Harbourfront Torque Dance Sequence & Kaeja d’Dance/31 (TouchX + I’m the Baby of…), choreography by Karen and Allen Kaeja, Harbourfront Centre Theatre, Nov. 11 to 13. Tickets right here.
Based in 1990, Kaeja d’Dance is one among Toronto’s most enduring up to date dance firms. Though co-artistic administrators Karen and Allen Kaeja are of their 60s, they’ve by no means stopped trying ahead, as their joint Harbourfront present demonstrates.
Karen has been engaged on her new piece TouchX for seven years, and key to the material of the work is the participation of on a regular basis members of the group, together with skilled dancers and college students from the graduating class of Faculty of Toronto Dance Theatre.
Allen has collaborated with Bruce Barton (Vertical Metropolis) to go excessive tech. His I’m the Baby of… options augmented actuality (AR) and livecam footage which affords the viewers the chance to view the present from their cell telephones via a QR code, or via the dancers’ physique cameras.
As Karen states, “My piece has the people; Allen has the tech.”
The 4 of us (Karen, Allen, Barton and myself) had a protracted Zoom name to attempt to unpack the construction of this advanced dance night. In my case, it was coming to grips with the most recent providing of the at all times shocking Kaejas.
What follows is a distillation of my many questions.
How did Kaeja d’Dance find yourself on Harbourfront’s Torque collection — one of the prestigious within the metropolis?
The reply, it seems, is straightforward. Karen wrote an e mail to Nathalie Bonjour, Harbourfront’s Director of Performing Arts, explaining that she was engaged on a bit that included each group {and professional} dancers, and that she needed Bonjour to find out about it. Within the dialog that adopted, Bonjour discovered about Allen’s foray into AR, and the joint night blossomed from there.
Says Karen, “It’s a really costly present, and having Harbourfront as a sponsor positively helped. I wouldn’t be on this state of calm with out them.”
Allen provides, “Harbourfront has by no means given two residencies to the identical firm earlier than, and it was a present, as a result of they had been technical residencies the place we labored with their experience to help our visions. We obtained to see how the set, lighting, costumes and our bodies labored within the theatre area. We might troubleshoot the complexities of the items.”
Karen Kaeja on her piece ‘TouchX’
I got here late to bop — I used to be 18 — and what fascinated me was bodily contact — how individuals bodily join — and this exploration has consumed my entire dance profession.
I made a Dora Award-winning duet in 2012 referred to as Crave that investigated the idea of contact, the implications and issues of connection, and I needed so as to add on a brand new layer to the work — combining each skilled and group dancers.
I actually needed to have 100 individuals within the piece however COVID ended that concept. TouchX has 36 individuals — 8 skilled dancers, 8 graduating college students from Faculty of TDT, and 20 group dancers. The scholars and the group performers deliver an entire completely different really feel to the piece.
Pre-pandemic, the dancers had been requested what had touched them probably the most of their lives, after which they created their very own gestures to precise this. The important thing was to immerse everybody in one another’s dance tradition. Through the pandemic, I might solely work on solos in my yard. The pandemic added new challenges and juxtapositions to the that means of contact. For instance, how can we really feel about being touched after Covid?
A lot of the group dancers are older, and I selected this age group, as a result of as I age, I notice that the physique and thoughts include a lot historical past that I wish to discover — how motion modifications over time, as does the vary of contact and connection.
My composer, Gregory Harrison, took a few of my writing and turned it right into a libretto with stay singing. My designer, Sonja Rainey created a superb panorama comprised of clear material that is sort of a metaphor — this materials layer that we’ve to see via, like one other pores and skin.
Sonja and I labored with imagery that conveyed ice, glaciers, desolation, coldness, numbness, transparency, layers of that means. It’s a really large set.
The work comes from deep inside me, ideas that I’ve been working with my entire life.
I had so many modules, as I name them, that TouchX might have lasted for 7 days, however I needed to lower it right down to 50 minutes.
Allen and Bruce Barton discuss concerning the background for ‘I’m the Baby of…’
For level of reference, Barton, 64, is the Director of the Faculty of Artistic and Performing Arts (dance, drama, music) on the College of Calgary. His firm, Vertical Metropolis, based in 2007, focuses on interdisciplinary efficiency and analysis/creation. That is the fifth time he has collaborated with Allen Kaeja with an emphasis on productions which can be immersive inside inventive environments.
The idea for I’m the Baby of… was sparked throughout the 2015 election marketing campaign by then Conservative chief Stephen Harper, who stated he wasn’t going to fulfill with the opposite leaders over the Syrian refugee disaster. But, the whole nation had been moved by the lifeless little Syrian boy who had been washed up on the shore when his boat sank.
This led Allen to react to the truth that he was the kid of a refugee — a Holocaust survivor who had misplaced his spouse and youngster, and who had frolicked in a refugee camp. When his dad’s cousin in Canada wrote to him after the struggle, he informed him, “Don’t come right here as a result of they don’t need our variety”, however Allen’s father got here anyway, and made life for himself. He was so cherished that he was made an honorary police officer. “That’s what refugees do,” says Allen. “They make a brand new life.”
