The Dance Centre presents the Global Dance Connections series
Stand Up Dance: Anatomalia: anatomy + anomaly + femalia
November 16-18, 2023
Scotiabank Dance Centre
The Dance Centre acknowledges that it is located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. It is an honour and a privilege for us to be guests in their lands. We are grateful.
I wanted to arrive at joy, queer joy. I wanted to burn shame, make friends with my demons and dance. Along the way, someone said, you cannot heal in a vacuum, it’s a collective activity. I wanted to track the progression, mark the stages, and move on. Anatomalia: anatomy + anomaly + femalia moves through shame, fear, repulsion, to singing the bones, desire, curiosity, trust to joy. I wanted to create an experience for you. To witness and experience these different states, like children scaring themselves at the fair – a place to flirt with big feelings.
I began envisioning Anatomalia at an art residency in Marrakech at the end of 2018. I worked with dancers in different residencies and with composer Ra Tack throughout the process. Last year, in Potsdam we mounted a video installation created by Linnea Swan based on the choreographies and created the installations, worked with a local chorus of dancers and invited audience through the experience. Now we finally get to put the live dancing and the installations and the chorus in the same space. Maybe one day, we’ll add the video installation!
I hope you enjoy.
-Meagan O’Shea
ANATOMALIA: ANATOMY + ANOMALY + FEMALIA
CREATIVE TEAM
Choreographer & Artistic Director: Meagan O’Shea
Producer & Stage Manager: Valeria Oviedo
Lighting Designer: Alexandra Caprara
Music Composer: Ra Tack
Set & Costume Designer: Helen Yung
Associate Set Designer: Kimira Reddy
Costume Assistant: Kelly McInnes
Technical Director: Darren John
Dancers: Areli Moran, Cathy Walsh, Nicole Nigro, Linnea Swan
Sasha Amaya (absent due to injury)
Vancouver Chorus: Andrés Avecias, Eri Acorn, Hana Acorn, Valerie Borgoe, Rodrigo Flores, Tessie
CO-PRODUCTIONS AND PARTNERS
Queens Collective, Marrakech, Morocco; FringeLAB Dublin, Ireland; Canada Council Strategic Funds; Ponderosa Tanz, Stolzenhagen, Germany; KulturPark Stolpe, Germany; TanzFabrik, Berlin, Germany; Fabrik Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany; The Art of Festivals, Canada; Fabra i Coats, Barcelona, Spain; Nationales Performance Netz – Joint Adventures, Germany; Magic Mirror, Sziget Festival, Budapest, Hungary; Espai Nyamnyam, Mieres, Catalunya; Rechenzentrum Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany; The Dance Centre, Vancouver.
STAND UP DANCE
An international dance collaboratory that activates people individually and collectively through transformative experience. Working across forms and borders, using dance, theatre, somatic and social improvisation to facilitate exchange, practices are shared, and new micro-cultures are created. Stand Up Dance seeks to disrupt dominant paradigms by telling stories and sharing experiences that give voice to alternative and silenced narratives.
Stand Up Dance orchestrates international collaborations, in-situ ensemble improv, interdisciplinary solo shows, participatory creative process, dance-films and workshops. Led by queer, contemporary dance+ artist, Meagan O’Shea, Stand Up Dance partners with other organizations to make more art possible for more people.
Our guiding principles are:
· Be As You As You Can Be
· Include Everyone & Find Your People
· Cultivate the Oblique
· Magnify Joy
· Amplify Impact
standupdance.com
THANKS AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Stand Up Dance Board of Directors:
David Matte, chair; Lori Delorme, treasurer; Vanessa Reid, secretary
Dancers during the research process:
Áine Ní Laoighaire, Jade O Conor, Marion Cronin, Ella Effendy, Lily Kane, Sarah Ryan, Julianne Carino, Anna Fitussi, Camilla Malenchini, Lysandre Coutu-Sauvé, Jennifer Dahl, Glorià Ros Abellana, Arantza Lopéz Medina, Carolina Charol Stefano
Contributing Designers:
Ruth Barry, Hanna Bowe and Gülsah Cerit, Loana Flores, Esther Roca Vila
A massive thank you to all who have contributed and supported to the project. Thank you to Mirna who got on board to help bring this project to life when it was just a big idea! Thank you to Dave and Mark – you are the best. Thanks to Fanny, who shaped a vision for the project to move through the world. Thanks to all the donors and supporters. You made it possible. Thank you to Norma and Jorge at Rainbow Refugee and Yurie at The Dance Centre. Thank you Raquel and Darren for your incredible dedication. And to the performers and designers and Valeria, most thanks.
