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Tag: dance

Our sense of reality and self

Our sense of reality and self

Chuck Wilt and Rebecca Margolick in birds sing a pretty song. (photo by Maxx Berkowitz)

Social media has changed the way in which we work, play and shop. It has changed how we communicate, access information, and even how we define ourselves.

A new work by Rebecca Margolick and Maxx Berkowitz, called birds sing a pretty song, “explores how surveillance and confinement through our digital and physical surroundings affect one’s sense of reality and self.” The full-length piece will have its world premiére in New York City next week. It will then arrive in Vancouver for its Canadian première at Chutzpah!Plus May 13-14.

Birds sing a pretty song was created during a year-long fellowship at New York’s 14th Street Y Theatre’s LABA: A Laboratory for Jewish Culture and two Chutzpah! Festival creation residencies.

LABA describes itself as a program “that uses classic Jewish texts to inspire the creation of art, dialogue and study.”

“After learning about LABA in 2015, we decided to take our shared vision and esthetic to create a piece together that would leverage our differing backgrounds and skill sets of dance and music, design and tech,” said Margolick and Berkowitz in an email interview. “Through the year of study and support from the LABA fellowship, our original concept, revolving around the loss of physical self in a hyper-social world, evolved through the varied conversations about beauty and imagery seeded by the provocative ideas in the ancient texts we studied.

“We had two work-in-progress showings at the 14th Street Y in April 2016 and, this past year, we were fortunate to be able to continue to develop the full-length piece through the support of two creation residencies from the Chutzpah! Festival, in Vancouver and Sointula, B.C., where we refined the choreography and brought in live music. The roots of last year’s showing are still present; however, the movement, sound and film have all changed.”

“Some of the most memorable moments in the development of the piece were when Maxx and I would have moments of clarity between us,” said Margolick. “After coming up with complex ideas, we would realize that staying true to our core goal for this piece, being that simple and raw, can be the most impactful, and that technology should be used as a means to enhance the narrative of the work, rather than a means of distraction or excess.”

As for Berkowitz, he said, “One of the most memorable conversations Rebecca and I had during the development of this piece was walking home after a LABA study session where we had read the story of a rabbi who was known as one of the most beautiful people of the time. His beauty led a princess who loved him without reciprocation … to the point of losing touch with what his beauty meant to her, coveting his beauty to the point of taking the skin off of his face to make a mask for herself. This horrifying story led us to discuss the parallels with how one can lose themselves in their online personas, seeking fame, beauty and recognition to the point of losing their sense of self.”

Birds sing a pretty song involves two dancers, whose wanderings the audience follows “through a world manipulated and influenced by the ‘curators’ … and projected light structures that move and direct the world onstage. Throughout the piece, they encounter an attempt at a relationship, fleeting glimpses of memory, and a fight for connection.”

Dancers Margolick and Chuck Wilt are joined by guitarist/media/composer Berkowitz, guitarist/composer Jake Klar and percussionist Bruno Esrubilsky (the curators) and Israeli author and scholar Ruby Namdar.

“The idea of ‘curators’ came from our exploration of how, in our social media platforms, it is easy to forget that everything you see is carefully selected for you based on the computer-crafted picture of you, that you can get trapped in a sounding room where the news, information and even advertising is targeted at your historical tastes and how that can be harnessed to manipulate your choices and decisions and fixes you into a stereotype of yourself,” explained Berkowitz. “This has become even more [relevant] in the current political climate and the ‘post-truth’ world, in which social media has played such a heavy role, and surveillance is an ever-increasing fact of life.”

“We wanted to play with the idea of the dancers being trapped in a curated space (the stage), where the musicians subtly manipulate the dancers’ movement and reactions,” added Margolick. “The dancers are also aware of the audience’s gaze, subconsciously at first but, as the piece goes on, they become aware of the audience and curators and are left exposed.

“As a performer, I was always intrigued by the fact that you’re in an enclosed space together with the audience, where you are aware that the audience is watching you as you are also watching them. This feeling of being observed while also observing is something I wanted to explore in this piece.”

Margolick has family connections in Vancouver, and has given of her time to the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver’s Festival Ha’Rikud, which she will do again when she is here in May. She also has connections to the Metro Vancouver dance community.

“I trained at Arts Umbrella from 6 to 18 years old and, through that program, I was introduced to both local and international dance artists and choreographers,” she said. “Over the past couple years, I’ve traveled between New York City and Vancouver and have been involved in dance projects with Donald Sales’ Project20 and Shay Kuebler’s Radical System Art. As for the Jewish community, through growing up attending Temple Sholom, working at the JCC summer day camp and dancing with Or Chadash, I was immersed into the local Jewish community.”

Berkowitz, too, has local ties.

“I was fortunate,” he said, “to be involved with the Chutzpah! Festival in the past, joining Shay Kuebler’s Radical System Art’s residency in Sointula to document their process and teach photography to local residents. And, in 2015, my up-and-coming band Twin Wave had two performances in Vancouver, at the Imperial Theatre and the Red Room.”

Among the major supporters of birds sing a pretty song are the Jewish Foundation of Greater Vancouver, Phyliss and Irving Snider Foundation, Diamond Foundation, Betty Averbach Foundation, Canada Council for the Arts, B.C. Arts Council and the City of Vancouver.

Birds sing a pretty song is at the Rothstein Theatre May 13, 8 p.m., and May 14, 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $29.50, $25.50 (senior) and $23.50 (student) and can be purchased at chutzpahfestival.com, 604-257-5145 or in-person at the JCCGV, as well as from Tickets Tonight, 604-684-2787.

Format ImagePosted on April 28, 2017April 26, 2017Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags Chutzpah! Festival, dance, LABA, Maxx Berkowitz, Rebecca Margolick
Ballet BC trio of firsts

Ballet BC trio of firsts

Choreographer Emanuel Gat, who was in Vancouver for a few weeks at the beginning of the year, will return for the Ballet BC world première of his new work. (photo by Wendy D Photography)

Ballet BC finishes this season May 11-13 with Program 3, which features a world première by choreographer Emanuel Gat, an almost world première by Emily Molnar and the Ballet BC première of Minus 16 by Ohad Naharin.

“I have long admired the works of Emanuel Gat and Ohad Naharin and have been eager to bring them to our artists and audiences,” says Molnar, artistic director of Ballet BC, in the press release announcing the program. She isn’t the only one to admire the creativity of choreographers Gat and Naharin, and many dance fans will be excited to see their work performed. Professional dancers age 16 and over will even have a chance to learn with Gat in person on May 6, when he teaches excerpts from the 30-minute piece he created for the full Ballet BC company (balletbc.com/choreographic-workshop-emanuel-gat).

