The Dance Centre’s 2018-2019 season presents a program of exciting performances and events by artists working across contemporary and cultural genres. TheGlobal Dance Connections contemporary dance series features Canadian and international choreographers, and the popular Discover Dance! series presents a varied range of dance from diverse cultural backgrounds. Other highlights include internationally-renowned improvisation pioneer Katie Duck, Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award recipient Julianne Chapple’s first full-length work, the annual Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House, and residencies and research labs throughout the season.
Global Dance Connections series
November 14-16 WArd/waRD-Ann Van den Broek
January 21-22, 28-29 Company 605
January 24-26 Kuan-Hsiang Liu
January 31-February 2 Victoria Hunt
April 4-6 Simon Mayer
May 23-25 Davida Monk
Discover Dance! series
September 20 Thai Dance Company
October 4 Company 605
November 22 Dancers of Damelahamid
March 14 South Asian Arts
April 18 Ballet BC
May 16 Jacky Essombe
Events
September 15 Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House
September 28 Katie Duck
October 26-27 Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award: Julianne Chapple
April 29 International Dance Day
May 31 12 Minutes Max
Residencies and Projects
Tickets and Information
Tickets Tonight 604.684.2787 www.ticketstonight.ca
Info 604.606.6400 www.thedancecentre.ca
Events take place at Scotiabank Dance Centre, 677 Davie St, Vancouver.
Global Dance Connections series
WArd/waRD-Ann Van den Broek: The Black Piece
Tuesday–Thursday November 6-8, 8pm Post-show talkback November 7
Elegant and seductive; reassuring and comforting; frightening and sinister. The many qualities of the colour black are examined in Dutch-Flemish choreographer Ann Van den Broek’s thrillingly audacious The Black Piece. Five charismatic dancers and a camera operator lure the audience into the darkness for a sensory adventure filled with haunting sounds and images. The camera unveils what would otherwise remain unseen, conjuring up a shadowy film noir world punctuated by sudden bursts of frenzied movement. This startling, award-winning work by one of Europe’s most provocative and original creators expertly taps into our deepest emotions.
Elegant and seductive; reassuring and comforting; frightening and sinister. The many qualities of the colour black are examined in Dutch-Flemish choreographer Ann Van den Broek’s thrillingly audacious The Black Piece. Five charismatic dancers and a camera operator lure the audience into the darkness for a sensory adventure filled with haunting sounds and images. The camera unveils what would otherwise remain unseen, conjuring up a shadowy film noir world punctuated by sudden bursts of frenzied movement. This startling, award-winning work by one of Europe’s most provocative and original creators expertly taps into our deepest emotions.
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Company 605: New Work
Monday-Tuesday January 21-22 & 28-29, 7pm Post-show artist talkback January 22
Presented with PuSh International Performing Arts Festival
An electrifying force in Canadian dance, Company 605’s trademark hyper-physical style highlights effort, tension, exertion and risk, capturing a fresh and exciting aesthetic. Choreographed by Artistic Directors Lisa Gelley and Josh Martin, this new collaboration is their first full-length ensemble work in three years. It explores concepts of looping and transformation, and how inevitable conflicts and inconsistencies lead to the emergence of something new. The dancers navigate a ceaseless flow of dynamic movement, in a sublime test of stamina, skill, and the human capacity to cope with change.
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Kuan-Hsiang Liu: Kids
Thursday-Saturday January 24-26, 8pm Post-show artist talkback January 25
Presented with PuSh International Performing Arts Festival and TaiwanFest
Taiwanese choreographer and dancer Kuan-Hsiang Lui is an explosive new talent on the international dance scene, whose luminous works often have autobiographical roots. Kids is a tribute to his late mother: it draws on recordings of conversations between her and Liu during her last days, which touch on family memories, illusion and reality, and her impending passing. From this emerges an unorthodox and dazzling meditation on the eternal cycle of birth, life and death. Three virtuosic dancers veer from calm ritualistic movement to twisted, frantic physical extremes, yet this deliriously wild and undulating work is suffused with serenity and even joy. Kids celebrates the exuberance of life, in the face of death.
