continued on page 2

AfterThe Gathering

Dance CentralA Dance Centre Publication

The Gathering was a conference held as part of the 2013 Vancouver

International Dance Festival, and was designed to bring together dance

artists from various communities, and to focus on the challenges of mar-

keting and networking, especially as they affect Aboriginal and cultur-

ally diverse companies. The conference took place over the weekend of

March 9-12, 2013 and included presentations of excerpts of works by all

participating companies, and a responding panel.

AK: We had hoped to have this conversation before The Gathering took

place, but there wasn't time. Did it unfold as you expected?

JH: It is probably better to talk about it afterwards. I wasn't really sure

what was going to happen. We had an interesting group of people, both

locally and from across Canada. It was a conference that focused on

marketing and networking as two areas that I thought we could fruitfully

explore in a short time. One of the things we wanted to do was to provide

people with practical information. That is still in process because we are

building a website (www.thegathering.ca) that will be both an archive

of the weekend, of what was shown and discussed, and a place where

people can take these ideas further and interact with each other. We

will structure it in a way that is similar to a social networking site, where

people can connect and start initiatives.

AK: The focus was specifically on companies outside the 'Western' canon?

JH: The issues were of interest to anybody in contemporary dance, and

it was open to anybody, but we thought that contemporary artists in the

culturally diverse and Aboriginal categories were arguably more chal-

lenged and more marginalized than those of the primary English and

French Canadian cultures. I think that contemporary dance in general is

challenged in terms of marketing, and that contemporary artists have dif-

ficulty, no matter what their background, in getting touring opportunities,

so the points that we were trying to cover were applicable to everybody.

The website (www.thegathering.ca) will be open to everybody, and if

people want to identify specific challenges within different cultural con-

texts, we encourage that.

A conversation with Jay Hirabayashi

Content

After The Gathering:A conversation with Jay HirabayashiPage 1

A Note from the Executive Director:Mirna ZagarPage 4

Thinking Bodies: Byron Chief MoonPage 6

Designing Dance: Itai ErdalPage 11

Dance Calendar May/June 2013Page 12

May/June 2013

2 D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3

Welcome to the May/June 2013 issue of Dance Central.

Welcome to the May/June issue of Dance Central.

We continue to focus on questions that contemporary

dance artists working in culturally diverse, or 'ethnic'

forms have to grapple with. Continuing a conversation

that began with Bharatanatyam choreographer Jai

Govinda in April, we feature an interview with Jay

Hirabayahsi of Kokoro Dance and the Vancouver

International Dance Festival, about The Gathering, a

conference that took place as part of the VIDF and

focused on marketing and networking strategies for

dance artists, especially those of First Nations, culturally

diverse backgrounds, and others who are marginalized

by the current funding and presenting structures.

The 'Thinking Bodies' series features a portrait of dancer,

actor, writer and choreographer Byron Chief Moon, who

speaks about his experience living and working inside

and outside the city, about the relationship between tra-

ditional and contemporary elements of his work, and

about the role of his family in his life as an artist.

The third feature of this issue continues the Designing

Dance Series, with Lighting Designer Itai Erdal. As

always, we thank all the artists who have agreed to con-

tribute and we welcome new writing and project ideas

at any time, in order to continue to make Dance Central

a more vital link to the community. Please send material

by mail to members@thedancecentre.ca. or call us at

604.606.6416. We look forward to the conversation!

Andreas Kahre, Editor

continued from cover

AK: We recently published a conversation with Jai Govinda where

he described the resistance he has encountered in describing his

work as contemporary, and the difficulty that companies who, like

his, defined as 'ethnic' have in securing funding. Do you encounter

similar problems as an artist and presenter?

JH: Kokoro Dance started the festival largely in the face of these

challenges and the fact that we were having difficulty finding pre-

senters. Having built a growing and diverse local audience seemed

to have little cachet outside Vancouver. Part of the problem was

that it was difficult to get presenters to see our work and when

they did, they didn't know how to deal with it, because we were a

Butoh company, but we weren't Japanese per se. We talked to one

presenter in Toronto and said "we are not asking you to present us,

we would just like your feedback on what you think the challenges

would be for another presenter in dealing with our work," and she

said: "Well, you know, if I was going to present a Butoh company I

would probably present a Japanese, a 'real' Butoh company…". That

was also our problem in getting funding. It took us six years to get

Canada Council funding because it is a peer assessment system

and we didn't have any peers. We had all these people looking at

us not understanding why we chose to paint ourselves white and

shave our heads and dance naked. It wasn't in their context.