Both Gat and Naharin started their dance careers relatively late, in their 20s, but have more than made up for any lost time. Born in 1952 in Kibbutz Mizra, in northern Israel, Naharin has been artistic director of Batsheva Dance Company since 1990 and is the creator of the movement language called Gaga – it is not an exaggeration to say he is an icon of contemporary dance. Born in Netanya in 1969, Gat is artistic director of Emanuel Gat Dance, which he established in 2004, and his works have been performed around the world.

Gat’s career trajectory changed when, at age 23, he attended a workshop led by another Israeli choreographer, Nir Ben Gal.

“I was studying music at the time,” Gat told the Independent in an email interview. “I’d just started a first year at the Rubin Academy of Music, and intended to be a conductor. I stopped a few months after starting to dance.”

Within a couple of years, Gat was working as an independent choreographer. When he founded his company, it was at the Suzanne Dellal Centre in Tel Aviv, which Batsheva Dance Company also calls home. However, after about 15 years in Tel Aviv and a few in the south of Israel, Gat moved to France in 2007, where he lives in a small village near Aix-en-Provence.

One of the aspects Gat most likes about being a choreographer is that “you work with a group of people, that it’s not a solitary process, and that it’s always full of surprises and insights.”

In various interviews, he has stressed the importance of process in the creation of a work.

“Time, space and eager dancers, basically,” he said of the elements needed for a creative environment. “All the rest is a result of an ongoing process of examining different questions regarding these elements, the way in which they come together and affect each other.”

While the Ballet BC program doesn’t name Gat’s new work, his website lists it as Lock.

“It comes from a certain task I gave [the dancers] on devising ways of joining two separated phrases,” he said about the title. “One of the strategies they came up with, they named ‘lock,’ which I liked the sound of.”

Gat was in Vancouver for a few weeks at the beginning of the year to create the piece, he said, and he will be returning “to finalize the work and create the light[ing] for it.”

“I’m very happy about this project,” he said, “and it was a lot of fun creating together with this talented bunch.”

Heading the talented bunch at Ballet BC since 2009 has been Molnar. The National Arts Centre in Ottawa commissioned her latest work as part of ENCOUNT3RS. The NAC presentation paired “three Canadian choreographers with three Canadian composers to create works with original scores, in celebration of Canada’s 150th anniversary,” notes the Ballet BC release. Molnar’s creation, set to a score by Canadian composer Nicole Lizée, saw its world première in Ottawa at the NAC April 20-22 and local audiences will see it as part of Program 3.

Rounding out Program 3 is Naharin’s Minus 16. Unfortunately, the choreographer won’t be able to make it to Vancouver for the performance. For just over two months now, he and Batsheva Dance Company dancers have been developing Venezuela, a full evening work set to start its première run at the Suzanne Dellal Centre May 12. But Batsheva personnel will be helping Ballet BC rehearse their first Naharin work.

“I have a team that can do it without me, though I would love to join all the premières,” Naharin told the Independent in a phone interview from Tel Aviv. “I trust them,” he said. “They have done it before without me many times.”

photo - Ballet BC will perform Ohad Naharin’s Minus 16 as part of Program 3
Ballet BC will perform Ohad Naharin’s Minus 16 as part of Program 3. (photo from Ballet BC)

At the start of his career, he said, “I didn’t have the safety net of people I can trust and that knew how to do it; I didn’t have the skill myself to teach other people how to do it. Over the years, and especially with Minus – because Minus has been done by a lot of companies and also it’s a work that we do, or we do versions of it – my assistants have become experts at doing it and teaching it. It’s true that still, given the control freak that I am, it’s an exercise of letting go each time, but it’s a good exercise.”

The Ballet BC program description of Minus 16 mentions its “mesmerizing use of improvisation.”

“The idea is to give dancers as much information as possible, because it’s not about free form or do whatever you want,” explained Naharin about how improvisational aspects are “written” into a piece of choreography. “It’s about basing your intention, dynamics, texture, volume on very clear ideas, and those ideas are shared with the dancers, then they improvise and they get feedback. Usually, it’s not about what not to do. Feedback usually will highlight what was weak or what was right, what was the moment that produced what it needed. What is nice about the situation is that it can offer a [dimension] that I didn’t write that can be just as good, if not better sometimes.”

But, he said, about Minus, “There is very little improvisation in the piece, actually. What has made the piece easy to teach … is that it is very structured. Also, some of it is built on repetition and accumulation; it is not crowded with a lot of steps. Some of my work has a more complex structure, many different people doing different things and different movements, and that takes a lot of time and also skills and experience to learn and to teach. With Minus, a lot of it is unison and a big chunk of it is about repetition and accumulation, and very clear counts – so many times, my work is done to music that doesn’t have a groove or a beat, and the manic of the movements comes from listening to each other and understanding the essence of the creative pulse of the movement. With Minus, almost all the movements are counted and based on a particular rhythm that also comes from and is supported by the music. The improvisation part of Minus is meaningful, but it’s not the big part of it.”

Originally created in 1999, Minus 16 is “set to a score ranging from Dean Martin to mambo, techno to traditional Israeli music.” Of what ties its elements together, Naharin said, “I think, in balance, what ties things together in a right way is not how different the ingredients are from each other or how similar they are, but it’s how you try to create the right tension between all the elements.

“It’s just like if you go and look at the landscape. Sometimes it can be just desert and sky, and sometimes it can be a landscape that’s crowded with a lot of elements, including bridges or houses or the sun or clouds or birds or animals or people or machines, and it can still create something that is coherent and clear. It can also create, potentially, the sensation of ‘wow!’ And the reason it’s all connected is not because of what the ingredients are but how they are all organized.”

While there are no rules about what music can go with another music, he said, “a choreographer has his own rules, or his own code.” He explained that a choreographer could set an evening-length work to only the music of Mozart and still the work’s elements may not connect well, whereas shorter pieces set to vastly different music could work together well as a whole – “you could put John Zorn with Vivaldi and it can be magnificent,” he said. “It has to do with creating the right tension and the right mix.”

Naharin has been creating that balance since his choreographic debut in 1980.

“There are a few things I can think of immediately,” he said about what he loves about his work. “One of them is the pleasure of research and finding things that I didn’t know existed before I found them, couldn’t even imagine before I found them, and I find them in the process.

“Another thing is the pleasure of working with a brilliant, generous, beautiful, creative group of people that I love; learning from them and sharing with them what I learn.

“I love what the dancers offer me. Not when they show me my choreography but when they show me their interpretation of my choreography, and when they can offer a narrative that I didn’t write. That can be very moving.

“I like to dance. I love to move. I love to make up movements. I need to dance. It’s something that, if I don’t do it, I’m unhappy.”

