DESERT ROSE 🌹 A Dance/Art Film by Michelle Sorensen

This piece wasn’t created for an online show. It was created for ME.

There are a lot of reasons this film has meaning for me, but the most important one speaks to my personal journey of leaning into my sexuality/sensuality as a woman and the various ways that I have been shamed for that.

When I first started exploring sensual floorwork/pole dance, I hid it from the world, afraid of the backlash I might receive for my choice to pursue more erotic art. I was primarily concerned with how my career as a fusion bellydance artist would change once others knew about it, but I also knew my immediate family would not be pleased.

I grew up in a very conservative home, where ANY kind of sexuality was frowned upon. It took many years of self-discovery to reclaim that for myself, and pole dance was the catalyst.

I had been involved in the “fitness” aspect of pole for a few years before diving into the sensual side. I look back at the day I decided to try my first floorwork class and remember how UTTERLY TERRIFIED I was. I felt awkward, uncoordinated, and a little uncomfortable, but it awakened something in me I had never felt before. That “thing” was addicting. I kept going back to classes, got myself some fancy stripper heels (which I felt like a baby deer in for quite some time) and have never looked back since.

The growth I have experienced both emotionally and physically from TRULY embracing those parts of my sexuality I had suppressed for many years, opened my eyes to so much I was missing out on, both in the relationship with my spouse, and with other women. Being empowered in my sensuality helped me see why boosting OTHER women was so important, and that has become my true passion both on and off the dance floor.

This song, sung by French/Algerian artist ‪@LoloZouai‬, originally speaks to the strained relationship with her fathers side of the family, which is Algerian. The religious/cultural standards that they hold makes it hard for them to accept her as she comes, as she does not live the same lifestyle. (If you have time, please watch her music video to this track. It’s breathtakingly and tragically beautiful.)

I know I am not experiencing her exact situation, as culturally, my family/societal lifestyles are quite different, but it spoke to my heart and my own personal struggles with being accepted in the more conservative dance community/inner circles for my life choices.

I am not ashamed of who I am, for I know I am becoming more of who I was meant to be every single day. Erotic art/stripping/sensual movement has changed me forever, in the very best ways.

Thank you all so much for encouraging me on this journey, and for being vulnerable and willing to share part of yours with me in taking my more sensual classes.

I love and appreciate you.

M

Song: "Desert Rose" by ‪@LoloZouai‬

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