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Victoria Hunt: Copper Promises: Hinemihi Haka
Thursday-Saturday January 31-February 2, 8pm Post-show artist talkback February 1
Presented with PuSh International Performing Arts Festival
Australian dance artist Victoria Hunt’s spellbinding solo Copper Promises embodies the cultural and physical journey of Hinemihi – a female ancestor, but also a ceremonial meetinghouse connected with her own Maori cultural heritage: a carved ancestral house which was ‘acquired’ and transported to Britain after a devastating volcanic eruption in 1886. Hunt’s mesmerizing stage presence and potent physicality, combined with stunning lighting, sound and visual effects, generate a work of fierce energy and emotional power. Hinemihi’s story is interwoven with her own, tracing themes of reconnecting with family and culture, and learning from the land. Copper Promises creates a world of rupture, foreboding, resilience, and catharsis.
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Simon Mayer: Sons of Sissy
Thursday-Saturday April 4-6, 8pm Post-show artist talkback April 5
Sons of Sissy delves into the heart of the Upper Austrian countryside, where traditional folk dances and music reign supreme. These traditions are joyously subverted when four versatile performers/musicians reformulate Alpine dances to liberate themselves from convention. Defying categorization and pigeonholing, the Sons of Sissy live up to their name as they conduct themselves as part weird folk music quartet, part experimentally playful ritual dance combo, using humour to radically disrupt hackneyed male role models. An accomplished choreographer, dancer and musician, Mayer offers an irreverent, affectionate take on his heritage, while demonstrating impeccable timing, bodily control, and musicality.
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Davida Monk: Ashes for Beauty
Thursday-Saturday May 23-25, 8pm Post-show artist talkback May 24
Presented in partnership with M-Body
Calgary-based Davida Monk has been an influential figure on the Canadian dance scene for over three decades. A prolific choreographer, performer, teacher and mentor, her rich repertoire of works finds inspiration in myth and literature, as well as the natural environment. This program celebrates her achievements with three pieces. Her evocative Ashes for Beauty, specially remounted for seven Vancouver dancers, explores ideas of metamorphosis and transformation. Monk dances a new solo created for her by Alberta choreographer Helen Husak; and Paras Terezakis of Kinesis Dance somatheatro premieres a duet performed by Monk and Arash Khakpour, based on the classical Greek tragedy Antigone.
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Global Dance Connections tickets Subscription packages available/single tickets from $33 from TicketsTonight.ca/604.684.2787.
Thai Dance Company
Thursday September 20, 12 noon
Discover the elegance, beauty and precision of Thai dance. Originating in the Royal Court of Old Siam, this exquisitely detailed form has a strong sacred element, and many dances are performed during ceremonial events. Artistic Director Megara Solloway teams up with renowned Ottawa-based Thai classical dancer and choreographer Kai Whitcomb to present a selection of dances, in homage to their spiritual and cultural traditions.
Company 605
Thursday October 4, 12 noon
Company 605 fuses contemporary and urban styles to make athletic, physically demanding works that test the limits of their virtuosic performers. This presentation offers a sneak peek at their hotly-anticipated new ensemble work, plus an excerpt from Albatross, a powerful duet created in collaboration with Brussels-based choreographer German Jauregui, which drives the dancers through an intense and hypnotic cycle of continuous motion and perpetual contact.
Dancers of Damelahamid
Thursday November 22, 12 noon
Dancers of Damelahamid is an Indigenous dance company from the Northwest Coast of BC, with a rich history of masked dance which inspires compelling performances. Through dramatic dance, captivating narrative, intricately carved masks, and elaborate regalia, Spirit and Tradition shares the treasures of the company’s heritage, and bridges the ancient with a living tradition.
South Asian Arts
Thursday March 14, 12 noon + 6pm
Originally a Punjabi folk dance celebrating the harvest, bhangra has become a global phenomenon in recent years, both in its traditional form and as a fusion with genres such as hip hop, house, and reggae. In this explosive performance, leading exponents South Asian Arts will showcase bhangra’s exuberant energy, and its deep connections to music and rhythm.
Ballet BC
Thursday April 18, 12 noon
Bold and innovative, Ballet BC has developed a distinctive and highly acclaimed style, presenting a varied repertoire of contemporary ballets by Canadian and international choreographers which combine the rigour of classical technique with a cutting-edge approach. Introduced by Artistic Director Emily Molnar, the company’s superb dancers will perform excerpts from the current repertoire.