AK: Well, as (Montreal choreographer) Jo Leslie pointed out in a

report to the Dance Section at that time, 'dance theatre' wasn't in

their context, even when Pina Bausch had gone into retirement.

JH: The other problem at the end of the last millennium was that

audiences were dwindling. There was the Dancing on the Edge

Festival, but it was struggling to build an audience outside the

dance community, and couldn't meet our need as a company to

do full evening works. Besides, there weren't a lot of companies

that were coming to Vancouver regularly, and so we thought there

was a need to have more touring companies to stimulate local

artists. The festival is a good format for attracting presenters, and

we wanted to build audiences and find a way out of the impasse

where dance artists send their packages to different present-

ers and never hear back. It is a way of getting presented that just

doesn't seemed to be working any more. There are thirty or forty

presenters across the country; many of them people who have

A conversation with Jay Hirabayahsi

After the Gathering

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 3

continued on page 14

been in their positions for a very long time, who seem to have

made up their minds decades ago about what they like and

what they don't like. They also face the same challenges as

everybody else, in terms of not having the luxury to be able to

take programming risks. They have to have a certain box office

attendance and presenting work from an Aboriginal or cultur-

ally diverse background is challenging when they think that

their audiences may not be ready for it.

AK: I spoke with Mirna Zagar before The Gathering and she

was curious whether focusing on specific subsets of the com-

munity would be the most successful strategy in addressing

problems that the entire dance community is facing. Did The

Gathering include a discussion of the relationship between the

community as a whole and the distinct communities within it?

JH: I wasn't interested in taking the discussion into that area.

You can have a whole conference on the philosophical,

theoretical and political dimensions of that, but I wanted to

get practical. On the marketing side, what had become ap-

parent to us was that we are artists presenting other artists,

but the artists we were presenting saw us only as presenters.

We have noticed that many of the proposals that we get are

like grant applications: They tell you who they are, where they

came from, what the work is about and why they did it but there

is nothing usually in there that would tell an audience why they

should see it. I recently listened to Terry O'Reilly's CBC program

Under the Influence, in which he pointed out that one primary

rule of marketing is that you do not describe the product but the

effects of using it. You don't describe what toothpaste is but how

sexy you will feel and how fresh your breath will be if you use

it. Dance usually describes the product. Artists don't say "If you

come see my work you're going to cry, or laugh, or feel angry"

and give you some sense of what the experience of seeing the

work will be. I thought it would be good to start developing a

vocabulary, a different way of talking about dance—less about

what it is about and more about its impact and what it can do. So

the format for the weekend was to have short performances, to

which a panel and the audience gave their feedback—not on what

they saw, but on what the impact was, and on the emotions they

felt.

I picked a panel — not consciously— that turned out to be all

white, and we recorded their responses. It included Alex Varty,

Deborah Meyers, David McIntosh and Ellie O'Day, — two critics,

Photo: Chris Randle

4 D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3

Dance CentralThe Dance CentreScotiabank Dance CentreLevel 6, 677 Davie StreetVancouver BC V6B 2G6T 604.606.6400 F 604.606.6401info@thedancecentre.cawww.thedancecentre.ca

Dance Central is published every two months by The Dance Centre for its members and for the dance community. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent Dance Central or The Dance Centre. The editor reserves the right to edit for clarity or length, or to meet house requirements.

Editor Andreas KahreCopy Editor Hilary Maxwell

Contributors to this issue:Jay Hirabayashi, Byron Chief Moon, Itai Erdal, Mirna Zagar

Dance Centre Board MembersChair Andrea WinkVice Chair Gavin RyanSecretary Ingrid M. TsuiTreasurer Roman Goldmann

Directors Barbara Bourget Susan ElliottMargaret Grenier Anndraya T. Luui Josh MartinSimone Orlando Jordan Thomson

Dance Foundation Board MembersChair Michael WeltersSecretary Anndraya T. LuuiTreasurer Jennifer ChungDirectors Santa Aloi, Linda Blankstein, Grant Strate

