Catching Up to the Future of Our Past: Program

Concept & Creative Direction James Gnam
Choreography & Performance James Gnam, Natalie LeFebvre Gnam
Scenography James Gnam, Jack Chipman
Media Jack Chipman, James Gnam
Lighting Design James Proudfoot
Sound Design Kevin Legere, Loscil, Robin P Gould, Judy Garland, The Kinks
Media Integration & Technical Direction Jack Chipman
Outside Eye Ileanna Sophia Cheladyn
Production Assistant Zack Faulks
Photography Michael Slobodian, David Cooper
Videography Dan Loan
Touring Jason Dubois

Supported by The Dance Centre, PuSh International Performing Arts Festival, Electric Company Theatre, LENA, Savage Society, Impulse Theatre, Metro Vancouver, Deux Mille and Hamber Foundations

Plastic Orchid Factory

Plastic Orchid Factory (POF) is an interdisciplinary organization led by dance artists James Gnam and Natalie LeFebvre Gnam, on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh peoples (Vancouver). For over twenty years, POF has created work that dissolves the boundaries between dance, theatre, installation and digital media. By inviting audiences to reconsider how movement, space and technology intersect, the company cultivates experiences that are both site-responsive and immersive. Committed to risk-taking, POF embraces experimental rigour while foregrounding collaboration with local and international partners to build bridges between artists, communities and contexts. POF has created more than twenty original works presented in galleries, theatres, studios and community halls across Turtle Island and beyond. Recent highlights include Entre Chien et Loup, presented at The Citadel (Tkaronto/Toronto), MAI | Montréal, arts interculturels (Tio’tia:ke/Mooniyang/Montréal) and The Fluid Festival (Mohkínstsis/Calgary); Digital Folk, shown at Omineca Arts Centre (Lheidli T’enneh/Prince George), Mile Zero Dance (Amiskwaciy Waskahikan/Edmonton), Swallow-a-Bicycle (Mohkínstsis/Calgary) and Crimson Coast (Snuneymuxw/Nanaimo); and The Door Project at Left of Main (MST Territories/Vancouver). plasticorchidfactory.ca

James Gnam (he/him) is a Vancouver-based dancer and choreographer whose work explores the reciprocal tensions between embodiment, technology and social exchange. A graduate of Canada’s National Ballet School, he has interpreted repertoire for Les Grands Ballets Canadiens, Ballet BC, EDAM Dance and 10 Gates Dancing, performing landmark creations by Crystal Pite, Twyla Tharp, Jiří Kylián, Mark Morris, Kurt Jooss, Peter Bingham and Tedd Robinson. Gnam is Artistic Director of Plastic Orchid Factory, a founding member of Left of Main, and an associate artist with Mélanie Demers’ MAYDAY and Jacques Poulin-Denis’ Grand Poney. James’ choreography positions the body as both subject and analytic instrument, extending dance into gaming environments, gallery contexts and civic spaces. Across more than twenty works with Plastic Orchid Factory, he has cultivated a practice that oscillates between meticulous introspection and architecturally scaled spectacle, consistently interrogating the conditions under which meaning—and community—are produced.

His research and productions have been supported by Opera Estate (Bassano, Italy); Circuit-Est (Montréal); Centre Q and the National Arts Centre (Ottawa); and, in Vancouver, The Dance Centre, Electric Company Theatre, The New Forms Festival, The Vancouver Art Gallery, The Burrard Arts Foundation/Facade Festival, The Belkin Gallery and SFU Goldcorp Centre for the Arts. In 2010, the late Lola Maclaughlin nominated Gnam and his partner and collaborator Natalie LeFebvre Gnam for the City of Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award for Dance.

Natalie LeFebvre Gnam (she/elle) is a dance artist, producer, teacher, curator, performance maker and mother to two energetic boys, born on Lheidli T’enneh land (colonially known as Prince George), now living on unceded xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and səlil̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Territory (colonially, Vancouver). She studied dance at L’École supérieure de danse du Québec and Le Cégep du Vieux Montréal in Tio‘tia:ke/Mooniyang (Montréal) and Arts Management at Capilano University (Lil’wat, xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Shíshálh (Sechelt), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) territory). Natalie has performed with companies and artists across Turtle Island including, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, Coleman Lemieux & Co., The Vancouver Opera. Since 2003, she has the privilege of co-imagining and collaborating in the projects of Plastic Orchid Factory as artistic producer, alongside her life and art partner, James Gnam.

As a producer, Natalie has worked across disciplines and languages with DanceHouse, The Cultch, Théâtre la Seizième and Dusty Flowerpot Cabaret. She is currently the Managing Producer at Electric Company Theatre. In 2009, she was awarded the Isadora Award for excellence in performance and with James Gnam, was nominated by the late Lola MacLaughlin for the City of Vancouver’s Mayor’s Arts Award for Emerging Dance. Active in her community at large, Natalie is a committee member for the Indigenous Learning Program at École Secondaire Jules Verne, the chair of francophone theatre company, productions 4par4, and chaired the Training Society of Vancouver from 2009-2020. In 2017, Natalie led Plastic Orchid Factory’s work in establishing Left of Main, a creator hub for the live arts in Vancouver’s Historic Chinatown.

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 Christopher David Gauthier; Comptroller Elyn Dobbs; Dance Central Editor Shanny Rann

Board of Directors

Yvonne Chartrand, Mique’l Dangeli, Mirjana Galovich, Linda Gordon (Chair), Selim Hasan (Vice-Chair), Anndraya Luui, Sujit Vaidya, Wen Wei Wang, Mark Weston (Treasurer)

Scotiabank Dance Centre/The Dance Centre is an IATSE 118 Union house.

The Dance Centre is grateful for the generous support of The Choreographer’s Circle, Anndraya Luui, the BC Arts Renaissance Fund, and all of the following:

THE CORPORATE LEADER’S CIRCLE
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 x2, Marnie Carter, Moh Faris, Tony Giacinti (in memory of Lola MacLaughlin), Stephen Jarislowsky, Yosef Wosk OBC
Artistic Director: Linda Blankstein, Beau Howes and Genieve Burley, David Matte, Jackson McKiee
Principal Dancer: Anonymous, Ken Alexander, David Cousins, James Felter, Mike and Kathy Gallagher, Judith Garay, Ken Gracie and Philip Waddell, McGrane – Pearson Endowment Fund, Jean Orr, Patrick Shea, Don and Jane Shumka, Janet and Ron Stern
Dance Artist: Anonymous, Santa Aloi, Rosario Ancer, Noel Best and Barbara Shuman, Matthew Breech and Shino Watanabe, Richard Cavell and Peter Dickinson, Amanda Collinge, Jason Dubois and Clayton Baraniuk, Linda Johnston, Kemo Schedlosky and Mark Gatha, Annelie and Dan Vistica, Wen Wei Wang, Jason Wrobleski, Max Wyman and Susan Mertens, Mirna Zagar

THE ARTIST’S CIRCLE
Sylvia Anderson, Carol Carr, Beth Carter, Kirk Chantraine, Yvonne Chartrand, Nicola Follows, Lorna Froidevaux, Linda Gordon, Dubravko Pajalic, Dr. Mary Robertson, Anthony Roper

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 Dance Centre | Scotiabank Dance Centre, Level 6, 677 Davie Street, Vancouver BC V6B 2G6

T 604 606 6400 info[at]thedancecentre[dot]ca thedancecentre.ca

The VDC Dance Centre Society is a registered charity no. BN 11925 8754 RR0001