He added, “For me, to dance is not about performing. I don’t need an audience to dance.”

One of his favourite places to dance? “I love to dance in the shower.”

Anything else he’d like Jewish Independent readers to know? “Just not to forget to dance a little bit every day.”

Program 3 runs May 11-13, 8 p.m., at Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Tickets range from $21.25 to $91.25 and can be purchased from 1-855-985-2787 (855-985-ARTS) or ticketmaster.ca. For more information, visit balletbc.com.

Format ImagePosted on April 28, 2017April 26, 2017Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags Ballet BC, Batsheva Dance Company, dance, Emanuel Gat, Emily Molnar, Ohad Naharin
Dance that speaks out

Dance that speaks out

Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion’s The Gettin’ is among the repertoire the company will be bringing to Vancouver March 11-13 for the Chutzpah! Festival. (photo by Jerry and Lois Photography)

Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion is bringing to Western Canada for the first time a sample of its acclaimed repertoire, including The Gettin’, Quiet Dance and excerpts from the company’s newest work, Dearest Home. They will perform at the Chutzpah! Festival March 11-13.

“Dearest Home is a new evening-length work that is broken up into solos and duets dealing with love, longing and loss,” explained Kyle Abraham in an interview with the Independent. “Some of the themes, and movement itself, were derived from the workshops and conversations that took place during residencies. The excerpts that are shown in this program were made during a residency at the Hopkins Centre for the Arts, Dartmouth College.”

Politics, identity, justice and freedom are some of the other themes Abraham explores in his work.

“I try to create work that reflects society as I see it,” he said. “Sometimes people see hope in that and sometimes people see the disparity that is in closer correlation to my experience growing up in this country. But, there is also purposefully the possibility of seeing both hope and disparity in my work; I think that speaks to the conflict and tensions that have been in this country for a long period of time. There are stories that are from an earlier time, but the work winds up correlating with current events basically because of the cyclical nature of history repeating itself over and over again. With that work so often comes a direct smack in the face that there is still so much more progress to be made. I like to make work that speaks to all those things.”

Religion also plays a part in some of Abraham’s creations.

“Since my parents passed, and since my mother’s more recent passing, I have had a really conflicting connection with religion and spirituality in a larger sense,” he said. “I was very curious as a child when it came to religion. I think there’s so much history in religion, in so many different ways. My parents were of different Christian faiths: my father was raised in an Episcopalian church, my mother was raised in a Baptist church, and I purposely chose to go to Hebrew school. I think that shows that I was really interested in learning about different faiths and trying to figure out where I fit in.

“It’s a tricky thing. Just because your parents believe something doesn’t mean that’s what you will believe. Just because your friends believe something doesn’t mean that’s ultimately what you’ll wind up believing yourself. But, I’ve always been curious about religion and faith in some way, shape or form, and have spent time in different religious spaces through points in my life. The last religious space I was in was a (Jewish) temple; that was in October for a friend of mine’s mother’s passing. And then, before that, it was my mother’s passing, in a Baptist church.”

While his parents weren’t artists per se, Abraham said the arts were encouraged at home, and that his parents “were really creative people because they worked in education and they had to come up with inventive ways to really push education forward in the public school system.”

Born and raised in Pittsburgh, Abraham’s education in dance started relatively late in life.

“I started studying dance the summer I turned 17, when I took a boys jazz class,” he said. “The catalyst for this was seeing the Joffrey Ballet performing in Pittsburgh to Prince’s music, which was the first dance performance I ever saw. I also had some good friends that were in musical theatre that I went to raves with, and they suggested that I audition for our high school musical.”

Though he has made a career of dance, before Abraham started on that route, he studied music. And, when he took a break from dancing for a few years, it was to music he returned.

“For so much of my life, music has been my first passion,” he said. “When I was a senior in college, I thought about moving to England to study studio composition, to make electronic music, but, during that same year, I started taking company classes with Bill T. Jones. I was later offered an apprenticeship, which led to joining the company very briefly after college.

“That experience was very telling for me, because it helped me realize that even though I really loved that company and wanted to be around them, I preferred being a part of the creative space around the dancers rather than being a dancer myself within the company. I had a very hard time with making mistakes with an artist’s work that I respected so much. I felt like I was ruining the possibilities for people to be inspired by messing up, which is such a heavy burden to bear that I needed to find a healthier way into dance.

“When I quit dancing,” he said, “I started working in record stores; I would meet up with friends and I would maybe sing over some records for friends while playing around in the studio making songs. I also worked at the Andy Warhol Museum as an artist educator. During that time, I thought about different facets of my artistic interests growing up; for example, bringing in music at times, bringing in movement and finding ways we could connect those art forms to Warhol’s work. That’s primarily what I was doing with that time off.

“My way back into dance started when I was dating a visual artist. At the time, we both wanted to move to England so we thought that the best way for us to do that would be for both of us to get into school in England. I also applied to NYU [New York University], just as a backup plan in case I didn’t go to Europe – maybe I would go to NYU and see what New York was like again. We both ended up going to school in London, where I attended the [Trinity] Laban School. I went to Laban for maybe a couple months, but I was frustrated by the lack of opportunities I had to really dance: to make dance, take classes, etc. So, I left school and spent the rest of my time there focusing on trying new things (i.e. singing). I eventually moved to New York to go to NYU to figure out what my relationship to dance could be.”

Abraham received his bachelor in fine arts from the State University of New York at Purchase (2000) and his master’s from NYU (2006). He is a multiple award-winner, for both his choreography and performance. He has performed with many notable companies, and his works have been performed not only by his company, Abraham.In.Motion, which he founded in 2006, but others, as well, throughout the United States and abroad.

About one of the pieces set to have its West Coast première next weekend, Rachael Carnes of eugeneweekly.com wrote, “… The Quiet Dance, a quintet set to Leonard Bernstein’s ‘Some Other Time,’ this work built organically around simple gestures, from the swivel of knees and elbows side to side, to the slow descent of a head, alone, or against another. Abraham played with connection here, relating dancers to self and other, finding moments of counterpoint, without being heavy-handed or glossy. His organic style delved into lovely canonical structures without feeling artificial or contrived, as he boldly carved the stage space into two separate fields of vision.”

About The Gettin’, she wrote, “set to Robert Glasper’s interpretation of Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite, Abraham plows even more deeply into the roots of racism, exploring the similarities between apartheid South Africa and the U.S.

“Jazzy and lyrical, yet pointed and gripping, this piece sings from a deep, guttural place.”