Dance Centre Staff:Executive Director Mirna ZagarProgramming Coordinator Raquel AlvaroMarketing Manager Heather BrayServices Administrator Anne DaroussinDevelopment Director Sheri UrquhartTechnical Directors Justin Aucoin and Mark Eugster Accountant Lil ForcadeMember Services Coordinator Hilary Maxwell

The Dance Centre is BC's primary resource centre for the dance profession and the public. The activities of The Dance Centre are made possible by numerous individuals. Many thanks to our members, volunteers, communi-ty peers, board of directors and the public for your ongoing commitment to dance in BC. Your suggestions and feedback are always welcome. The operations of The Dance Centre are supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council, and the City of Vancouver through the Office of Cultural Affairs.

We have had an exciting season at The Dance Centre, and

as we get ready to finalize our plans for the coming year, we

have much to reflect upon, and to look forward to. I would

especially like to remind our members about the upcoming

elections and to encourage everyone to exercise their right to

vote. We know that the situation of artists will be affected by

the outcome, and there is a lot of information available about

the various party platforms. To help you make your choice,

have a look at the Election Tool Kit created by the Arts Coali-

tion of BC, available at www.artscoalitionbc.ca

Personally, I hope that whoever wins the elections follows

through on their promises of investing in arts and education.

No aftermath suprises - please!

At The Dance Centre we just concluded the second National

Dance Week festivities, which culminated in International

Dance Day, and the announcement of the winners of the

Isadora Award and the Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer

Award, which provided a wonderful opportunity to recognize

the many talented artists here in Vancouver. The competition

for both awards was very tough this year, with significantly

more nominations than we have seen before. I would like to

congratulate all nominees, and express my pleasure at the

fact that the growing number of nominations, we believe, is

an expression that the community acknowledges the op-

portunities and support we try to offer our constituency. The

growing number also meant that the jury had tougher choic-

es to make! This year's recipient of the Iris Garland Emerg-

ing Choreographer Award is Vanessa Goodman and we look

forward to working with her and her team in support of her

artistic vision as she prepares to produce her new work.

Su-Feh Lee is the recipient of the 2013 Isadora Award in ac-

knowledgement of her body of work, and her contributions to

the dynamic development of contemporary dance in British

From the Executive Director

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 5

From the Executive Director

continued on page 16

Columbia. It recognizes her unwavering quest to push

the boundaries of both her own artistic reach, and that

of dance itself as it manifests the encounters of differ-

ent cultures and disciplines.

While the curtain has officially come down on this

season, we have still more events to look forward to

before the start of next season: Ame Henderson and

Matija Ferlin are returning to feature their new work

as part of the 2013 Dancing on the Edge Festival. We

are pleased to continue this and another partnership

that emerged from the Artist-In-Residence program,

with Dancers of Damelahamid, to be presented on June

15th, and dumb instrument Dance, the Contingency

Plan and Anne Cooper, on June 21st and 22nd, as well

as a partnership with MACHiNENOiSY, for Dancing on

the Edge in July.

For the coming season, we look forward to renewing

our successful partnerships with several local festivals

and working with a new pool of artists in residence. We

are also delighted to present another edition of Dance

In Vancouver, this time curated by Jeanne Holmes, the

Artistic Director of Canada Dance Festival. The event

will also be an opportunity to welcome to Vancouver

several national networks and promises to once again

offer a platform for stimulating dialogue. Well, we can

only promise that the season ahead will be full of op-

portunities, and I invite you to look out for the details

soon to be announced. Enjoy the Summer and come

back all set to explore and engage with dance!

Mirna Zagar, Executive Director

Next:

Dance Central July/August 2013

Proximity: a conversation about future projects

Thinking Bodies: Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg

Designing Dance: Nancy Bryant

and more...

How do I share?

6 D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 Photograph courtesy of Alex Waterhouse-Hayward (www.alexwaterhousehayward.com

BCM: Usually, they are ideas I am playing around with, and it’s

usually when I start working that the phone rings and some-

one says "Hey, by the way, do you happen to have some-

thing?" and I will say "Oh, I just happen to be working on this

idea." I look for people to respond to what I am sharing. I was

at a conference, The Gathering, recently and if you look at the

video and see what the panel said to me, you can see that it

was quite a profound journey to go through, because often

you don't hear back immediately what people are seeing or

feeling, but in this case I did, and their criticism was right on;

I presented an excerpt with an ear infection which threw

me off balance. It was fun dancing off balance, and I think it

helped the character, but I didn't want it to end the way it did.

