Reviews
Pushing Past the Comfort Zone
By Philip Szporer “Lost Pigeons” David Pressault DanseFor David Pressault’s Danse-Cité production, “Lost Pigeons”, the dancer-choreographer uses the symbol of the sexy pigeon as his central image to probe today’s lost generation of lovers who see relationships slipping away.
Posted February 18, 2006
It Dances as a Whole
By Kaija Pepper “5 AM” Paula de Vasconcelos, Pigeons International, PuSh International Performing Arts FestivalThe rhythmic flow and poetic abstraction of “5 AM” (“5 Heures du Matin”) lends the whole of Paula de Vasconcelos’ well-produced and visually outstanding dance/theatre work a polished choreographic feel. Yet the pure dance sections themselves were disappointing.
Posted February 15, 2006
What can you say about love?
By Kathleen Smith "The Betrayal Project" Julia Sasso DancesWhat can you say about love, lust and sex that hasn’t already been said in a million different ways in a multitude of media? This is the fundamental dilemma that must underpin any discussion of Julia Sasso’s new full-length exploration of eros: “The Betrayal Project”.
Posted February 14, 2006
Three Exceptional Women
By Kaija Pepper Dances for a Small Stage XII Dances for a Small StageDances for a Small Stage takes place in a bar, the Crush Champagne Lounge on downtown Granville Street, just a few steps away from The Dance Centre. The bar venue is crucial to the success of the popular series, which is produced by Day Helesic and Julie-anne Saroyan of MovEnt, because having a good time is what Small Stage is all about.
Posted February 14, 2006
Seriously Improvising
By Kaija Pepper “Thirst” Peter Bingham, Wen Wei WangThe partnership of Peter Bingham and Wen Wei Wang is a surprising one. Bingham is an older dancer, in his mid-fifties, and widely known as a master of contact improvisation. Wang, fourteen years younger, studied Chinese dance from a young age, was a member of Ballet British Columbia for several years and has a growing reputation as a contemporary choreographer.
Posted December 5, 2005
Moments Apart, Together
By Philip Szporer “Au coeur de l’inconnu/At The Heart of The Unknown” Andrew de L. Harwood, Kirstie SimsonA couple of comments linger long after watching the performance of Andrew de Lotbinère Harwood and Kirstie Simson, both accomplished dancer/improvisers. Prior to attending the concert, which occurred during the recent CORD (Congress on Research in Dance) conference in Montréal, one of the speakers, an academic from the United States, asked what was playing in town that night, and I mentioned the show at Studio 303. Her response was curt: “Oh, is [Harwood] still doing that?” That not-so-gentle put-down was countered by a woman who exited the show, remarking, “[Simson] has managed to take him far beyond what he normally does.”
Posted November 30, 2005
Finding Entertainment in an Artist’s Obsessions
By Suzanne Jaeger "bODY_rEMIX/gOLDBERG_vARIATIONS" Marie Chouinard, Compagnie Marie ChouinardIt is not that Chouinard has run out of ideas. “bODY rEMIX” is a rich, wildly entertaining compilation of playful associations, sensual and erotic imagery and stunning virtuosic dancing enhanced by a cleverly woven mesh of percussive sounds, music, recorded speech, breathy sighs, grunts, orgasmic gasps and squeals.
Posted November 20, 2005
A Ballet with Teeth
By Garth Von Buchholz “Dracula” Mark Godden, Canada's Royal Winnipeg BalletMark Godden’s Dracula is a twentieth-century Goth guy (the dance premiered in 1999) tricked out in nineteenth-century vampire garb. He’s been clever enough to get himself a film deal (Guy Maddin’s “Dracula: Pages from a Virgin’s Diary”) that garnered rave reviews around the world.
Posted November 15, 2005
Physical Resonance
By Philip Szporer “Play It Again!” Danièle Desnoyers, Le Carré des LombesDanièle Desnoyers’ new work, “Play It Again!”, is detached from narrative. Well mostly: there’s the resonance of tough guy Humphrey Bogart’s famous line in the film classic Casablanca, indelibly linked to tinkling the ivories.
Posted October 30, 2005
Tranquility, Destruction, Struggle, Amusement: Four Choreographers, Four Very Different Dances
By Suzanne Jaeger Four at the Winch Sara Porter, Andrea Nann, Valerie Calam, Louis Laberge-Côté, Toronto Dance TheatreA musician sits at the far left of the stage with a banjo and percussive instruments including bowls of water. In front of him is a small boat, “dry docked” with colourful nets hanging from it. Invoking familiar images of a seaside beach, a life jacket and bucket hang from ropes dropped from the fly, and at the front, seashells of various sizes and shapes are piled on the floor. The dance begins with …
Posted October 29, 2005
Dancing the Architecture
By Philip Szporer "Full Time at the Belgo" Lin SnellingLin Snelling and her assembled troupe did a fine job of imagining the Belgo building in “Full Time at the Belgo” (“FTATB”). The stage for the innovative site-specific dance project was the vast, six-storey fixture itself, located at Saint Catherine Street West and Bleury. Dancers explored the architecture of the building and their bodies, and the public was invited along for the ride.
Posted October 16, 2005
Fierce Courage
By Fritzraven Sky “Speed” Suzanne Miller, Allan Paivio, Magali Stoll, Karsten KrollMontrealers received a singular invitation to the dance last month from Rafik Sabbagh, artistic director of Transatlantique 2005 (September 19th through 24th). The six-day moveable feast featured some leading lights of the past decade, and the premiere of Suzanne Miller and Allan Paivio’s stunning new work, “Speed”, danced to transcendent perfection by the unforgettable duo of Magali Stoll and Karsten Kroll… *This review was delayed due to unforseen circumstances.
Posted October 12, 2005
Not Wisely But Too Well
By Garth Von Buchholz “Othello” Tom Stroud, Winnipeg’s Contemporary DancersOf “Othello” the play and “Othello” the dance, you could say that “so sweet was ne’er so fatal”. The Canadian premiere of Tom Stroud’s “Othello”, performed by Winnipeg’s Contemporary Dancers (WCD), was a bleak and emotionally exhausting experiment in unstructured, improvised dance theatre.
Posted October 12, 2005
That Rare Breed Called Soloist
By Kaija Pepper Chasing Bliss Jolene Bailie, Cuppa Jo Solo DanceIt’s not easy to be a solo dancer, filling out a program and keeping the audience engaged and focussed all by yourself. Margie Gillis does it brilliantly; so does Peggy Baker. And so does the up-and-coming Jolene Bailie.
Posted October 7, 2005
