Salzar graduated from Yale University with a major in art history. After graduating, she spent 15 years in San Francisco, California, choreographing her own work.
“College really helped me understand the ways that I express the ideas that interest me through choreography,” Salzar said.
While teaching in northern Wisconsin, Salzar saw the job for Alabama’s dance program and said she immediately fell in love with Alabama’s dance faculty and students.
“The magnitude of the dance program is overall very impressive,” Salzar said.
She currently teaches Modern Dance Technique II and Dance History and is preparing to teach a dance for film class, which will be added to the course listing in fall 2015.
“Part of the class is going to be asking students to consider the different ways in which digital media may affect them and how they want to approach that, which is really an inevitable element of their lives,” she said.
When most students learn to dance and choreograph on stage, they are showcasing for a wide view of someone looking at the stage. In contrast, when someone films choreography, the angle is the inverse of a wide view, Salzar said. As a result, a choreographer’s design and a dancer’s performance both change when adapted for film.
Erika Davis, a junior majoring in dance, is currently enrolled in Salzar’s dance history class. She said the class’s early start time is a small price to pay to have Salzar as an instructor.
“She is so prepared and does an amazing job with challenging us to question our material and make connections on a larger scale,” Davis said. “She has this unique ability to make everyone want to participate in group discussions.”