I was losing my balance and I just had to end it, and the re-

sponse was very honest. The pieces I make are quite emotion-

al, and they saw exactly what I was attempting. I shared what I

had written about it, but I had someone else read it.

AK: You dance, you act, you write. Is there anything else?

BCM: I am into directing dance films and I try to grow my own

food for myself and my family, to make sure we aren't reliant

on GMO produce, and grocery chains are in the pockets of

Monsanto. I think that growing my own food and being out of

the city and away from television is important.

AK: How much time do you spend in the city?

BCM: Work brings me to Vancouver maybe once a week.

Sometimes I fly, sometimes I drive through the Chilcotin and

sometimes along the Northern part of Vancouver Island, which

is fantastic wherever you go, you go through so many different

environments and climate zones.

AK: Speaking of television, you have been on the other side of

the camera a lot, as an actor, but also as a film maker.

How do I share?

AK: You are on your way to Bella Coola. Is that home these days?

BCM: I live in several places. Bella Coola is the closest town to

where I live on the central coast.

AK: You are one of the performers who work in many different

disciplines, and categories—dance, film, and television. What

supports you in your work?

BCM: I went through a change, because I lost my mother. She

passed away about two years ago, and it is still difficult. She was

my best friend, and always there for us. We knew that we would

always have support and whenever we had issues about this

world that we live in, she would help us work through it. She just

gave you the truth— whether you wanted it or not, and she would

do it with love. She would say "This is what I see you doing." and

if she had issues with it, she would say "You've got to change this

way you are being." She always asked us to be in the present. I

often get caught up with things and forget to come back to centre,

and she did that for me. Now I can't pick up the phone and say

"Hey, Mom, I have this thing..." She would sometimes just laugh at

my angst, and she said, "Pain is useful—if you're growing though it,

fantastic, but if it's useless, why stay there?"

My family has basically said that I do resistance art. I guess it's

because I am just telling tales of the revolution. I wanted to be

away from the city, because there are so many things I was told

that are wrong. Now things from that experience are coming to

me, and coming to me fast. How do I share? How do I share this

through my dancing, or acting or singing? Whatever that is—How

do I share? I keep saying it in different ways, I keep trying to find

different ways to share what it is I see and what I go through, and

hopefully those stories that are real to my people can become

real to people in the mainstream.

AK: Do you originate most of the projects you work on, or does

the phone ring, or is it a mix? How do things happen?

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 7

THINKING BODIES | Portraits A conversation with Byron Chief Moon

Photograph courtesy of Alex Waterhouse-Hayward (www.alexwaterhousehayward.com

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 8

BCM: More as a dance producer, I haven't directed any drama,

but dance film is maybe a way to share what I have to say

when my body gets too old.

AK: How do you experience aging as a dancer?

BCM: I have always had some problems, because as a young

dancer I would do just everything I was told, and as you get

older you feel the aches and pains more, and you've got to

slow down. But then I found a new way to dance and even

if my knees hurt sometimes, I am happy as long as I can just

share my dance style and storytelling through it.

AK: What was the journey to the dance you do now?

BCM: When I was young, I learned traditional dance and began

to incorporate different styles and contemporary movement.

I use the body to shape-shift, and express a force, and when I

listen to stories, my body just begins to shape-shift to the story

being told.

AK: Did you ever go through training in Western forms?

BCM: As you know, I danced with Karen Jamieson for a long

time, and Karen and I started to collaborate on stories that I

brought to her, and that's where the influences of contem-

porary movement and contemporary forum allowed me to

understand how to utilize the 'tricks of the trade'. I also saw as

much dance as I could. I think there is always room for new

ways of dancing and it is an opportunity to take some risk and

explore what you want to say.

AK: You strike me as someone who gets asked to perform with

others because of your personal presence.

BCM: I understand that people appreciate my stage presence,

perhaps along lines like: "Here is a native man going through

some contemporary movement and taking a contemporary

journey with some traditional flair." Some are surprised, but I

come from a culture that is constantly evolving, where nothing

is static. We are constantly adapting, constantly shape-shifting

to our immediate environment, while people keep trying to put

us back into the past. History has to be re-written, correctly

and truthfully. Spirituality is a part of that: We are all spiritual;

we just have to appreciate it. I guess for me it's my family.

