The Firehall Arts Centre Launches its 36th Anniversary Season with New Work from Vancouver’s Vanessa Goodman in Never Still

September 26-29, 2018 | Firehall Arts Centre | 280 E. Cordova

Performance Times: Wed-Sat, 8:00pm

Tickets: From $20 at https://bit.ly/2waDxXe or 604.689.0926

Post Show Talkback: September 27

Shion Skyve Carter photo Dayna Syndrowski

The Firehall Arts Centre is proud to kick off its 2018/2019 season with the world premiere of Never Still from Wednesday, September 26 to Saturday, September 29, 2018.

Never Still, the newest work from Vancouver’s Vanessa Goodman (Action at a Distance Dance Society), is inspired by the inherent conflicts and dichotomies of water. It is graceful and challenging, like humanity itself, and we are literally made of it.

Created in collaboration with Shion Skye Carter, Stéphanie Cyr, Bynh Ho, Lloyd, “Loscil” (Scott Morgan), Alexa Mardon, James Proudfoot and Lexi Vajda, Never Still explores social, environmental, and biological themes. It is a highly physically piece that dives into the distinctions and overlap between three different systems of circulation: global water cycles, communication technology, and fluids within the body.

“We are living in an increasingly polarized culture,” says Donna Spencer, the Firehall Arts Centre’s Artistic Producer. “And it is our role as artistic creators to encourage audiences to consider, through what they are seeing on stage, how inextricably linked we all are in finding our way through these challenging times.”

She adds, “This season, our programming is about choices – the ones we make, the ones we think we should make but don’t, and the influences around us that colour that decision-making. Live performance allows us to experience a unique and powerful collective sharing of emotions and information that resonates through our day to day lives long after we have left the theatre, and indeed may influence the choices we make in the future.”

Never Still is created by Action at a Distance Dance Society in collaboration with:

Choreographic/Artistic Director: Vanessa Goodman

Choreography created in collaboration with the performers: Shion Skye Carter, Stéphanie Cyr, Bynh Ho, Alexa Mardon, & Lexi Vajda

Sound and Projection Design: Loscil (Scott Morgan)

Lighting Design: James Proudfoot

Costumes: Lloyd

Set Design: Vanessa Goodman, James Proudfoot, & Scott Morgan

Creative Mentor: Peter Bingham

For more information on the Firehall Arts Centre, please visit the following platforms:

Website: www.firehallartscentre.ca

Facebook: www.facebook.com/firehallartscentre

Twitter: www.twitter.com/FirehallArtsCte

Instagram: www.instagram.com/firehallartscentre

About Action at a Distance Dance Society:

Action at a Distance Dance Society is a Vancouver-based performance company under the artistic direction of choreographer Vanessa Goodman. The company respectfully acknowledge that it is working on the ancestral and unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh people. The priority of the company is to foster work that reflects the human condition, using dance to decode contemporary experience. It is the company’s goal to create immersive environments, working towards facilitating an engrossing experience for those who witness the work. Goodman was the recipient of the 2013 Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award and the 2017 Yulanda M. Faris Program. She has been commissioned to create works for the Dancing on the Edge Festival, The Gwaii Trust, Vancouver Biennale, and Simon Fraser University. Most recently, her work has toured nationally and internationally and been presented by DanceHouse, SFUW, The Canada Dance Festival, The Dance Made in/Fait au Canada Festival, The Bienal Internacional de Dança Do Ceará, On the Boards, The Risk/Reward Festival, The Dance Centre, The Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, Small Stage, Push Off, Music on Main, and The Chutzpah! Festival. www.actionatadistance.ca

About the Firehall Arts Centre:

Located in a heritage fire station built in 1906, the Firehall Arts Centre produces a season of eclectic theatre, dance and interdisciplinary performances, and acts as a host to visual arts exhibitions in its intimate gallery/lounge. Each year, FAC hosts over two hundred performances bringing audiences into the heart of the city to enjoy artistic works, view art works in the gallery, and sip a beverage in the enclosed courtyard. The building that is now home to the Firehall Arts Centre served as a fire hall – the first motorized fire hall in North America – until 1975. Minor renovations to turn the building into a theatre were undertaken at that time but it was not until February 25, 1982, that the building opened as the Firehall Theatre. Later the decision was taken to change the name to the Firehall Arts Centre to better reflect all of the different arts activities that are housed in the bustling centre that we are today. www.firehallartscentre.ca