Urban ritual, dancing man describes his latest work, Solo 30x30, as “900 minutes of intimacy between a man and a city.” A thirty-minute dance performed for thirty days in a row, whatever the weather, in five outdoor locations around the world, the project culminates in Montréal this month.
In late summer of 2005, Dancers’ Studio West (DSW) in Calgary announced a new artistic director. Underlying that announcement was a complex series of events that created a deep rift in the local dance community and reverberated throughout the 2005/06 season. Now, just one year later, the pieces are slowly being put back together.
Performer, artistic director, choreographer and arts advocate, William Lau has been credited with bringing the pre-Cultural Revolution aesthetic of Peking Opera to Toronto. Committed to authentic study, he makes a distinction between preserving and petrifying the art form and stressed the need for modern influences in order to move the traditional practices in new directions.
Cylla von Tiedemann has travelled the world photographing dancers, most of them Canadian. A versatile artist, she has also collaborated on multi-media projects and is moving into video production. Here we feature a few of her selected dance images.
How does dance measure up? (Professional organization membership)
International touring in jeopardy with announcement of federal budget; DTRC founder to receive Governor General’s Performing Arts Award [Joysanne Sidimus]; Whitehorse hosts first Art Equinox Festival; Benoît Lachambre receives a Bessie Award; CADA-BC classes lose funding; Herbert Whittaker 1910-2006; Quick currents [Tangente; Rex Harrington; École supérieure de ballet contemporain de Montréal; Laurence Lemieux; Canadian Youth Ballet Ensemble; ProArteDanza
From cultural historian Allana Lindgren on creating a useful playbill
Leisha Miller, in her first year of the Professional Program at the School of Contemporary Dancers in Winnipeg
Crazy Legs Contemporary Dance (Karen Johnson; Darha Phillpot) in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories
Emerging dancers, like their peers in other arts sectors, require determination, ingenuity and discipline. Graduates today seem better equipped to deal with the realities of a career in dance, but they require a strong professional network and community in order to persist. Easing the transition has become a goal for a number of service organizations, while grassroots initiatives and collectives provide spaces of creation and exploration, as well as mentorship opportunities, that keep them dancing.
Currently on a western Canada tour, the National Ballet of Canada is offering a mixed program featuring William Forsythe’s the second detail, Jer…
Montréal
QC
February 16-8 avril 2021
This intensive will explore the tendus and dégagés of ballet to the spinal work of contemporary dance and mudras of Indian dance in a hybrid new way to move.
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