Allen eager to discover refugees and their tales, and the way these tales work together. He requested his eight dancers to start by writing down their reminiscences, which offered a number of views. The corporate did two residencies at Banff the place these many pages of reminiscences had been lowered down to at least one reminiscence of 150 phrases for every dancer. As properly, they every had to decide on a track from their childhood.
Says Barton, “My curiosity is in bodily dramaturgy, which inserts in properly with Allen’s choreography that’s at all times very formal, very bodily and really athletic. I took the writings and refined them to create a textual atmosphere. Composer Edgardo Moreno recorded the dancers’ voices and the songs, and created a soundscape for the piece.”
The excessive tech part of ‘I’m the Baby of….’
There are eight dancers and 5 augmented actuality (AR) dancers. The 5 AR dancers come from the eight. Like Karen, Allen selected dancers who spanned an entire vary of ages, from their 20s to 60s. He additionally selected Karen, who’s a dancer in I’m the Baby of…
The AR part grew out of an experiment. When the pandemic hit, Allen and Barton obtained a grant from Artworkx TO, which was an initiative designed to create neighbourhood artwork. Dancers carried out choreography in a laneway that was filmed. Viewers of their houses might see the dance by scanning a QR code on their telephone.
This led Barton and Allen to go one step additional. On the precise theatre efficiency of I’m the Baby of… an viewers member can scan a QR code and see an AR dancer in actuality, and never in a movie. Explains Barton, “It’s an entire new structure of efficiency. Audiences can watch the stay and perceived dancer work together collectively. This results in the query — what’s the deeper that means of know-how?”
The result’s the primary interactive AR dance manufacturing in Canada, because of Toaster Lab, the corporate that created the AR part. The avatar dancers had been animated in area by filming them earlier than a inexperienced display screen. When viewers members scan a QR code, 4 squares seem on their display screen, and clicking on every sq. offers them a distinct viewpoint of the efficiency.
“AR figures can’t be projected on a wall. It’s essential see them on a telephone or an iPad by scanning a QR code,” Allen says.
Barton provides, “This can be a efficiency the place cell telephones are welcome.”
As the boys describe the method, you’ll be able to play with scale by making an avatar life-size, or smaller, or bigger. They don’t seem to be a novelty, nevertheless. Slightly, the AR dancers are built-in thematically into the efficiency, and so add to the idea of how we understand one another.
Thus, there are three other ways audiences can immerse themselves within the efficiency. They’ll see the AR dancers carry out with their stay selves. They’ll observe the efficiency via the dancers’ eyes via their livestream bodycams, or they’ll merely watch the stage efficiency.
“We had been desirous about making a multi-perspective efficiency,” says Allen, “and the viewers has company. They’ll select simply how immersive they wish to be.”
To not be forgotten, nevertheless, is that every dancer is performing their very own story which incorporates features of their very own childhood. The reminiscences vary from the benign — getting a brand new pair of curler blades — to the traumatic — youngster abuse. The dancers collectively kind a wealthy group of reminiscences.
The boys have additionally thrown a structured improvisation part into the 38-minute work. An hour earlier than the present begins, the dancers pull a collection of prompts out of a hat that, for a sure part of the efficiency, tells them who they are going to be dancing with, what bodily course of they’ll use, and the underlying emotion of the assembly.
How do the Kaejas and Barton see the 2 items working collectively?
Inter-relationships are talked about, as is the presence and absence of innocence, of notion, of presence. Questions raised embody: How can we see ourselves and others.? How can we reply to individuals? How can we stay our lives?
Says Karen, “The items are a celebration of humanity, however we’re not sweeping wrestle underneath a rug.”
“We’re right here to honour and respect these voices, to hear and reply, however to not create judgment,” Allen provides.
“The works signify a hybrid. On one hand there may be nose to nose communication, on the opposite is know-how, and life via a display screen,” says Barton.
What does Kaeja d’Dance stand for as an organization?
From Barton: “Kaeja d’Dance is exclusive as a result of it’s pushed by the 2 very completely different personalities of a married couple who’re savvy, clever, and prepared to take dangers. They’ve a deep funding in what experimentation means with out seeing it as a pattern or novelty. They’ve survived for 30 years via pressure of will and creativeness.”
From Karen: “The help between the 2 of us has been an unbelievable journey. We’ve allowed one another to observe our personal fascinations. It has not been with out its challenges, nevertheless. The flowers are at all times blossoming, however some die.”
From Allen: “Why be forward of the curve, when you’ll be able to create the curve?”
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Paula Citron is a Toronto-based freelance arts journalist and broadcaster who hosts her personal web site, paulacitron.ca. For over 25 years, she was senior dance author for The Globe and Mail, affiliate editor of Opera Canada journal, arts reviewer for Classical 96.3 FM, and dance previews contributor to Toronto Life journal. She has been a visitor lecturer for varied cultural teams and universities, significantly on the position of the critic/reviewer, and has been a panellist on COC podcasts. Earlier than assuming a full-time journalism profession, Ms. Citron was a member of the drama division of the Claude Watson Faculty for the Arts.
