For Frédérick Gravel, it doesn’t matter if the microphone is the hands of a dancer or an actor, as long as the message shakes things up.
“They take the microphone, and they just go,” says the Montreal-based choreographer. “Like, ‘I have something to share’, and then it starts."
Gravel is describing the beginning of Thus Spoke..., his cheeky, politically charged rock ’n’ roll mashup of theatre and contemporary dance, coming to Vancouver for the Dancing on the Edge Festival (DOTE).
In the piece, two dancers and two actors take turns on the mic, philosophizing on everything from mass consumerism and privilege to Stephen Harper and Stalin. Meanwhile, their talking points, crafted by writer and playwright Étienne Lepage, are set to a ripping Hendrix score, and enhanced and often outright contradicted by their movements.
“They’re physically doing something that doesn’t really compute with whatever they’re saying. And by doing so, they can kind of say two things at once, or three things at once,” says Gravel, who will be joining the cast on stage for this performance. “They seem really assured in what they are saying, but the body is saying something else.”
“It’s a mind fuck,” the Usually Beauty Fails creator laughs, later, of the choreography.
Making its Western Canadian debut July 8-10 at the Firehall Arts Centre, Thus Spoke...is just one of the highlights of DOTE, which, as Canada’s longest running professional dance festival, confidently explores the frontlines of contemporary dance.
In fact, for 28 years DOTE has been presenting some of the scene’s biggest risk takers and pioneers.
“The goal of the festival is to provide audiences with an opportunity to see contemporary dance work that is usually cutting-edge or pushing the envelope,” says festival director Donna Spencer, of the Firehall. “And it’s also a festival that strives to give opportunities to artists that take risks and to test new work.”
DOTE was created by the Firehall to offer an outlet for Vancouver’s most innovative dance artists. Along the way, it has helped shaped the face of contemporary dance in this city by presenting works by more than 400 choreographers – artists like Kidd Pivot founder Crystal Pite and Ballet BC artistic director Emily Molnar, as well as the physically masterful Company 605 and twisted genius of Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg.
“At the time that we started it there were so few opportunities for dance presentation – contemporary dance presentation – in Vancouver, and so few venues, that we were getting all these requests. So we decided to create a festival to support them,” Spencer recalls. “And little did we know that it would still be going 28 years later!”
This year, the festival celebrates the unexpected with more than 30 choreographers and 80 artists over the 10 days. Other highlights include a dramatic duet by Ottawa’s DORSALE Dance (July 14-15), an exploration of distortion by Toronto’s Adelheid Dance Projects (July 15-16) and a premiere by Victoria’s Constance Cook (July 15-16). In addition, DOTE will play host to some of the city’s finest choreographers, such as Friedenberg, Ballet BC company member Alexis Fletcher, an evening of solos by the award-winning MascallDance, new work by Joshua Beamish’s Move: the company, and a five-man piece by Wen Wei Dance.
The festival also features exciting site-specific programming, such as a performance in the trees of Stanley Park by the Aeriosa Dance Society (July 13-14).
Some artists, such Belgium’s German Jauregui – the festival’s lone international act – are presented in “Edges”: groupings of artists that allow you to see two or three performances with one ticket; others, such as Thus Spoke..., stand on their own.
All, however, offer dance that will make you think.
“[The festival] has had a tremendous impact on Vancouver dance artists and Vancouver dance companies,” says Spencer, thoughtfully. “Some people have said to me they really think it has been the catalyst for the growth of Vancouver as a hotspot for contemporary dance.”
• Dancing on the Edge runs July 7-16 at venues around Vancouver. Tickets $28/26/24; passes available at DancingOnTheEdge.org.