Abraham.In.Motion performs March 11 and 13, 8 p.m., and March 12, 7 p.m., at Rothstein Theatre. For tickets ($29.47-$36.46) and the full Chutzpah! schedule, call 604-257-5145 or visit chutzpahfestival.com.

Format ImagePosted on March 3, 2017February 28, 2017Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags Chutzpah! Festival, dance, Kyle Abraham
Life stories told in dance

Life stories told in dance

Allen and Karen Kaeja perform their latest lifeDUETS series March 9-11, as part of the Vancouver International Dance Festival. (photo by Zhenya Cerneacov)

As a dancer, how do you tell the story of a couple’s life together that has deep roots but is continually evolving? The Kaejas decided to commission two different pieces from two different choreographers. The result is the latest in their lifeDUETS series, which comprises a structured piece that is more or less consistent in every performance, and another that constantly changes.

Allen and Karen Kaeja established Kaeja d’Dance in 1991. The Toronto-based couple commissioned three duets about 20 years ago, and the newest two were commissioned in 2015 for their 25th anniversary. It is this anniversary pair – one by Tedd Robinson, the other by Benjamin Kamino – that the Kaejas will share at Roundhouse Performance Centre March 9-11, as part of the Vancouver International Dance Festival, which runs March 1-25 at various local venues.

“We’ve always performed together, but improvised, and I suggested this idea of commissioning choreographers,” said Karen in an interview with the Independent over speakerphone.

“We commissioned Claudia Moore … Peter Bingham from out west, and then we did our own lifeDUET, and commissioned Marie-Josée Chartier. Those years of commissioning ended in 2001,” said Allen.

Variations of that program toured throughout Canada, the United States and many other parts of the world. “And then,” said Karen, “for our 25th anniversary, that’s where I thought we should really reinstitute the lifeDUETS and commission more people. At that time, Allen was performing less, so it took a little bit of nudging and, together, we decided on bringing someone into the fold who was highly experienced and created pieces on so many Canadians, which is Tedd, and then someone who was up-and-coming who was in the realm of experimentation.”

“And that was Benjamin Kamino,” said Allen. “And so, two opposites of the spectrum.”

The two pieces were collaborative works. “We created together with both of them, so both choreographers say in their program notes, created with and performed by us,” explained Allen. “They were both created for our 25th anniversary, as Karen was saying, and Tedd’s is called 25 to 1. He talked to a very dear friend of his, Peter Boneham, about, what am I going to do with these two guys?” The semi-joking response, said Allen, was to put the couple in a tent having sex (though less delicately phrased).

“But then, of course, the whole thing began to evolve, and became this really gorgeous duet. And what was beautiful about that was that neither of them knew that Karen and I, in our dating years, would do wilderness camping up in Algonquin, in Temagami; we’d go out for 10 days to two weeks at a time. We loved wilderness camping, so it really resonated at home with us, but they didn’t have any idea.”

As for the idea that sparked Kamino’s piece, Karen said, “I think his vision came from the concept of ‘becoming’ each other, and that was the initial seed. Because we have this history of all these years, instead of having us do what people know us to do, which is a lot of partnering and so on, he would create a work where we almost never touched each other, where we would become each other to different degrees to a scored creation, because we knew each other so well.”

Karen said that every work created for her takes her off guard – “because it takes me on a tangent that I would not go myself” – and these two were no different. “Ben’s is really quite raw and exposed,” she said, “and that was a very beautiful inter-relational process, of becoming each other – and having him witness, as a choreographer. That process, for me, was like a mindful trio, very different than me and Allen being in the studio creating a work.”

Robinson and Kamino were creating works on a significant and special relationship, she said, and she and Allen “in a way, had to open our door and let them in.”

“Karen and I met in 1981 and started dueting 36 years ago, but started dating 32 years ago … so, our physical connection has a longevity that most people don’t know together,” said Allen, referring to its dance aspect. “As Karen was saying, a lot of our dueting is improvised, so we’re continuously surprising each other, we’re continuously living in this state of unpredictability, and yet a depth of knowledge about [each other].”

“Or catching each other’s predictabilities and challenging those,” interjected Karen.

“That, as well,” admitted Allen. “That being said, Tedd’s piece is tightly, tightly, tightly choreographed, to almost every beat in the music. There is very little room for variation. Whereas, in Ben’s piece, there’s only one moment that’s set and even that is an improvisation, so it really captures our life and our existence together.”

After a brief discussion about how many moments are indeed set – which wasn’t definitely resolved – Allen said, “The emotionality of the work, especially with becoming each other, with Ben’s piece, it’s a very different type of piece because we are continuously asking ourselves questions. For example, I was there when Karen’s father passed away, and so I would ask a question, what would my last dance be for my father’s final minutes, things like that. It’s got an emotional resonance that nobody would know but her. For me, it’s not only a vulnerable place and a personal place, but it puts me into her being, her essence. I’ll never know how Karen is truly feeling … but it allows me a window into her soul, to be my perception of where she is at.”

The Kamino piece is different every night, said Karen, “because we work with imagery that comes to us; it’s not set imagery.”

While not religious, Allen described he and Karen as “Jewish to the core.”

“Some of our works have touched upon that aspect of our lives,” he said. “But, as creative artists, I would say the connection to being Jewish, in a sense, is that connection of always questioning, of not being satisfied with an answer.”

“But I would say that that is universal,” said Karen. “I don’t think that’s particularly Jewish, but that’s what’s led us, our heritage.”

Allen’s father was a survivor, and Allen has done series of works on his father’s life during the Holocaust, including two trilogies of films, he said, some of which are housed at Yad Vashem, in its permanent collection, as well as in the permanent collections of New York’s Jewish Museum, and Museum of Modern Art.

Karen said her parents never approved of her becoming a dancer, and certainly not her marrying one. “Acceptance came later,” she said, “after the commitment to our career went forward and they saw what fruits were coming. It’s a long road, establishing oneself as a dance artist…. But, here we are, 27 years into the company.”

For tickets to lifeDUETS and the full festival lineup, visit vidf.ca/tickets or call 604-662-4966.

Format ImagePosted on February 24, 2017February 21, 2017Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags choreography, dance, Kaeja, lifeDuets
Chutzpah! tix now on sale

Chutzpah! tix now on sale

David Broza, left, and Ali Paris will perform in concert. (photo from Chutzpah! Festival)

Tickets are now on sale for the 17th annual Chutzpah! Lisa Nemetz International Jewish Performing Arts Festival, which will run from Feb. 16 to March 13, at venues including Rothstein Theatre, York Theatre, Scotiabank Dance Centre and the Biltmore Cabaret.