Feminine forces inspire me daily, every morning. Not that there

is anything wrong with the body I am in, but I appreciate the

feminine dance force that comes out of this body, and I am aston-

ished sometimes.

AK: I remember when we worked on Raven of the Railroad, with

Karen Jamieson, you spoke about that often. Has the experience

changed?

BCM: It is constantly evolving, and it is something I play with in the

studio, to try to understand what my body wants to say. When you

are in traditional dance, you are in a 'zone' — the repetition and the

rhythm puts you into a trance where you connect with everything

around you, where you see and hear and are a part of everything.

That's why when you go see a Powow it is hard to try to watch one

dancer tell their story: Everybody is telling their story, and if you

sit back and appreciate it as a whole you can hear and see it all

at once. Storytelling is an element of the traditional songs as well,

and it is a challenge to take it into the contemporary form and add

contemporary elements, because even though I say we are con-

stantly evolving, oral culture evolves over time, by being constantly

repeated, and it takes time. Sometimes I want to push, and I have

to tell myself "Slow down, let it sit, let it evolve."

AK: Is Coyote Arts a vehicle for a specific kind of work?

BCM: It was a vehicle to develop new work, and was great for net-

working, but I don't think I am capable of operating it year-round.

AK: If you hadn't danced for some reason, what else would you

have done?

BCM: I probably would have been a farmer. For now, we just grow

our own food. We had 5000 square feet last year, and we are just

getting it ready again, and hopefully we will have 10000 square

feet this time.

AK: Which means that you will eat more or share more?

BCM: We will share more. We have got to get away from our de-

pendence on grocery chains, and GMO foods. We must be aware,

and grow our own.

AK: What do you imagine you will be doing in the coming years?

BCM: I hope I will still be dancing. I also hope that our government

understands that art is a big part of our society and needs the sup-

port. I hope there will be less killing. I really hope that my discover-

ies about our present situation are wrong.

AK: Do you work with other dancers?

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 9

"I use my body to shape-shift."

BCM: I enjoy working with dancers who are traditionally trained.

They understand the rootedness of the movement; they under-

stand the storytelling aspect of the style. It's just that they need to

allow themselves to step into that contemporary forum, because

traditional dance is a ritual. I work mostly with men, although I

am interested in the feminine. I went through my rites of passage,

and that experience made me understand the feminine in myself

more. Working with men, through dance training and the rehearsal

process, I get them to just dance until we get out whatever it is

we needed to get out, and then we are in a head space where we

begin to understand the story we want to tell and find the style of

movement to do it in. In the traditional form we are used to danc-

ing outdoors, in the open air and under the sky. When you put

traditional dancers into a studio in a contemporary context they

begin to see how other elements can be added, and they begin to

understand how storytelling can be a performance art rather than a

ritual. But it can be a challenge as most mainstream dance venues

are prosceniums and they are used to performing in the round, so

you have to say "You need to focus on this direction", and they learn

to find their light. But, what I enjoy the most is to see how they

become more aware of the feminine force, and how they begin to

stand up for it, and wake other people up.

AK: Do you choreograph in the conventional sense?

BCM: When I work on my own in the studio, I do. I make up

phrases and try them, if I can't do it, I won't ask my dancers to do

them. But I also ask them to give me their choices, and if they have

a phrase that brings them joy, I will ask them to keep it in.

AK: Do you discover the length and shape as you work, or does the

storytelling determine the format?

BCM: If I were to make pieces as I create it in my mind, they would

be Kabuki-like. They would go on forever. There is just so much to

say. I look at all the pieces I create, and say "I like what this does,"

and then I share it with my family, who are not afraid to critique.

If my family doesn't like it or doesn't understand something, and I

can’t immediately answer, it doesn't go on stage. So then I

go back and do it all over again, and ask: "What about this

one?" It is a long process, because they live in Southern

Alberta and I am here.

AK: How long does it take you to make a work?

