John Ward

Has been folkdancing for the last 42 years, 39 of them with UF International Folkdance club (http://grove.ufl.edu/~folkstep) and plans to keep dancing for some 20 more.

Style of Dance:

International Folkdance with a predilection for showy Balkan men dances and Israeli circle dances. Will teach the men's part in European couple dances to anybody interested who comes to a folkdance club meeting.

Short Dance Bio:

John began folkdancing in fall of 1961, as a graduate student at Yale. In 1962 he joined the art faculty at UF, and saved the local folkdance group of death by lack of a leader. He has been dancing with the UF group eversince, sauf 1964-66 when he studied for a painting degree and danced with the Albuquerque folkdance group and a one year sabbatical for Ph.D. qualifying exams at Boston University (1978). He has been back in Gainesville ever since, teaching art history and occasionally painting classes, and hardly missing the Friday folkdance meetings. Dr. Wards expects to retire in the spring of 2004, which may give him more time to dance.

For his career as an artist and art historian and a painted self-portrait, 1991, see John
For more pictures of folkdance see http://grove.ufl.edu/~folkstep/gallery.htm