News & Events

As 2011 Exits

This blog is being written in Bonn, Germany while I prepare for another show of EXpose next Tuesday at into the field dance festival at theatrerimbalsall; I started writing this blog earlier from South America but delayed posting it while on the tour with EXpose from Montevideo, below was how I started ...

While in Montevideo, Uruguay, in November 2011.
 
It’s spring here at the moment and days can be very bright and sunny, up to 20 degrees at times. Montevideo is a city of history with a European and South American mix of cultures with a current sense of economic strain but a rich cultural history and an innate love for the arts.
 
Co.ERASGA, in partnership with Complot, premiered EXpose last Tuesday at the beautiful Teatro Solis to warm Uruguayan audiences, despite a hectic technical run.
 
This is Co.ERASGA’s second return to South America after Venezuela in 2005 where we engaged in a five city tour of Field.
 
This is an opportunity to return again to EXpose, a duet with Martin Inthamoussu, rediscovering the moments and nuances of this piece after the premiere run last April in Vancouver. The piece continues to mature and we are finding depths of interpretations.
 
The Canadian Embassy, with Ambassador Francis Trudel, hosted a small cocktail reception Monday night on behalf of this intercontinental project at his home in Montevideo.  Expressing his gratitude to the artists involved despite the lack of economic support of artists and arts globally in his speech, he emphasized that working artists, arts and cultures dynamically contributes to the  social wealth of our diverse communities.
 
Before touring Uruguay this fall, back at home I spent my early autumn intensely focused on creating a small duet for the Vancouver project 10X10X10 presented at the dance centre Nov 12-15, 2011. I was thrilled to have Sujit Vaidya dance with me, incorporating his classical Indian background and movement vocabulary from the barathanatyam dance and to also work with Vancouver’s own composer/musician Francois Houle who created a riveting new score for the piece.
 
Now, continuing from Bonn and the present.
 
I sit in the home of artist Rafaela Giovanola, our host in Bonn, a future collaborator and dance artist that will come to be part of 2012 Exchanges series in Vancouver next spring, sharing her expertise and methods of the 9 points method by William Forsythe. I look forward to this exploration of this dance system. Rafaela was a soloist for 8 years with the Frankfurt Ballet, and she has just shared stories with me on her close relations to Billy Forsythe’s great choreographic mastery, I look forward to more evidence and stories.
 
EXpose takes centre stage for a European premiere at Into the Fields dance festival hosted by COCOONDANCE.  An early December in Bonn is filled with Christmas’ traditional splendour, a chill in the air and a grayish sky to fill out the wintry mood. It is good to return to Germany again to gain a sense of its climate for the arts, to feel the aesthetics, politics, and energy of contemporary dance here, seeing also the works by independent artists and smaller dance companies participating in the festival.
 
Completing here Co.ERASGA’s season after the 2 shows of Expose, I begin to mull the situations of the upcoming the 2012 season.  2011 will soon be another year gone by, more challenging than I expected it to be. One always wishes for a better year and the prospect and outlook for an inspiring and enlightened future.
 
As we enter the end of this year, I write here to wish you all happy holidays, some moments of bliss and serenity.