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As 2011 Exits

December 07, 2011

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.
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And We Have a Winner

November 15, 2011

Or four, actually. We would like to offer our congratulations to the winner of our raffle, and a thank you to everyone who came out and supported us last Sunday. The winners of the Company ERASGA Society raffle were drawn for 4:00pm, Sunday, November 13, 2011 as part of our Dance for the Camera event. Here are the lucky winners:

Ticket# 100: Donald Fisher, winner of a stay at the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver 
One night at Vancouver’s iconic Fairmont Hotel Vancouver with sparkling wine and chocolate dipped strawberries on arrival, spa amenities, breakfast in bed and a late check out of 3:00pm for a luxurious and relaxed morning, plus two tickets for COCOON Dance in April, 2012.

Ticket # 207: Mona Gleason, winner of a stay at the Listel Hotel
A night on Robson in one of the Listel Hotel’s Gallery Floor rooms featuring original artwork with breakfast at O’Doul’s restaurant and Bar, morning coffee delivered to your room and a copy of the fiction anthology Vancouver Stories, plus two tickets for COCOON Dance in April, 2012.

Ticket # 262: Cristina Peralejo, winner of a stay at the Sheraton Wall Centre
Two nights just minutes away from Vancouver’s entertainmentdistrict, Davie village, and Robson Street shopping at Vancouver’s Sheraton Wall Centre Hotel including breakfasts in Café One, plus two tickets for COCOON Dance in April, 2012.
 
Ticket # 220:Michelle Stack, winner of a stay at Tofino Cabinas
A weekday escape to Tofino with a night’s accommodation in early July in the heart of Tofino at Tofino Cabinas with a massage treatment for yourself, plus two tickets for COCOON Dance in April, 2012.
 
BC Gaming License #38383
 
Thank you everyone who played!
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Quest For Clarity

July 30, 2011

Returning to this blog for the first time since spring, now it’s summer and July is almost ending.

I have recently completed two weeks of summer school contemporary dance workshops of technique and repertoire for Little Pear Garden Collective. Spending time with the collective members comprising mainly classical Chinese dancers, ranging from novice to contemporary in movement, but persistent and with a hunger to learn. The classes reminded me again that dance, especially contemporary, is hard work!  And that learning,  like anything else, has it’s own results, pending an individual’s openness, that recognizing process has an important role in achieving the littlest reward to move forward and see result.
 
This year Co.ERASGA presented two visiting artists for our EXCHANGES outreach series and we recently completed the latter 2nd part with the highly sought after American dance teacher and specialist of Jose Limon technique, Risa Steinberg. I felt inspired to be part of her teaching process again; Risa purifies, invigorates and persists in the art forms needed in contemporary dance techniques. She is one of the few and rare teachers in the dance world who firmly believes and practices that dance is communication and that achieving clarity is a must. In her words and teaching, the repeated, resounding message is that clarity! Allowing the body to accept the nuances of learning, the quest to understand, to experience the practice and meeting the cohesive dance technique for a dancer to be.
 
In an open studio showing and public conversation with her, she describes dance as unforgiving career, and that aspiration, dedication and focus is merely enough when one’s career path is faced towards the aging body, the rigor of physical work, the flux and uncertainty of economic supports and the endurance in both the emotional and physiological dilemmas.
 
Earlier, at the beginning of June, the 1st part of Exchanges was with Canada’s Sarah Chase, whose story telling movements, backgrounds and layers form a deep web and are knitted from all sorts of  personal stories and sources that Chase continues to develop purely of  her own; a contemplative and thoughtful artistic processes. Her work combines words and sorting out of movements from the simplest to dramatic patterns, quilted and woven to create a visceral presence, stories that move in space! She asks, what is the origin and roots of my name….then a story could begin…
 
In May, Co.ERASGA stepped into a 4 engagement mini-tour of Paradis, back to Northern France in the L’aine region that included venues in Laon, Noyon,  Chauney and in Paris at Studio Cygne . Remounting the work with musician Emmanuel Mailly was once again very rewarding. The tour marked 21-24th performances of this solo work. Paradis has found it’s way of adapting to different set up and venue configurations proving that touring, though difficult at present with economical and feasible supports, can still exists if the artists are willing to prolong and stretch the visioning and life of a work.
 
I am moved when my art can move, be seen and  appreciated beyond my expectations, to willing eyes, to savour and experience the notes of every sound and the breath of each movement. The conversation of live music and dance is beyond pleasurable measure, it is a luxurious event when fully met!
 
April brought to life the completion of EXpose with Martin Inthamoussú with 3 world premiere performances at the Dance Centre in Vancouver. I was tormented after the last show! The piece begun to simmer and sit in our body, emotions stirs and drive of the choreography begins to live. The show must go on!
 
Alas, in a challenging economical situation, a short run, as often  the case of many contemporary dances, brings frustrations to creator and performers.
 
Creating and process is one part, performing another; a step towards clarity, to transmit and share the dance in different views and perspectives, an important bridge to that place of a dance artist's growth to master the form. Luckily the coming fall will bring us back to EXpose for different audiences in Uruguay and Germany, what and how then will the next process be?
 
So here you have it!, an updated, backwards in time view of Co.ERASGA's various activities since spring.

As summer unfolds, burying myself in several writing projects, reflective of past creative processes, contemplating on what lies ahead, looking for pathways,  finding insights so to move forward with a quest for clarity.
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