Features

The Creative Gesture

Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity By Sarah Todd

The Creative Gesture, the inaugural contemporary dance residency led by sessional Banff dance director Emily Molnar and program head Stephen Laks, demonstrates responsiveness within a very ambitious and structured four weeks in the mountains.

Posted August 27, 2016

Moving Beyond the Pas-de-Deux

Four Montréal-based dance artists discuss gender in contemporary dance By Helen Simard

Helen Simard discusses issues of gender in contemporary dance with four Montréal-based dance artists.

Posted August 15, 2016

Canadian Dance Goes Audio

Radio and Podcasts Take the Stage By Rachel Silver Maddock

Did you know that Canada produces a number of rich listening resources for dancers? Here are some Canadian dance audio highlights for you to tune into.

Posted June 27, 2016

Ballet BC Rehearsal Director Sylvain Senez Retires

By Brittany Duggan

In a phone interview with The Dance Current, Ballet BC’s longtime rehearsal director, Sylvain Senez, reflects on his time with the company, how dance has changed in the past thirty-five years, and what he’s got planned next.

Posted June 27, 2016

Habitual Gestures

By Pia Lo

Dancer, choreographer and teacher Meredith Kalaman

Posted June 23, 2016

Into the Tao is Full of Street Dance Soul

By Rachel Silver Maddock

Street dance is vibrant and brimming with talent in Vancouver. Into the Tao is a journey into a street dancer’s mind and the psychology of going into a dance battle. In this project, Kim Sato explores the reasons why street dancers put themselves through battles, when it can be incredibly stressful and physically demanding.

Posted June 11, 2016

Cross-Canada Checkup

Canada Dance Festival takes the pulse of dance in Canada By Kathleen Smith

Now 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

Lucilla Munaretto Returns to the Stage

By Brittany Duggan

Coastal City Ballet dancer Lucila Munaretto, the twenty-one-year-old who was in a near-fatal rollerblading accident last summer, makes a comeback with a character role in new Swan Lake.

Posted May 20, 2016

Skating on the (B)rink

By Philip Szporer

With their daring innovations and flair, and an undeniably egalitarian mode of presentation, Montréal’s Le Patin Libre is gliding its way onto the world stage, continually igniting and spurring on new support and interest for the work and the group’s ambitions.

Posted March 8, 2016

The Invisible Injury

Two dancers discuss concussions in dance and the recognition, treatment, prevention and significance of this often misunderstood brain injury By Justine Comfort

Two dancers discuss the implications of concussions and the recognition, treatment, prevention and significance of this often misunderstood brain injury.

Posted March 1, 2016

Chan Hon Goh on Change and Giving Back

The principal dancer turned teacher and her cross-Canada master class tour By Emma Kerson

Coaching the next generation of aspiring ballerinas as part of her role as director of the Goh Ballet Academy in Vancouver, Vancouver’s Chan Hon Goh shares her favourite ballets, what dance means to her and the her thoughts on the state of Canadian ballet.

Posted February 24, 2016

Liquid Leading

Breaking Ballroom Traditions By Lori Straus

The rules of ballroom dance have been evolving since day one. But, according to Burlington-based dancer and actor Trevor Copp, they’ve still a ways to go to before reflecting our current contemporary society.

Posted January 11, 2016

Exclusion in Inclusion

Male dancers are in high demand, but at what expense does the dance world seek to encourage their participation? By Carolyn Hebert

There are many current programs and incentives aimed to encourage boys and men to dance, but how do they affect the girls and women with whom the male dancers train and perform? Carolyn Hebert examines the implications of such policies on both male and female dancers, as well as the dance world more broadly. She examines the consequences of the use of gendered language of athleticism as a way to make dance appear more masculine. Using her own research amongst adolescent dancer in a competitive studio, she highlights how costume, choreography and teaching practice often prioritize boys’ experience at the expense of the girls.

Posted January 6, 2016