“We are all excited for another year of presenting an electrifying array of internationally acclaimed dancers, musicians, comedians and theatrical artists to our audiences in Canadian, Western Canadian and world premières. We’re headed for an energizing and thrilling journey from stand-up comedy to theatrical drama to rich global music to explosive and elegant dance!” said Mary-Louise Albert, Chutzpah!’s artistic and managing director.

photo - Italy’s Spellbound Contemporary Ballet returns to Vancouver, bringing with them Carmina Burana
Italy’s Spellbound Contemporary Ballet returns to Vancouver, bringing with them Carmina Burana. (photo by Mariano Bevilacqua)

As it does every year, the 2017 Chutzpah! Festival dance series presents some of the most sought-after contemporary choreographers in the world. This year’s performances include the return of Italy’s Spellbound Contemporary Ballet with their full-length Carmina Burana; Israel’s Yossi Berg and Oded Graf Dance Theatre with their acclaimed 4Men, Alice, Bach and the Deer; and Kyle Abraham/Abraham.In.Motion (United States) brings a mixed repertoire of some of Kyle Abraham’s most popular works in their Western Canadian première. Vancouver’s Shay Kuebler/Radical System Art première their completed and full-length version of Telemetry, while local choreographer and performer Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg and Italy’s award-winning Silvia Gribaudi navigate the role of comedy as a catalyst to questions of gender, culture and language and understanding – this is world première presented with the Dance Centre. As well, in Chutzpah! Plus (May 13-14), there is Birds Sing a Pretty Song (Canada/United States/Israel/Argentina), an exploration through dance, film, interactive media and live music created by Rebecca Margolick and Maxx Berkowitz during a yearlong fellowship in New York City with LABA: A Laboratory for New Jewish Culture.

Among the Chutzpah! Festival 2017 musical highlights is Grammy-winners the Klezmatics 30th Anniversary Tour (United States). In concert together will be David Broza, whose music reflects the three different countries in which he was raised (Israel, Spain and England), and Ali Paris, who fuses Middle Eastern and Western music styles, and plays the qanun, a rare 76-string zither that dates back to the 14th century. Also in concert together will be Shalom Hanoch – touted as “the King of Israeli Rock” and compared to musicians such as Neil Young and Mick Jagger – who will be joined on stage by his longtime music producer, partner and keyboard player Moshe Levi.

Now based out of Chicago, Marbin, founded by Israeli guitarist Dani Rabin and Israeli saxophonist Danny Markovitch, is a progressive jazz-rock band, and MNGWA [ming-wah] opens their performance, mixing elements of psychedelic rock, dub, African rhythms, and vocals in four languages. Israeli singer Maya Avraham, who is known by Chutzpah! audiences from her performances with the Idan Raichel Project, comes to Vancouver with her band of Israeli and American musicians, and Lyla Canté (United States/Israel/Japan/Argentina) also joins the festival – exploring the intersection of Sephardi, flamenco and Ashkenazi music. For Chutzpah! Plus (April 2), composer Landon Braverman and Friends put on an evening of musical theatre – while currently based in New York, Braverman is originally from Vancouver.

With respect to theatre, one of this year’s Chutzpah! highlights is Wrestling Jerusalem, created and performed by Aaron Davidman. Set in America, Israel and Palestine, the play follows one man’s journey to help understand the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Davidman’s solo performance is a personal story that grapples with the complexities of identity, history and social justice.

Another theatre draw is Folk Lordz, high-speed and multicultural improv featuring two members of Edmonton-based Rapid Fire Theatre, which was co-created by Todd Houseman and Ben Gorodetsky and brings together the unlikely combination of Cree storytelling, Chekhovian character drama and spontaneous comedy.

Comedy highlights include Mark Schiff (United States), who has headlined major casinos and clubs and has appeared many times on both The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and Late Night with David Letterman. He has had HBO and Showtime specials, was a featured act at the Montreal Comedy Festival and regularly opens for Jerry Seinfeld.

Also on the comedy front, there is a double bill: Ali Hassan and Judy Gold. Canada’s Hassan appears in his one-man show Muslim Interrupted; Hassan is a stand-up comedian, actor, chef and radio and television celebrity, and is the host of Laugh Out Loud on CBC Radio and SIRIUSXM. Gold’s (United States) most recent TV appearances include guest-starring roles on Louie, Broad City, The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Inside Amy Schumer, and she has a recurring role on the upcoming series on TBS Search Party. Gold has had stand-up specials on HBO (Cable Ace Award), Comedy Central and LOGO and was twice nominated for the American Comedy Award for funniest female comedian.

After the success of Chutzpah’s first literary event in 2016, this year’s Chutzpah! features author Christopher Noxon in Hollywood Stories, a special pre-festival event. Noxon is an author, journalist and illustrator and his humorous and unflinching Plus One is a novel about an interfaith family set in contemporary Los Angeles. Noxon is married to television writer and producer Jenji Kohan, creator of Orange is the New Black. This event is presented with the Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival and will take place on Feb. 5.

Single tickets for Chutzpah! range from $23 to $50 and are on sale now from chutzpahfestival.com, the festival box office, 604-257-5145, or Tickets Tonight, 604-684-2787. Chutzi Packs are also available – see four different shows for $94 – and new this year is a special five-show dance pack for $115.

Tickets will be available in-person starting Jan. 30 at the on-site festival box office at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver. For hours and other information, visit chutzpahfestival.com.

Format ImagePosted on December 2, 2016December 1, 2016Author Chutzpah! FestivalCategories Performing ArtsTags comedy, dance, music, Rothstein Theatre, theatre
Dance in support of refugees

Dance in support of refugees

Children learn the #iamchild dance routine created by Israeli-Turkish therapist and journalist Michal Bardavid. (photo from iamchildproject.com)

There’s a new dance routine on social-media sites that has five catchy poses and one enormously powerful message.

The #iamchild dance-therapy routine is part of a project in support of Syrian children affected by ongoing civil war. It was created by Israeli-Turkish journalist Michal Bardavid to give emotional and moral support to millions of the world’s refugee children.

In addition to being an international correspondent for China Central Television, Bardavid is a psychological counselor and a certified dance therapist. After meeting hundreds of Syrian children in refugee camps on the Turkish-Syrian border, she created a motivational dance exercise made up of five positively worded sentences accompanied by five movements to show the kids that someone cares.

The five phrases – “I am loved,” “I am a child,” “I am safe,” “I am a whole person,” “I am beautiful” – are spoken in Arabic.

“The accompanying movements make the emotion more concrete as children say the sentences out loud,” Bardavid writes about the project.

In honor of United Nations Universal Children’s Day on Nov. 20, a day that promotes “international togetherness, awareness among children worldwide, and improving children’s welfare,” Bardavid uploaded a call-to-action video – in English and Turkish – asking people to join the movement and show support for the Syrian kids.