Jacky Essombe
Thursday May 16, 12 noon + 6pm
Cameroon-born Jacky Essombe is known for her inspiring teaching and exhilarating performances that express the cultural traditions and healing rhythms of West and Central Africa. This interactive presentation features high-energy dances, live drumming, and singing that is steeped in the poetic imagery and wisdom of her ancestors, creating an experience to excite the eyes, engage the spirit and refresh the soul.
Discover Dance! tickets Noon hour shows: Subscription package available, single tickets $15/$13. 6pm shows: single tickets $22/$18, from TicketsTonight.ca/ 604.684.2787.
The 17th annual Scotiabank Dance Centre Open House
Saturday September 15
A day of free open classes, workshops, studio showings and events featuring a host of different dance styles, at Canada’s flagship dance facility. Full schedule of events to be announced.
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Katie Duck: CAGE
Friday September 28, 7pm
A pioneer on the international improvisation scene, Katie Duck has inspired generations of performers through her innovative work with dance, text and sound. CAGE is a trenchant feminist analysis of the human condition and the oppression of modern life, which Duck stages in different locations around the world in collaboration with local musicians and performers. For the Vancouver edition, she is joined by musicians Ben Brown, James Meger and Roxanne Nesbitt.
Tickets $30/$24 students, seniors from TicketsTonight.ca/604.684.2787.
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Julianne Chapple: Suffix
Friday-Saturday October 26-27, 7pm + 9pm
Presented through the Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award
Julianne Chapple’s strikingly original work interweaves movement, sound, lighting and film, probing the edges of the body’s mobility to the point of abstraction, and creating surreal imagery. Her first full-length ensemble work, Suffix is an immersive performance combining dance, sculptures and video to explore the physical and spiritual effects of our rapidly changing technological landscape, and touching on our deep-seated urges towards self-enhancement and immortality.
Tickets $26/$22 from TicketsTonight.ca/604.684.2787.
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International Dance Day
Monday April 29
Initiated in 1982 by UNESCO, International Dance Day is marked annually on April 29 across Canada and around the world. Each year The Dance Centre presents a program of events celebrating the vitality and diversity of dance in Vancouver. Full program of events to be announced.
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12 Minutes Max
Friday May 31, 7pm
The 12 Minutes Max series supports the development of innovative new works lasting twelve minutes or less. Three times per season a rotating panel of guest curators will select up to four artists who will develop their works in the studio, followed by public studio showings. Artists and showing dates will be announced throughout the year. A selection of the works will be presented in performance on May 31, 2019.
Tickets go on sale spring 2019.
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O.Dela Arts/Olivia C. Davies
Contemporary dance artist Olivia C. Davies has established a multifaceted practice which honours her Métis-Anishnawbe heritage, and is grounded in feminism, social justice, and our relationship to the land and our environment. As part of a major Dance Centre residency this season, she will curate a program of public events including:
CoexisDance (December 2018), a performance series of improvised duets for dancers and musicians;
Home: Our Way (April-May 2019), women’s creative writing and dance workshops exploring the idea of Home in the body;
Matriarchs Uprising (June 2019) a weekend of performances, events and circle conversations focusing on women in the arts and highlighting work by contemporary female and 2-spirited artists.
Full details to be announced.
2018-2019 Artists-in-Residence
Company 605
Dancers of Damelahamid
Joe Ink
O.Dela Arts/Olivia C. Davies
The Biting School
2018-2019 DanceLab choreographers
Byron Chief-Moon/Consequence Collective (film, projection mapping technology)
Sujit Vaidya (lighting design)
Thoenn Glover (immersive dance-theatre)
TWObigsteps collective (movement and technology installation)
Projects
Body Narratives Collective
Danse Carpe Diem/Emmanuelle Jouthe
Eury Chang
Karen Jamieson Dance
Walter Kubanek
Information: 604 606 6400 www.thedancecentre.ca
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About The Dance Centre Established in 1986 as a resource centre for the dance profession and the public in British Columbia, The Dance Centre has expanded into a multifaceted organization offering a range of activities unparalleled in Canadian dance. It presents performances and public events; provides programs, resources and support for dance professionals; operates Scotiabank Dance Centre, Canada’s flagship dance facility; and works to promote BC dance.