BIOGRAPHIES
Meagan O’Shea
Award-winning, queer, contemporary dance+ artist, Meagan O’Shea (she|they), creates “uplifting, energetic and totally out of the ordinary” performances through dance-theatre mash-up, audience interaction and Oblique/Switch as a research method. Examining ideas from unexpected angles, she creates content-driven, problem-finding, contemporary work, treating the process like a science experiment, using body and the interaction with audience as test site, she jumps between forms seeking to unite disparate ideas.
Meagan also creates ensemble work, site-responsive work in public space, dance-plays, touch-triggered tactile installations/performances. Current projects include: It’s My Party, a dancefilm and performance project collaboration with Linnea Swan and womxn over 40 in different countries, exploring grief, changing life purpose and ideas of success; XwomXnseX, a stage and sauna project with Haugen Produkjoner in Norway. Her work has been presented across Canada, in New York, Mexico, Morocco, Northern Macedonia, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Ireland, Scotland, Austria, Greece, Spain, and Germany. Meagan teaches Interdisciplinary Solo Creation and Ensemble Improv internationally.
“Off the wall, impossible to categorize, fun” – Montreal Gazette
She is co-founder of hub14 in Toronto and Stand Up Dance. She has been International Associate Artist at Dance Ireland, Artistic Collaborator of BIDE/ES, Associate Artist at Theatre Direct/CA. She has created work in artistic residencies throughout Europe and North America. She is a recipient of the KM Hunter Award in Dance. She is based between Tromsø, Berlin and Barcelona.
Nicole Nigro
Nicole Nigro (she|they|we) b. 1981, is a graduate of The School of Toronto Dance Theatre (CA), holds an Honours BFA from York University (CA), a Diploma in Dance Teaching Studies with The Royal Academy of Dance (UK), and an MFA with Accademia dell’Arte (IT) and Mississippi University for Women (US). She has had the privilege of interpreting as a guest artist with Anandam Dancetheatre, Broken Jump Theatre, The Danny Grossman Dance Company, Divadlo Continuo, Dance Theatre David Earle, Peggy Baker Dance Projects for Nuit Blanche, Die Wolke Art Group, Diyar Dance Theatre, Stand Up Dance and several independent choreographers. Her work has been presented in Canada, the United States, Europe, Mexico and the Middle East. She was a longtime faculty member at The School of Toronto Dance Theatre’s General School and Canadian Contemporary Dance Theatre (CCDT), as well as the Artistic Director of CCDT’s Core Apprentice Company. She has facilitated at Universität der Künste Berlin (DE), Rose Bruford College (UK), George Brown College (CA), and York University (CA). Nigro is a member of Canadian Alliance of Dance Artists and the Dancer Transition Resource Centre. She has been a residency artist at Ponderosa (DE); Artscape (CA); Earthdance (US); La Macina di San Cresci (IT); Kulturfactory (IT); and Švestkovy Dvur (CZ). Her performative work interlaces her interests in behaviour, sensory perception, language, and connection. Rooted in explorations of effort, memory, motivation, and intuition, she examines the contact between body, voice and space, creating performance installations, which are a synthesis of her dance, somatic, vocal, and physical theatre practices.
Areli Moran
Areli Moran is a Mexican LGBTQ+ artist based between Berlin, Germany and Monterey, Mexico. Her work presents visually powerful perspectives on current feminist and political topics through deep autobiographical excavation. In 2015 Areli Moran founded her dance company Expectante in Monterrey, Mexico and in 2017 established the multifunctional performance space Espacio Expectante as a place to host her work as well as support the dance community of Monterrey. She is part of the curatorial and organisation team of Festival Espontáneo in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico from 2016-2022 and the Danish art platform Project V since 2018.
As a dancer, Areli performed internationally for nine years with Canadian choreographer Daina Ashbee in her works Unrelated and Serpentine, touring Europe, Canada, the USA, and Mexico including La biennale di Venezia, DANCE Munich, Tanztage Potsdam, and the National Arts Centre Ottawa, amongst others. She continues to perform in projects from Swiss company Divisar, directed by Mehdi Duman, and with Canadian artist Meagan O’shea.
As a choreographer, Areli created A menos que quieras bailar (Espacio Expectante, Monterrey 2017) with support from the Canada Council for the Arts, and Unfolded Lights (Troikatronix Festival at Uferstudios, Berlin 2017), and La postal de nuestra existencia (Sophiensaele Tanztage, Berlin 2020). As a dance researcher, she has taken part in the Digital Lab Artistic manoeuvres for the digital present (HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin 2021) and has received support from FONCA Mexico (Research Funding 2020-2021), Fonds Darstellende Künste (TakeCareResidenzen 2021, Research Funding 2023), DisTanz SOLO (2022), and the Berlin Senate Global Exchange Stipend (2023). She premieres SEGUIR at Plataforma Festival (DOCK 11, Berlin 2023) and The Plant Project (Centro cultural plaza Fatima, Monterrey 2024).
