{{Infobox artist | name = Della Davidson | image = Della Davidson.jpg | caption = Photo from the 1980s | birth_name = Mary Adele Davidson | birth_date = 1951/1952 | birth_place = Texas | death_date = March 13, 2012 (aged 60)<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20140924041540/http://www.ls.ucdavis.edu/harcs/news-and-research/della-davidson.html Obituary], ucdavis.edu. Accessed September 13, 2022.</ref> | death_place = Santa Fe, New Mexico | known_for = Modern Dance | spouse = Mark Reiff }}
'''Mary Adele "Della" Davidson''' (1951/1952 – March 13, 2012<ref name=Obituary>{{harvnb|Obituary|2012}}</ref>) was an American modern dancer, choreographer, and dance professor at the University of California, Davis Department of Theatre and Dance.<ref name=UCDavis>{{harvnb|UCDavis|2012}}</ref>
==Life== Mary Adele Davidson was born in Texas, but grew up in Michigan. While she had trained in ballet since elementary school, she discovered modern dance in college, attending Michigan State, the University of Utah, and the University of Arizona.<ref name=UCDavis/> She joined the faculty of the University of California, Davis in 2001. While there, she co-created ''The Weight of Memory'' with Ellen Bromberg, a choreographer/dance filmmaker, and ''Collapse (suddenly falling down)'', with the KeckCAVES institute. At the time of her death, she was working with Bromberg on a piece titled ''and the snow fell softly on all the living and the dead''.<ref name=UCDavis/>
She was Artistic Director of Della Davidson Dance Theater since 1986 and Sideshow Physical Theater at UC Davis since 2001.<ref name=Obituary>{{harvnb|Obituary|2012}}</ref><ref name=Dancersgroup>{{harvnb|Dancersgroup}}</ref> She created more than forty works in her lifetime, many of them multidisciplinary, combining dance and film.<ref name=Obituary/>
==Assessment== ''Driven by an urge to get away from the "roles" she and other women had been brought up to inhabit, she often created dance that evoked the raw energy of forceful women, their strength, physicality and sensuality. Heavily ironic, pieces such as ''10 P.M. Dream'' or ''Fierce/Pink/House'' displayed gender stereotypes only to expose them as insidious traps, and she was firmly committed to feminism as a challenge to oppression and small-mindedness.''<ref name=UCDavis/>
==''Night Stories''== In 1997, Davidson adapted for dance three stories from the book ''The Stories of Eva Luna'' by Isabel Allende: ''Wicked Girl'', ''Tosca'', and ''Revenge''. The dance was titled ''Night Stories: The Eva Luna Project First Cycle'' and was first performed at the Theater Artaud in San Francisco, California.<ref name=Davis>{{harvnb|Davis|1997}}</ref><ref name=Evenson>{{harvnb|Evenson|1997}}</ref>
==Awards== *Isadora Duncan Award for Outstanding Achievement in Choreography<ref name=UCDavis/> *1990 North American Award for Choreography<ref name=UCDavis/>
==Legacy== The Della Davidson Prize is an annual award of $1,220 to support "innovative dance and dance/theater artists."<ref name=Dancersgroup/>
==Personal== Davidson was married to Mark Reiff. She died on March 13, 2012, in Santa Fe, New Mexico.<ref name=Obituary/><ref name=UCDavis/>
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Sources== *{{cite web |author=Dancersgroup |title=Della Davidson Prize |url=https://dancersgroup.org/funding/della/ |website=dancersgroup.org |access-date= September 21, 2014 }} *{{cite web |last=Davis |first=Giancarlo |title=Dream My State of Affairs |url=https://www.metroactive.com/papers/sfmetro/09.97/dance-97-9.html |website=metroactive.com |date=September 1997 |access-date=September 21, 2014 }} *{{cite web |last=Evenson |first=Laura |title=Dancing With Allende: 'Night Stories' spins off of her 'Eva Luna'|url=http://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/Dancing-With-Allende-Night-Stories-spins-off-2805202.php |date= September 24, 1997 |access-date=September 21, 2014 }} *{{cite news |author=Obituary |date=2012 |title=Della (Mary Adele) Davidson |newspaper=Santa Fe New Mexican |url=http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/santafenewmexican/obituary.aspx?n=della-davidson-mary-adele&pid=156777527 |access-date=September 21, 2014 }} *{{cite web|author=UCDavis |date=2012 |title=Remembering Professor Della Davidson, Department of Theatre and Dance |url=http://www.ls.ucdavis.edu/harcs/news-and-research/della-davidson.html |website=ucdavis.edu |access-date=September 21, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140924041540/http://www.ls.ucdavis.edu/harcs/news-and-research/della-davidson.html |archive-date=September 24, 2014 }} *{{cite web|author=Dave Jones|date=May 29, 2012|title=THE ARTS: A new dance work, driven by Prof. Davidson's inquiry into life, death, beauty|url=https://www.ucdavis.edu/news/arts-new-dance-work-driven-prof-davidsons-inquiry-life-death-beauty|website=ucdavis.edu|accessdate=September 13, 2022 }}
{{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Davidson, Della}} Category:1950s births Category:2012 deaths Category:American female dancers Category:Dancers from New Mexico Category:American modern dancers Category:Deaths from breast cancer in New Mexico Category:University of California, Davis faculty Category:Michigan State University alumni Category:University of Utah alumni Category:University of Arizona alumni Category:21st-century American women Category:Date of birth missing Category:Place of birth missing Category:21st-century American dancers