Contributor
Kathleen Smith is a Toronto-based filmmaker, producer and writer with a special interest in movement and performance. Kathleen was editor of The Dance Current from July 2011 through April 2014.
Kathleen Smith's Work
Delving into Familial Pasts
Jacinto by Carmen Romero By Kathleen Smith Jacinto Carmen Romero, produced by Compañia Carmen RomeroFlamenco artist Carmen Romero captures the memory and mystery surrounding her father’s sudden death in Jacinto. Dripping with sadness while exploring movement that is capable of vast expression and infinite consolation, Jacinto situates Romero as part of an experimental new wave that is sweeping flamenco internationally.
Posted April 5, 2017
Balanced on the Edge of Humour and Gravity
Throwdown Collective presents Various Concert and Ylem (3 Eggs Ago) By Kathleen Smith Ylem (3 Eggs Ago) / Various ConcertThrowdown Collective finds stability between measured movement and the absurd in a double bill featuring the works Various Concert and Ylem (3 Eggs Ago).
Posted February 22, 2017
Performing Performances
By Kathleen Smith SummerWorks FestivalDance was front and centre at SummerWorks this year, building on some serious bonds forged during past editions of this annual contemporary performance festival in Toronto.
Posted August 27, 2016
Cross-Canada Checkup
Canada Dance Festival takes the pulse of dance in Canada By Kathleen SmithNow gearing up for its twentieth edition, CDF offers an important accounting of the state of the art of dance across the country. With regular “off-year” events and a full-on festival every other year, the festival is dedicated to growing audiences in the Ottawa region and providing a meeting site for dance artists across regional, generational, cultural and disciplinary lines.
Posted May 30, 2016
Is Everyone a Critic?
Changing Paradigms in Dance Criticism By Kathleen SmithThis past spring, tensions simmered in the Toronto dance community between artists and critics in the mainstream media. In this feature article from the July/August 2015 issue, Kathleen Smith has undertaken to investigate the issues that arose – exploring the history, the central issues, the problems and the questions that characterize the discourse today.
Posted September 9, 2015
Circus Stories Residency
An unusual initiative for cultural journalists just wrapped its second edition in Montréal. Circus Stories, Le cirque vu par … is modelled on a European residency called Unpack the Arts and is designed to offer arts journalists an immersive crash course in circus culture.
Posted July 28, 2015Is Everyone A Critic?
Changing Paradigms in Dance Criticism By Kathleen Smith Volume 18, Issue 4This past spring, tensions simmered in the Toronto dance community between artists and critics in the mainstream media. In this feature article, Kathleen Smith has undertaken to investigate the issues that arose – exploring the history, the central issues, the problems and the questions that characterize the discourse today.
Paratopian View
By Kathleen Smith ParatopiaChoreographer and singer Bageshree Vaze first studied classical Indian dance while growing up in St. John’s, Nfld. She has named her recent DanceWorks program of new and remounted works Paratopia. Also the name of the new group dance that closes the evening, the word can mean both “displacement” and “alternate reality”. Collectively, the works on the program acknowledge the ever-evolving nature of Indian dance forms – and of life itself, which has carried Vaze to a new home in Toronto.
Posted May 7, 2015Canadian Dance by the Numbers
A Report By Kathleen Smith Volume 17, Issue 6Kathleen Smith enumerates research conducted by the Canada Council for the Arts on dance across the country. She queries its major contributions and how the dance community might use this data as a resource in the future.
Dancemakers Appoints Co-Curators
Dancemakers announces the appointment of co-curators Emi Forster and Benjamin Kamino.
Posted October 9, 2014
