the awareness in our own body then we can bring that awareness into the space—meaning noticing every subtle beings around us. But before we put ourselves into the world, we have to know ourselves well. Otherwise, we see so many lost souls driven away by the fascinating world. Having a centered self, knowing clearly where the body parts are and understanding how they move take us to the world moving freely without losing the self. It’s a very fine balance.
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We don’t want to stay in ourselves too much; we also don’t want to spend all the energy out there and forget ourselves. Thus body/mind practice offers the opportunity to be able to move in/out to find our own balance. Another fascinating benefit of the somatics is that it empowers us. To know and experience that we are able to heal our bodies and strengthen the mortal weaknesses are empowering. In which way, we heal our mind as well.
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Photo: XiaoChuan Xie, courtesy of SCMA
One of the things I love about Spec-Chuan is the energy of accessibility you create. I think it can often feel intimidating to step into a dance studio and reconnect with your body in a public (albeit private) space. Could you speak about the importance of creating a space where all people are welcome, and how this speaks to your vision of dance within the community?
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Chuan: One of the reasons that I didn’t think performing alone was enough for me was that I couldn’t make people dance with me and share the joy of expressing when I perform in an opera house. In Spec-Chuan, all levels of movers are welcome because dancing/moving joyfully belongs to everyone. We don’t’ have mirrors in the space because I want to encourage people to start listening to their body, feeling the body, and sensing the body without any judgments.
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All somatic classes start with warm-ups, which are designed to focus on breaths and tuning-in, so the heightened sense of awareness and acceptance can be carried through the whole class. Although as abstract or tedious as somatic sounds, I still believe that dancing/moving needs to be joyful. So I incorporate many folk dance or community dance element in my classes to let people experience the joy of rhythms and movements, as if we are recreating the celebratory feelings of dancing together in a communal settings.
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Human beings used to get together, dancing, singing and sharing stories in a community, whereas nowadays we sit in a theater watching artists performing as if we were all royals. Spec-Chuan is a safe and loving space for all who are looking for a community of creative/therapeutic arts.
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Here is a quote from William H. McNeill’s Keeping Together in Time: “… the expanded emotional solidarity that dancing together arouses must have conferred an important advantage on those groups that first learned the trick of keeping together in time. So great, indeed, was the advantage, that other hominid groups presumably either learned to dance or became extinct.”
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I love how you look at dance as an art and practice within individual cultures, and you desire to bring these cultures together through movement. What inspired this interest in diversity and tradition?
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Chuan: First I wanted to have a community-based space, religion free, where people can come in learning more about their bodies, cultures, humanity, and creativity. I have lived here for almost eight years. This neighborhood is the most diverse neighborhood in the world. I am proud to be part of this multicultural harmony, and I want to highlight this harmony.
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Often we are separated or categorized by our skin colors, nationalities, or religions. However, I believe that we all share the same root-—humanity. As long as all cultures’ existence, there is dance. As a body/mind believer, I don’t think there is a better way to embody the culture than learning its folk form of dance. Culture is so powerful that some Islamphobes eat Halal food without any hesitation. So I believe that learning different cultural dances can help us understand more about each other.
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Please talk about where Spec-Chuan fits in on your path as an artist, and how it becomes a space for creation unto itself. What would you like to realize here?
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Chuan: Opening Spec-Chuan was really a dream come true. However, there lay many challenges. Being able to own an ideal business is empowering for an independent artist. I have always believed that art is a reflection of life. More layered and diverse life experiences make an artist’s work fuller and richer. I am innately curious and adventurous so life takes me on a forever-interesting ride.
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Many people are surprised that I chose this route as suppose a shining dancer. For me, this really is an extension of what I have been doing—exploring the unknown. I am at the stage that I need to create my own works. Thus creating Spec-Chuan, figuring out what I want to teach and make is a complex project. At this transformational moment of my life, I am encountering another self-discovery episode. I would use the image of snake or insect shedding the skin seasonally to describe my feelings about growing.
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I think once a while, I need to let what has grown on me peel, then I eat it as a kind of nourishment, then give the new organism a chance to grow. This sounds a little disgusting, but it’s exactly how I feel. I am learning to accept the painful process of peeling the old and to be patient with the new organism’s growth.
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For more information, visit
Spec-Chuan Movement & Arts
8810 Whitney Ave, B, Elmhurst, NY 11373
Monday-Saturday, 9am-9pm
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Photo: XiaoChuan Xie, courtesy of SCMA