So far, she has documented 600 Syrian refugee children and 350 Turkish schoolchildren doing the #iamchild dance routine. Children in Israel, Iraq, Spain, the United Kingdom and Turkey have sent in heartwarming homemade videos of how they perform the dance routine.

“#iamchild is about empowering Syrian refugee children, creating solidarity among Syrian and international children, and increasing global awareness on the issue,” writes Bardavid.

Bardavid wants to reach as many Syrian refugee children as possible via social media and word of mouth. “It’s important to remember Syrian kids are actually the ones most affected by the conflict,” writes Bardavid, noting that she hopes her #iamchild project will “induce a positive emotion even if for a brief moment.”

Israel21C is a nonprofit educational foundation with a mission to focus media and public attention on the 21st-century Israel that exists beyond the conflict. For more, or to donate, visit israel21c.org.

Posted on November 25, 2016November 23, 2016Author Viva Sarah Press ISRAEL21CCategories WorldTags #iamchild, dance, Israel, refugees, Syria
Becoming who we are

Becoming who we are

One of the best parts of Moos, which screens Nov. 10 as part of the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, is the friendship between Moos (Jip Smit) and Roel (Jim Deddes). (photo by Greetje Mulder)

Moos is a delightful and unpretentious film. The title character is a truly nice person, so busy taking care of others that, not only do her dreams fade into the background, but she does. When a close family friend toasts everyone at the Chanukah dinner table but forgets Moos, she drops her news – she’s going to audition for theatre school.

In this light and uplifting Dutch contribution to the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, which runs to Nov. 13, no one believes that Moos has the talent or confidence to pass the auditions and, well, she doesn’t, but her attempt starts her on a path of self-discovery and self-assertion. On their own personal journeys are Moos’ father, who must also become more independent and move through the loss of his wife, and Sam, a childhood friend of Moos who returns from 15 years in Israel for a visit and discovers that maybe he belongs in Amsterdam.

“I wanted to make a film about ordinary people in a world where beauty and appearance are everything,” writes director Job Gosschalk. “Not a glamorous romantic comedy but a film about two people who were not first in line when they were handing out good looks. There are enough stories about heroes. This would be a small story about daily troubles. I wanted to give the audience characters they could easily identify with.”

Sam, Moos and the other characters do seem like people viewers might actually know. And, while as predictable as most rom-coms, Moos has its own sense of humor and style. In addition to telling a good story, the film reinforces the importance of trying something (more than once) and of supporting (and being supported by) your family and friends – one of the best parts of the film is the friendship between Moos and Roel, who does get into theatre school. The value of tradition and ritual also play a large part in the film, which starts on Chanukah and features a bris and a bar mitzvah – for different boys. Moos is a really enjoyable hour and a half.

In the documentary realm, Mr. Gaga is a joy to watch if you’re a fan of contemporary dance. Full of excerpts from his masterful choreographic creations, the film also features many video clips of Ohad Naharin – as a boy dancing, as a young man trying out moves in his apartment, as a student, as a performer and as a teacher.

Naharin has been artistic director of Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company since 1990 and is the founder of his own language of movement, Gaga. His brilliance is evident from his work and, while Mr. Gaga, oddly enough, doesn’t tell viewers much about Gaga, it does offer a meaningful introduction to Naharin, his career path, relationships, method of work, love of dance.

“Dance started in my life as long as I remember myself,” he says. But, when asked by a reporter why he dances, instead of simply saying, there is “no one clear answer,” as he does in the documentary, he makes up a fantastical story about a tragedy involving a fictional twin brother and a grandmother dying in a car accident. It would be an understatement to say that Naharin has an active imagination and the courage to use it.

Naharin only started formal dance training at 22, and he credits his late start as a reason for his success: “… I was a lot more connected to the animal that I am.” A dance teacher notes, “what he did was different.” It certainly was – and is. Mr. Gaga shows just how creative and exacting a person Naharin is, some of the challenges he has faced, the losses he has mourned, the temper he has tried to quell, and his efforts to become a better communicator and teacher. As we all are, Naharin is a work in progress.

Another documentary in the festival is a local community project: A Life Sung Yiddishly about singer Claire Klein Osipov, made by Haya Newman. For viewers unfamiliar with Osipov and her accomplished lifetime career performing Yiddish folksongs – for the most part with pianist and composer/arranger Wendy Bross Stuart – the film touches on some highlights and serves as an important video record.

For the full festival lineup, visit vjff.org.

Format ImagePosted on November 4, 2016November 3, 2016Author Cynthia RamsayCategories TV & FilmTags dance, film festival, Gaga, romantic comedies
Dance links cultures

Dance links cultures

Sula Boxall will perform with Flamenco Rosario in Flamenqueando on Sept. 17 at Vancouver Playhouse. (photo by Tim Matheson)

The Vancouver International Flamenco Festival Sept. 10-20 features a lineup of local and international flamenco artists – including local Jewish community member Sula Boxall.

Founded by Flamenco Rosario in 1990, the festival is apparently one the few devoted to flamenco outside of Spain. It features both free workshops and ticketed performances by several different groups and, this year, “celebrates flamenco’s Spanish Gypsy origins with the Vancouver première of Mercedes Amaya Company (Mexico/ Spain).”

Boxall will perform with Flamenco Rosario in Flamenqueando on Sept. 17, 8 p.m., at Vancouver Playhouse. They will open for Mercedes Amaya Company.

“I am honored that Rosario [Ancer] asked me to be a part of Flamenco Rosario’s performance on Sept. 17. These types of opportunities do not come along very often in Vancouver,” Boxall told the Independent. “It is an amazing opportunity to grow as a dancer and be a part of her creative process and experimentation. To be dancing in the same performance as the renowned Mercedes Amaya is humbling and intimidating. Being able to watch other performers and learn from them is a chance for professional development; I’m looking forward to the other performances and workshops that the festival has to offer.”

Boxall was born in Vancouver. “My parents had moved to Canada three years previously from South Africa,” she said. “I grew up in the Kitsilano area, attending Trafalgar Elementary and the Prince of Wales mini school. I moved to Victoria to study at UVic before continuing my studies at UBC. Currently, I am an elementary school teacher in Vancouver and teach children’s flamenco classes at Centro Flamenco.”

She has always wanted to dance.

“Since I was able to walk, I’ve been dancing,” she said. “When I was in preschool, I would create performances in my living room for my parents. I begged for dancing lessons until my parents agreed to start me in ballet at age 5. I continued to dance for the next 11 years. After a nine-year break from dancing, I was drawn back into it with flamenco. For the last eight years, it has grown into another important part of my identity. Dancing is something that is a part of me and I am a better person because of it.”