Cathy Walsh
Cathy Walsh (she|they) is a choreographer, performer, and lighting technician. She holds a BA in Drama and Theatre Studies and Italian from University College Cork, an MA in Contemporary Dance Performance from the University of Limerick, and a diploma in Ensemble Performance from Queen’s University Belfast.
She has presented her own choreographies, Lucky You!; The Power of Frau; Running Up That Hill; Time Piece; meadow, meadow, meadow; Silence is Silver, in Ireland, Germany, South Korea, Finland, and Denmark. She has collaborated with other artists including Jule Flierl (Wismut; Menstrual Metal), Cecíle Bally (The Price is Right), Kareth Schaffer (Merkel Dances; Cassandra Has Turned 2; Unheard Of), Tino Sehgal (This Variation, These Associations, Yet Untitled), Miguel Gutierrez (DEEP Aerobics), Ruairí Donovan (Soldiers, Zombies, WITCHES), and Pamela Condell (Between Apnea; Aftermath).
She has worked as a lighting designer and technician for numerous artists and venues including Theater o.N. (fragil, Schnürchen, Future Beats, Die Zwölfe Monate), Melanie Jame Wolf (Highness, Mira Fuchs), Ania Nowak (Do Not Go for Second Best, Baby!), Martin Hansen (Monumental), Patrick Faurot (Manifold), Kareth Schaffer (Bee Dances, Unheard Of, An Animal Went Out). She was awarded the coveted MAKE residency at Tyrone Guthrie Centre 2019, Judges Choice Award for Zombies at Dublin Fringe Festival 2014, and the TanzWEB scholarship to Impulstanz 2013.
Linnea Swan
Linnea Swan (she|her) is a multidisciplinary artist whose work lives at the intersection of dance, theatre and film. As a performer and creator, she has been an active contributor to the Canadian arts ecology for over 25 years, living and working in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto and now Calgary. Also a filmmaker of note, her work includes dance film, documentary shorts, web series, as well as video to accompany live performance. Her extensive body of work has been acknowledged with the Dora Award for Outstanding Performance in Dance, as well as the K.M. Hunter Artist Award in Dance. Linnea is Co-director of ReLoCate, and was Associate Artist with Dancers’ Studio West (2018-2021).
Valeria Oviedo
Valeria Oviedo (she|her) is an interdisciplinary artist and producer from Tijuana, Mexico working with choreography, media art and performance. She received her BFA in Visual Arts at Universidad de Guadalajara (Mexico) and a Certificate in Entertainment Management from San Diego State University (USA). She has been working in Berlin since 2020, collaborating as a creator and producer in projects with Uferstudios, Feld Theater, Universität der Künste Berlin, Sophiensæle, ada Studio, among others.
Ra Tack
Ra Tack (they|them) b. 1988, is a painter and sound artist from Belgium living in Iceland. Ra approaches their sounds the same way they approach their canvases. Tack’s “extraordinary sound landscape” (Sismògraf Festival) deals with the complex realm of creation and destruction. Building layer upon layer of field recordings from their shifting environments, Ra composes a universe of sounds. A landscape of sounds. A soundscape. The compositions want to be experienced. They want to exist, to be lived, till they take on a life of their own. They are movement. They are a dance.
Ra Tack has performed live in The Netfactory, Seydisfjordur (IS), Queens Collective, Marrakech (MO) and Kvit Galleri, Kopenhagen (DK). They released a limited edition of their soundscapes on CD and shares their work on Soundcloud. They also send them to close friends to be experienced. Ra has been collaborating with Maxwell Sterling (UK, musician), Whitney Vangrin (US, performer), Meagan O’Shea (CA, dance artist) & Stand Up Dance and Emma Kallan (DK, artist) as an exchange project. Ra occasionally DJ’s at events.
Alexandra Caprara
Alexandra Caprara (she|her) is a queer interdisciplinary artist from Tkaranto, Ontario whose practice is grounded in performance making and design, with a focus on devised processes, movement, interactivity, and design lead creation. Her work often surrounds themes of femininity,autonomy, somatics, and queer ecology, and believes in making and producing work that center queer joy. She has worked internationally as a director, performer, and designer for lighting and video projection, and has presented her work across Canada alongside companies such as WorkMan Arts, GoodWoman Dance, Factory Theatre, Theatre Replacement, and Surrey Art Gallery. Select credits include designing for Mediation (Amber Barton, Re/Play), assistant design for An Undeveloped Sound (Electric Company Theatre) direction and creation of EVREN (Edinburgh Fringe Festival), and projection design for A Silent Howl (Dancing on The Edge). She is currently based in so-called Vancouver and holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Simon Fraser University.