BCM: It depends on where I am at. When I am in Vancou-

ver, I am connecting with friends and family and taking in

images and thoughts and feelings about urban life. When I

go back home I begin to work and reflect on these impres-

sions, but it used to take me a long time to get rid of the

feeling that this place is crazy. Now I can't wait to get out

of the urban and back home to explore. It's also more dif-

ficult to support the process now, because most of the film

industry that supports me in dance has moved to Toronto,

and I just can't live there. I like the water and the open

prairies.

AK: Talking about The Gathering once more, and its aim to

create opportunities to respond to each others' work, was

it a useful experience?

BCM: For me it was, because I realized that what I danced

was powerful, and the response was honest and direct.

I had written the story, but my family had said “Don’t tell

them the story", and so I had someone else read it. There

was a comment that maybe dancers shouldn't tell what

the story is. And I agree. I need to find a different point of

view. I am transitioning there now, into a creative environ-

ment where I am just understanding what my truth is, and

accepting it. However, it is pretty hard to surrender and to

accept. I do hope we can do that, and I do hope that we all

can dance for the feminine force and share— that's what

is going to sustain us. My mother encouraged us to be that

way, but I need to find out why— through dance.

AK: Thank you!

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 1 0

continued from page 9DesigningDance: Itai Erdal

Lighting and Photography by Itai Erdal

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 1 1 Lighting and Photography by Itai Erdal

AK: I know that you have been working across disciplines for

many years— with dance, theatre, and other performing arts. Do

you approach lighting for dance differently from lighting for the-

atre, and if so, how?

IE: There is both more freedom and more responsibility in lighting

dance, because when you are working in theatre, at least when

there is some degree of naturalism, there will be a motivation to

the light—either a window in the set, or a chandelier, or a candle

light, or even if we don't see it, we will pretend that they exist,

whereas dance is usually completely abstract, which means that

you are free to do everything you want as long as it enhances

the performances. You aren't constrained by whatever the set

designer gave you, or by the location and the time of day the

playwright decided on. On the one hand that gives the designer

a lot more freedom, but on the other hand it is that much harder,

because usually the lighting is a key element in the design. Sets in

dance are often very minimal and lighting is often the main tool

that the choreographer uses, together with the music, to create

the environment. This means more work, but also the freedom to

making choices purely on artistic grounds: I respond to a change

in the mood of the piece, or the movement evokes a certain feel-

ing in me, rather than having to account for the physical fact that

there is an imaginary window upstage right.

AK: Do you work from music, with music, or perhaps through the

choreographers' idea of music?

IE: All of the above. I must admit that I have sometimes worked

on dance pieces where I wasn't crazy about the choreography,

but closed my eyes and designed to the music. Music is a key

element, even if some dance pieces have just industrial noise, or

sound scapes, and I feel that I have to be connected to it.

AK: I noticed in looking at images of your designs that unlike many

lighting designers who will tend to create a space around the

body, you work a lot with textures that cover the body as well as

the space, and make it part of a larger architecture. Was that a

coincidence or is it a signature of your design?

IE: It is something I have become known for, because I often try to

create an environment, and while my tools, like the gobo patterns

you may have seen, can look quite cheesy when they are used in

a literal sense, they take on a whole other meaning when they are

used in an abstract way. Of course it depends on the piece; with

some works you don't want people to to notice the lighting very

much and just enhance the movement, but in general I like making

bold choices, with patterns and with colour. so that the area or

environment I have defined gives the choreographer and danc-

ers something to work with.

AK: I know you sometimes design sets; have you designed sets

for dance as well as theatre?

IE: I have, but never without also doing the lights, and never

naturalistic sets. I create sets as tools for the lighting design, and

most of the time I did that because people didn't have money

for a set designer. Some approach me instead of a set designer,

because they think that the environment can be created just

with lights, but I say, no, you need both.

AK: The relationship between set design and lighting design

can be problematic, because both claim the same space.

IE: The biggest difference I find is that the set designer has a lot

of time to work with the choreographer, to plan and throw away

and change things, whereas I have to be creative under pres-

sure, so I often have much less time, and the set is given to me

when I start working, I don't have much input in that.

AK: To my mind it would seem absolutely essential that all the

people who design aspects of the visual space for a dance piece

communicate with one another as early in the process as pos-

sible, but I know it rarely works that way.

IE: Particularly in Europe, the lighting designer is an after-

thought— the last person to get hired. In North America the

lighting designer is involved earlier, and like you say, I find that

bewildering since we are working toward the same goal.