According to her bio, Boxall studied ballet, modern, jazz and character dance at Arts Umbrella. When she returned to dancing in 2008, “she found a way to renew her love of dance with flamenco at Centro Flamenco” and Ancer’s mentorship was “an integral part of her development as a dancer.”

Boxall started Flamenco Rosario’s three-year professional training program in 2010, she traveled to Spain in 2012 and studied there, she regularly attends workshops in Vancouver and, in 2013, she had her first solo performance. She regularly performs around Metro Vancouver, and also participated in the Vancouver International Flamenco Festival in 2014.

“Flamenco is an art form that has connections to many cultures, including the Jewish culture. I feel that my love of the traditional Jewish melodies is closely tied to my love of flamenco music,” said Boxall about why she is particularly drawn to this dance form.

“Having the opportunity to move and feel through flamenco dance allows me to express myself,” she added. “Flamenco is incredibly complex and diverse and demands lifelong learning. It takes years of study to understand flamenco and, even then, there is always more to learn. The challenge is what draws me to continue and work on improving my skills and understanding.”

As for other aspects of Judaism or Jewish culture that play a role in her life, Boxall said, “When I was growing up, I regularly attended the Peretz Centre in Vancouver. Through the Peretz, I was allowed to explore different parts of Judaism and gain a greater understanding of my cultural background. The culture, traditions and history continue to be very important to me and my identity, in particular the elements of family and community. With my family and friends, I continue to celebrate the holidays and enhance friendships in the Jewish community.

“I’ve especially been drawn to the music and the way it moves my soul. My mother gave me a large book of Jewish music for Chanukah years ago and I continue to find joy in learning new songs.”

It is interesting to connect the secular humanist philosophy of the Peretz Centre with the way in which the weeklong flamenco festival is described on its website. Since it began, the festival has “grown to a mature understanding of Vancouver’s multicultural audiences by nurturing the form’s hybridized roots in Sephardic, Persian, Gypsy and Indian cultures, and by striving to reflect and connect its diverse sociocultural identity through work narratives underlining flamenco’s universal message of humanistic tolerance.”

For tickets and information about the Vancouver International Flamenco Festival, visit vancouverflamencofestival.org or call 604-568-1273.

Format ImagePosted on September 9, 2016September 7, 2016Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags Boxall, dance, flamenco, humanism, Peretz Centre, Rosario Ancer
An open door to dance

An open door to dance

Ziyian Kwan and Vanessa Goodman perform together in Simile, which concludes the Scotiabank Dance Centre’s open house on Sept. 10. (photo by David Cooper)

The Scotiabank Dance Centre’s open house on Sept. 10 culminates with Simile, featuring new work and performances by Vanessa Goodman of Action at a Distance and Ziyian Kwan of dumb instrument Dance.

All three pieces in the show – Kwan’s Still Rhyming, Goodman’s Floating Upstream and the collaboration In Vertebrate Dreams – are connected yet unique, Goodman told the Independent.

“Ziyian’s piece, Still Rhyming, is a beautiful work that responds to Patti Smith’s book M Train, and the piece has an incredible live sound score by Jo Passed,” she said. “It is a whimsical journey for the audience and Ziyian captures and transports my imagination while I am watching the piece. For me, Floating Upstream explores the notion of having one’s head in the clouds in a very simple sense: it is the idea

of being a dreamer, where anything is both possible and impossible. And, in In Vertebrate Dreams, we are creating a surreal world where human and animal instincts are being explored and subverted.

“In many ways, I think all three works are playing with a skewed perception of reality. However, I also believe that all three works are entirely different in their tone and expression. I think this has created a very diverse and engaging program.”

According to its description, Floating Upstream “plays with the fantastic being mundane and the mundane being fantastical.” Goodman explores these elements “through simple actions and coordinations that I employ daily, like walking or speaking,” she said. “In the opening of the work, I deconstruct the act of walking and try to transform it to feel as if I am floating through the space. Or simple gestures that I do while I am talking – with these gestures, I have experimented and distorted how I can embody them until they are unrecognizable.

“Floating Upstream has an original sound composition by Vancouver-based artist Loscil,” she added. “Loscil and I have been collaborating on several works over the last year, including my solo Container that just toured to Seattle’s On the Boards’ Northwest New Works Festival and Portland’s Risk/Reward Festival. It is so great to be continuing our creative process together, as I find creating with his soundscapes so rich and driving.”

Goodman has also been working with Kwan for some time, “supporting one another and collaborating in a number of ways since 2013,” she said. “Simile is, in many ways, a culmination of our interest in each other’s work and friendship. It is always such a pleasure and honor to collaborate with colleagues in new ways, to see where you can grow and be challenged inside your artistic practice.

“The idea for the duet seeded for us when we were doing a photo shoot for the production and we got several props to work with to create some imagery to publicize the show,” she explained. “We started exploring these masks and all of sudden we decided that we were compelled to make this work. What has become clearer for me as this process has gone on is that the work is about how we both are different animals when it comes to creation but, in a strange and wonderful way, we also complement each other and have created something that is unique to us working with one another.”

The evening also features lighting design by James Proudfoot.

Goodman expressed gratitude to the Dance Centre for Simile’s inclusion in the open house, saying that she and Kwan “are very excited to be sharing this program that we have been dreaming up for the last two years.”

The Sept. 10 open house starts at 11 a.m. with an hour class on pow wow, followed by a class on tap and then many other dance styles – including swing, Brazilian, Scottish, hip-hop, ballet – throughout the afternoon to 5 p.m., as well as a workshop on injury prevention. All classes are free and suitable for beginners.

Simile starts at 8 p.m. at the centre, which is at 677 Davie St. Tickets are $25/$20 from Tickets Tonight, 604-684-2787 or ticketstonight.ca. For more information, visit thedancecentre.ca.

Format ImagePosted on September 2, 2016August 31, 2016Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags dance, In Vertebrate, Vanessa Goodman
Dancers explore our humanity

Dancers explore our humanity

Naomi Brand’s En Route will be performed by members of All Bodies Dance Project. (photo by Chris Randle)

New works and the pushing of boundaries. Just what audiences expect from the Dancing on the Edge contemporary dance festival, and just what the three participating Jewish community members have created.

This year’s Dancing on the Edge (DOTE), which takes place July 7-16, includes work by Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg, Amber Funk Barton and Naomi Brand.

Friedenberg’s I can’t remember the word for I can’t remember is an excerpt from a work-in-progress – a new solo she is creating with director John Murphy.

photo - Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg has worked with actor John Murphy to create I can’t remember the word for I can’t remember
Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg has worked with actor John Murphy to create I can’t remember the word for I can’t remember. (photo by Wendy D Photography)

“I will be performing but a lot of what we’ve been making has come out of our conversations about memory and the displacement of our memories in the digital world,” she explained. “The piece explores how our minds, our selves escape us and the panic that brings.”