Helen Yung
Helen Yung (she|her) is an inter/transdisciplinary artist. She designs and makes installations, interactions, interventions, exhibitions, experiments and performances. Her company, the Laboratory for Artistic Intelligence develops research led by artists and artistic methods in collaboration with professionals from non-artistic backgrounds to uncover more perspectives and possibilities for society. Her co-creations has been nominated for multiple Toronto Dora Theatre Awards (Outstanding Design, Lighting and Production). Design credits include: Das Geswicht der Amiesen (The Weight of Ants) directed by Christof Seeger-Zurmühlen for D’Haus (Düsseldorf State Theatre); LULU directed by ted witzel for Buddies in Bad Times Theatre and the red light district; The Youth Elders Project directed by evalyn parry for Buddies in Bad Times Theatre; Taken By Night co-directed by Andrea Nann and Helen Yung for Dreamwalker Dance Company; This Is Why We Live directed by Coleen Macpherson for Open Heart Surgery Theatre Company; workshop productions of Gertrude and Alice directed by Karin Randoja for Buddies in Bad Times Theatre; and Purgatory in Ingleton directed by Birgit Schreyer Duarte for the red light district and Storm & Stress Co.
THE DANCE CENTRE
The Dance Centre was established in 1986 as a resource centre for dance professionals and the public in British Columbia, and offers a range of activities unparalleled in Canadian dance. The Dance Centre offers programs and resources supporting the professional development of artists, presents public performances and events, manages Scotiabank Dance Centre, one of Canada’s leading dance facilities, and works to promote BC dance. www.thedancecentre.ca
Staff
Executive Director Mirna Zagar; Associate Programming Director Raquel Alvaro; Associate Producer Linda Blankstein; Membership Coordinator Kaia Shukin; Director of Marketing Heather Bray; Outreach Coordinator Yurie Kaneko; Digital Marketing Coordinator Lindsay Curtis; Development Manager Catherine Butler; Venue and Services Manager Michelle Johnstone; Comptroller Elyn Dobbs; Technical Director Darren John; Dance Central Editor Shanny Rann
Board of Directors
Jason Wrobleski (Chair); Andrea Reid (Vice-Chair); Annelie Vistica (Treasurer); Tin Gamboa (Secretary); Judith Garay; Linda Gordon; Arash Khakpour; Rosario Kolstee; Anndraya Luui, Rachel Maddock; Jennifer Aoki; Katia Oteman
The Dance Centre is grateful for the generous support of The Choreographer’s Circle, Anndraya Luui and the BC Arts Renaissance Fund.
The Corporate Leader’s Circle
Alexander Holburn Beaudin + Lang LLP – Ingrid M. Tsui, Partner; The Holiday Inn and Suites Vancouver Downtown – Angela van den Byllaardt, Sales Manager; Jarislowsky, Fraser Limited – Beau Howes
The Choreographer’s Circle
Impresario: Charles and Eve Chang Foundation, Anndraya Luui;
Choreographer: Anonymous, Anonymous, Beau Howes and Genieve Burley, Tony Giacinti (in memory of Lola MacLaughlin), Stephen Jarislowsky, Anne Hildebrandt;
Artistic Director: Linda Blankstein, Marnie Carter, Yosef Wosk OBC, Moh Faris, David Matte, Jackson McViee;
Principal Dancer: David Cousins, James Felter, Mike and Kathy Gallagher, Ken Gracie and Philip Waddell, McGrane – Pearson Endowment Fund, Jean Orr, Don and Jane Shumka, Janet and Ron Stern;
Dance Artist: Anonymous, Anonymous, Ken Alexander, Santa Aloi, Rosario Ancer, Herb Auerbach, Gary R. Bell, Andrew and Andrea Benzel, Noel Best and Barbara Shuman, Richard Cavell and Peter Dickinson, Kirk Chantraine, Amanda Collinge, Count and Countess Enrico and Aline Dobrzensky, Tom Donaldson, Jason Dubois and Clayton Baraniuk, Nicola Follows, Judith Garay, Linda Johnston, Gail Lotenberg, Amy Millar, Andrea Reid, Kathy Scalzo, Ingrid Tsui and Matthew Heemskerk, Annelie and Dan Vistica, Michael Welters, Jason Wrobleski, Max Wyman and Susan Mertens, Mirna Zagar
The Artist’s Circle
Anonymous, Denis Blais and Paras Terezakis, Deborah Dragon, Lorna Froidevaux, Lynn B. Johnston, Dubravko Pajalic, Dr. Mary Robertson, Frank Salisbury, Selma Savage
The operations of The Dance Centre are supported by the Government of Canada, Canada Council for the Arts, the Government of British Columbia, the BC Arts Council, and the City of Vancouver.
Media sponsors: Stir, The Georgia Straight
The VDC Dance Centre Society is a registered charity no. BN 11925 8754 RR0001