The simultaneous turnover of 5 dancers out of 7 is a big change for a small, tight-knit company. When retirement, injuries, career changes and a desire to try out the dance world of Europe combined in the season just ended, that is just what happened at Whim W’Him. Most fortunately, a strong, multi-faceted institutional foundation, along with unity of vision, supports the company. And at the artistic heart of the enterprise, two phenomenal dancers, Kyle Sangil and Jacob Beasley, remain to offer continuity, talent and lofty aspirations. Whim W’Him founder and artistic director Olivier Wevers praises highly their general level of artistry and the special gifts of each. They are also all in, “the way artists must be,” he says. “It takes so many things to be a real artist, to keep learning and reinventing and continuing to maintain focus and drive and not slack off.”
Kyle and Jacob are both intense, intentional and dedicated, but in very different ways, embodying the company’s trusts in each dancer as a unique, inimitable individual who also believes in Whim W’Him as an ensemble, a joint enterprise.
CALM
READY
EAGER
These are the adjectives that complement Kyle’s company bio. He is eager in demeanor and ready in his commitment to the venture—and adventure—of Whim W’Him. Physically, Kyle is a pinpoint bundle of energy, as if his natural state is motion, not rest. His quick, acrobatic, speed-switching, shape-shifting concentration, whether in a solo onstage or in company class, compels attention.
On dry land, as it were, he is something of an archivist. “I always work with a notebook. It’s a part of me. I notate everything.” He’s developed his own notation as a way to hang on to all the necessary details of movement for each separate piece being created and rehearsed. This combination of passionate energy and careful observation make him a valuable source in the conservation and expansion of Whim W’Him in its newest incarnation.
When Kyle came to Seattle, he was the youngest member of the company. It was during the pandemic, when masks, tests and distancing were the order of the day. Much is different, and he’s grown and learned a good deal, “but,” he adds, “I still want to be a student.” Now he is the dancer most steeped in Whim W’Him ways. “Strange,” he says wonderingly. “It’s my third season. I have lots of knowledge under my belt, and opportunities to share all I have. It’s so exciting.” He is also excited because, “Everything is new for WW now—traveling, the Center, the new dancers, the school” where he also teaches. “It’s a cool opportunity, not to make something different, but to add to what’s there.”
Kyle takes very seriously being a repository of Whim W’Him style and approach and is working hard to enfold the five new dancers into the company’s life. They, like him, have mostly migrated to WW and Seattle from elsewhere without knowing people. So at least to start with, the Center and the company is the hub of their new lives here.
“Whim, when I came to it, was a land I knew nothing about,” says Kyle. There is such a collection of new emotions, attitudes, movements. “At first, it’s like being in the middle of a fountain. Super tiring and exhausting. That’s hard, so it’s good to keep it light. We can acknowledge all that we want, have work, and laugh. I want the five [new dancers] to feel like they’ve been here as long as I have.” He admires that Whim W’Him founder and artistic director Olivier Wevers can do that—be so deeply demanding and serious, but also “silly and fun.”
GENTLE
INTENTIONAL
SENSITIVE
Jacob, in his second Whim W’Him season, is precise and clear and focused. Olivier, impressed with how he meditates during short breaks to keep himself there in the moment, remarks on Jacob’s calm, though as Olivier also notes, “he also can be explosive.”
For Jacob, dance has always been a magnet. “I couldn’t not dance. It’s within my design, an instinctive passion.” He began with hip hop, then went on to tap and jazz—and ballet around the house (“I didn’t really know what it was”). His parents needed convincing to let him take on ballet too but eventually he did start classes. One night, a few months later he had a dream that was dancing—and knowing what it was to do it with grace and poise. This dream, he says, “embodied the energy of dance and gave me new information.” The very next day his teacher noticed an immediate shift in how he moved.
Jacob’s “journey with dance” has changed over time. “I love performing,” he says, “but now it’s more about practice, experiencing myself inside my body.” He describes his switch to contemporary dance this way: “With ballet you can feel outside your body, observing, following very strict rules, checking boxes, recognizing right and wrong. It’s a big distinction from innate feeling. Looking back, it was important not to lose sight of what I was doing.”
“In 2021, I decided I wanted to move away from ballet to contemporary. The change came from a place of discontent. I felt a big opening inside myself.” Now Jacob is “on track to more what the right way feels like rather than looks like. Mindfulness. Breathing. Being in my body. I’m back to what I’m here for.” Whim W’him is to Jacob like “an external manifestation of internal expansion.” He talks ardently about feeling “formless and spacious internally.” When I ask for clarification he says, “Deep meditation—vastness and a paradox in my body. In a container and not. I feel I’m in an environment where I’m able to be nurtured.” All along his own path to the present and the future, “Guidance from others, has been essential too.” In turn, he now stands ready to welcome and nurture Whim W’Him’s newest dancers as he did with those who came before.
