Making its world premier Wednesday as part of Harbourfront’s World Stage program, relay is a collaborative choreographic experiment for eight performers and two musicians. The work investigates the role of the dancer by dragging the memories of their past performance experiences into the future. relay’s dramaturge, Jacob Zimmer (Artistic Director of Small Wooden Shoe), left with choreographer Ame Henderson, writes about how this unique project came together and comments on how this new work challenges notions of how artists work together on stage individually and collectively. The show re-imagines unison as a mode of being together; is it possible to move together without abandoning individuality? Public Recordings Artistic Director Ame Henderson wants to confront the taboo and pleasure of both watching and making movement in unison, activating unison as an extreme gesture of togetherness to allow for the emergence of sensational difference, connection and participation.
Almost two years ago Ame Henderson brought together a group of artists: Toronto’s Barbara Pallomina, Brendan Jensen, Mairéad Filgate, and Eric Chenaux were joined by Montreal’s Claudia Fancello, Marie Claire Forté, Katie Ewald, Chad Dembski and Eric Craven and Croatia’s Matija Ferlin to make up the musicians and dancers who would create and perform a new work, relay. Designers Trevor Schwellnus and Cathia Pagotto joined in the fun.
On and off, in Toronto and Montreal and a little in Amsterdam, this group – remarkable in their histories as well as geography – worked together on how to ‘be together’ and what we remember as we live in the present on our way into the future.
Historically in dance, of course, there is a lot of togetherness. Unison (more than one person doing the same thing at the same time) is a big part of classical, folk, modern and popular dance not to mention parades and other public spectacles – but it has a troubled 20th century history: sometimes pointing towards a dictatorial hand, sometimes a lack of individual distinction.
But the extreme alternative – not to be together, to be always separate, seems no ideal solution. So there is an apparent conflict between the desire to be together and the desire to be individual. Dance as a form and dancers as people are particularly capable of working on these problems – open to and familiar with extremes of individual and group expression and all of the potential ethics, fears and pleasures that go with them. And so the question became, given the history of dance – how else could there be togetherness on stage? Relay is our answer to that question.
WHERE/WHEN: Part of Harbourfront’s World Stage series, relay is at the Enwave Theatre (231 Queens Quay West, 416-973-4000) April 7 to 10, 2010 at 8 pm; tickets $15.
Photos: Ame Henderson and Jacob Zimmer by Matija Lav Ferlin, relay in rehearsal by Bettina Hoffmann
relay is a collaborative choreographic experiment for 8 performers and 2 musicians. The work investigates the role of the dancer by dragging the memories of their past performance experiences into the future. relay’s dramaturge, Jacob Zimmer (Artistic Director of Small Wooden Shoe http://www.smallwoodenshoe.org/index.html), writes about how this unique project came together and comments on how this new work challenges notions of how artists work together on stage individually and collectively. The show re-imagines unison as a mode of being together; is it possible to move together without abandoning individuality? Public Recordings (http://publicrecordings.org/) Artistic Director Ame Henderson wants to confront the taboo and pleasure of both watching and making movement in unison, activating unison as an extreme gesture of togetherness to allow for the emergence of sensational difference, connection and participation.
“Almost two years ago Ame Henderson brought together a group of artists: Toronto’s Barbara Pallomina, Brendan Jensen, Mairéad Filgate, and Eric Chenaux were joined by Montreal’s Claudia Fancello, Marie Claire Forté, Katie Ewald, Chad Dembski and Eric Craven and Croatia’s Matija Ferlin to make up the musicians and dancers who would create and perform a new work, relay. Designers Trevor Schwellnus and Cathia Pagotto joined in the fun.”
“On and off, in Toronto and Montreal and a little in Amsterdam, this group – remarkable in their histories as well as geography – worked together on how to ‘be together’ and what we remember as we live in the present on our way into the future.”
“Historically in dance, of course, there is a lot of togetherness. Unison (more than one person doing the same thing at the same time) is a big part of classical, folk, modern and popular dance not to mention parades and other public spectacles – but it has a troubled twentieth century history: sometimes pointing towards a dictatorial hand, sometimes a lack of individual distinction.”
“But the extreme alternative – not to be together, to be always separate, seems no ideal solution. So there is an apparent conflict between the desire to be together and the desire to be individual. Dance as a form and dancers as people are particularly capable of working on these problems – open to and familiar with extremes of individual and group expression and all of the potential ethics, fears and pleasures that go with them. And so the question became, given the history of dance – how else could there be togetherness on stage? Relay is our answer to that question.”
The world premiere of relay takes place night from April 7 to 10, 2010 (at 8 p.m.) at Harboufront Centre’s Enwave Theatre as part of their World Stage series. For more information and to purchase tickets call 416-973-4000 or visit harbourfrontcentre.com/worldstage
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