Students on the Path to Arts Education Learn New Steps From Dance Troupe

Nine-year-old Darrell Beasley and five friends discovered at Inner-City Arts on Thursday that success comes in many forms, even the sound of a pair of weathered workman’s boots.

Sporting their trademark construction-site shoes, members of the Australian tap-dancing troupe Tap Dogs took time out from a world tour to teach the six Figueroa Street Elementary School students a few new steps.

“It’s fun,� Beasley said afterward. “We want to get their moves. It’s cool.�

But it was the performance in front of their peers that made the budding dancers most nervous, they said.

About 100 pupils watched Beasley and his friends perform a dance routine that they had practiced for three days. As each of the six showed off their own solos, the audience cheered.

While the other five dancers slowly shuffled in bright plastic tap shoes, 8-year-old Carlos Zuniga moved into the middle of the circle first, his head down and his feet jamming. Each young dancer followed suit.

Finally, to the whoops and whistles of his friends in the audience, Beasley jumped into the middle, his arms outstretched like a bird soaring, then diving with his feet leaping and clicking.

“I’m going to be famous,� he said later.

Inspiring such dreams and providing the opportunity for downtown students to fulfill them prompted the nonprofit group’s artistic director, Bob Bates, to co-found Inner-City Arts in 1989.

“If we give [children] the opportunity to grow creatively, there’s no telling what they could become,� he said as he watched rehearsals before the show.

Many of the students who come to the arts program cannot speak English. But learning how to paint a self-portrait and sculpt with clay offers children the ability to express themselves regardless of language, said Beth Tishler, Inner-City Arts’ executive director.

The arts “allow children to create something that is not right or wrong but is unique,� she said.

During the 1980s, budget cuts in arts education at Los Angeles schools deprived local students of adequate facilities to develop artistic skills, Bates said. Inner-City Arts, he said, is trying to fill the gap.

The organization began by providing supplementary classes in the arts to students at 9th Street Elementary School.

Now, eight years later, 8,000 students from 11 downtown elementary schools receive instruction in dance, acting, painting, sculpting and playing musical instruments.

Tishler credits corporate sponsors for Inner-City Arts’ recent ability to expand.

Dancers from Tap Dogs unveiled a new mural dedicated to the growing list of sponsors. Inner-City Arts officials said they hope to be able to send arts teachers into schools and give more students the kind of opportunity that Zuniga, Beasley and their fellow dancers had Thursday.

After the show, the six elementary school students relaxed with Tap Dogs dancers and talked about becoming professionals.

“Will you teach us?� Carlos asked members of the dance group. “I’ll trade you some steps.