Friedenberg and Murphy met years ago, when she was choreographing a Fringe show in which he was performing.

“He is one of the funniest performers I know and a very smart playwright and director,” said Friedenberg. “I wanted to do research into narrative structure and comic writing, as well as explore being ‘myself’ onstage. Once John and I started researching, we both got excited about turning the research into a piece. Marc Stewart will create an original score for the work as well.”

As for other future projects, Friedenberg said she had recently returned from a residency in Italy where she was collaborating with Italian dance-theatre-performance artist Silvia Gribaudi. “We will be premièring our duet next year at the Scotiabank Dance Centre – it’s a co-production with the Dance Centre and Chutzpah!”

In addition to DOTE, Friedenberg is also choreographing West Side Story for Theatre Under the Stars this summer.

“It’s my first time working for TUTS and the cast is fantastic!” she said. “The amazing Sarah Rodgers is directing – I also met her years ago on the same Fringe show where I met John. It’s a very edgy take on West Side and I am able to bring my contemporary vision to it.”

Barton is also bringing a new work to DOTE that she hopes will evolve into something larger – Village, a 15-minute group piece, performed by members of the response.’s apprenticeship program.

photo - Dancers from response.’s apprenticeship program will perform Amber Funk Barton’s Village
Dancers from response.’s apprenticeship program will perform Amber Funk Barton’s Village. (photo by Chris Barton)

About it, Barton said, “I am always interested in working with narrative and story and, lately, I seem to be inspired by small towns and their intimate interactions. When I travel, I find it fascinating that, as a human race, we all have a similar rhythm to our lives but the diversity of how we carry out this rhythm is what continues to make us interesting to one another. We all wake up. We all eat breakfast. We all go to work. We all struggle to define what our short lives on this planet mean. We all love and have our hearts broken. We all want to be loved. We struggle to attain happiness…. So, I’ve decided that I would like to make a dance that reflects these inspirations; I want to portray a group of people who live by the sea and survive a storm.

“My intention in creating Village for the festival this year,” she continued, “is that it is a starting point for a much more developed work with possibly a larger cast. But, to start, I am working with four dancers – Andrew Haydock, Antonio Somera Jr., Marcy Mills and Tessa Tamura – who have all gone through my company’s apprentice program. So, this is also a special endeavor, as it is giving these emerging dancers an opportunity to perform in the festival, as well as working with them as professional dancers. It’s really exciting to witness their growth. I’ve also decided not to perform in Village because I want to focus solely on the creation of it.”

Another focus of Barton’s has been working to make VAST, her first full-length solo, a reality. “I’ve been doing a lot of movement research and performing works-in-progress in support of it and I’m currently working towards a 2017 première,” she said.

“I’ve also held two more cycles of my company’s apprentice program. It’s hard to believe, but my company’s 10th anniversary is on the horizon, so I’m dreaming about what I would like to create to celebrate that. I’m also teaching regularly and am currently on staff as the head of contemporary at Avant Dance Company in Burnaby.”

And, if that weren’t enough, Barton recently did a residency with the company EDAM Dance.

“This spring,” she said, “with the support of EDAM, I was invited to create a 20-minute work for three dancers. I called the trio Scenes for Your Consideration and it was recently performed at EDAM’s Induction performance series.” The work featured Elya Grant, Somera Jr. and Haydock, she added, “and became a collection of scenes and interactions where the relationships between the dancers continued to shift. When I watch the work, I see them shift between friends, enemies, lovers, siblings – all the various roles that we encounter in our everyday lives.”

Brand’s work for DOTE is about a different form of shifting. Called En Route, it “explores different ways to traverse public spaces and negotiate our place in a crowd. The piece celebrates and exploits the fine line between practical and performative ways of getting from point A to point B.” To the program description, Brand added, “Directionality and determination to get somewhere are contrasted with meandering, circuitous pathways towards our goal.”

The piece will be performed in the inner courtyard of the Woodward’s Building, which, she said, “requires me to think more creatively about the three-dimensional experience of watching a living choreography. The Woodward’s space is also a space with its own complex choreography of people moving through it in myriad diverse ways towards their own destinations. We are excited to build upon the existing dance of that space.”

En Route will be performed by members of All Bodies Dance Project, which she described as “an inclusive group of movers who experience and perceive the world differently.”

Brand launched All Bodies Dance Project in September 2014 with Mirae Rosner and Sarah Lapp.

“The three of us were/are interested in making a space in Vancouver to explore an inclusive dance practice that was open to movers of all abilities,” said Brand. “We have been really fortunate to partner with the Vancouver Parks Board and the Roundhouse to make this project possible.

“All Bodies Dance Project is accessible to anyone and welcomes difference as a creative strength,” she continued. “Our work poses questions about dance and how it is practised: Who has access to dance training? Who gets to make dances? What is the artistic potential of different types of people dancing together?

“By bringing together ‘standing dancers’ with dancers who use wheelchairs and other mobility aids, our practice seeks to challenge the ideas of normalized dancing bodies and make space for a new and innovative community of dance makers. We want to widen the spectrum of who dances and what dance can be.”

All Bodies Dance Project has created two full evening productions to date, See & Be Seen (2015) and TRACE (2016), and have done numerous community performances in local festivals and events, said Brand. “We are interested in continuing to create new and innovative pieces of choreography, allowing new audiences to see the choreographic possibilities of difference.”

In the fall, she said, there will be a new session of the group’s open classes at Trout Lake Community Centre and the Roundhouse, in addition to a new class it is launching for young dancers ages 8-12 at Mount Pleasant Community Centre and a new group at Sunset Community Centre (allbodiesdance.ca).

In addition, Brand continues “to make and perform contemporary dance across a wide spectrum of contexts, from my own solo work to work with professional dancers to dance with diverse populations. I have just completed a three-year residency at the Roundhouse, where I was working with an ensemble of 20 older adults called the Ageless Dancers.”

As well, when the JI contacted Brand by email for this interview, she was on Toronto Island where, she said, “I am working with a group of 24 dance makers from across Canada on a project called 8 DAYS. This is my fourth time at this intergenerational gathering that aims to connect choreographers, to share their practices and create dialogue about the form.”

For the full schedule and tickets for the DOTE festival, visit dancingontheedge.org.

Format ImagePosted on July 1, 2016June 29, 2016Author Cynthia RamsayCategories Performing ArtsTags All Bodies Dance, Amber Funk Barton, dance, DOTE, Naomi Brand, Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg.

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