AK: If you are working on a set, with a lighting designer whose

aesthetics are very different from yours, and your concepts col-

lide at the last second there is not much you can do to integrate

the elements, especially if the set involves projections, which

inevitably also light the space. Do you work with projections?

IE: I work with other people who design them, but I don't de-

sign my own projections. I have done it once, and I don't think I

will again.

AK: Why not?

IE: I have issues with most of the projections I see; curiously,

all of the shows I have created have had projections in them,

but there they were a tool that moved the story forward rather

D a n c e C e n t r a l S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 4 3

than part of an aesthetic environment. I find that, particularly

in dance, people end up upstaging themselves. When I see

a massive image of a dancer, the tiny actual body in front of it

just can't compete. My eye is drawn toward the bigger image,

and then I ask: "What are you trying to achieve? Are you split-

ting my focus and are making it harder for me to follow what

ever you are trying to tell, or are you helping me?" I think it is

a fashionable thing, and half of the ones we see now will not

be around.

AK: Some lighting designers work with projections as a light

source. Do you?

IE: That's another thing I don't like. Of course, it can be quite

beautiful when a special can be a river or clouds. But unfortu-

nately, people use projection also in period pieces, and when

I see the pixels on the costumes, it takes me out. The light of

the projector is always cold, and the LED and incandescent

sources are difficult to mix together. And then, there is always

a line where the projection ends, which can't be blurred and

that drives me crazy. Unless you have a set that is designed

with the projection in mind, I have issues with it.

AK: Do you work with LED lights much, and how do you find

working with them in dance?

IE: I have issues with LEDs as well. They are an amazing tool,

especially when you have no power, but I don't think the

technology is there yet. They have two problems: The light

is cold, and they don't dim well. Going from 5 to 10 percent

is fine, but when you go to from 5 to 0, they flicker. I hate that.

AK: I don't want to turn this into a technical talk, but there are

some interesting questions that have aesthetic impact. For

example, I dislike the fact that projectors and LED lights dim

without a hot spot, which feels like the horizon widens as the

light fades rather than concentrate on a part of the image you

want to leave in the audiences's gaze until the end.

IE: That's correct. I find that too.

AK: Another question is that since dance lighting often in-

volves a lot of side lights, the architecture at the edges of the

stage gets lit as well. Some designers seem very aware of

that, and make great efforts to hide or mitigate the effect by

masking, whereas others don't seem to care—which means

that you are expected to ignore the space. I find it difficult not

to see the body in relation to the illuminated space, even if that

is a brick wall with a fire extinguisher. Do you care about it?

IE: I do, and I think it changes with show and venue. If you have

a proscenium arch you can use masking and you don't want to

see the lights. But if you are in studio, and you see the instru-

ments, it doesn't bother me. I always talk to the choreographer

beforehand and try to find out if they care.

AK: How do they respond?

IE: The majority of people say they don't care, and they don't

mind if you light the walls, but this is usually in studios.

AK: Do you find working with choreographers markedly differ-

ent from working with theatre directors?

IE: It's very different. I find theatre to be a much more collab-

orative artform. In dance, the choreographers often have the

whole show in their heads and can be autocratic, whereas in

theatre, particularly when it comes to lighting, people don't re-

ally have the ability to imagine what I can do, and so they allow

me to surprise them and take more of what you bring to the

table. I think choreographers do that with dancers in the room,

but when they get to the theatre they often have preconceived

notions of what they want it to look like. So generally, in dance

you give them what they had imagined, whereas in theatre you

can surprise them.

AK: You do collaborate in dance, however, including a project

with Billy Marchenski and Alison Denham. Where is that at?

IE: We are still in the very early stages, but that was very excit-

ing. We were in residency at Scotiabank Dance Centre for a

week, and at the workshop I provided the lighting environment

first and then they created the choreography. We all found that

extremely satisfying. But we have a ways to go.

AK: If there is something you could change in the way choreog-

raphers and lighting designers collaborate, what would it be?

IE: In the perfect world, you would create in the theatre with

the designer there. Of course we have too little money in

dance, but having all the elements would be wonderful.

AK: Once in a while someone finds the resources to put all the

elements into the same room, with the result that there is an

embarrassment of riches, which can be confusing in itself.D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / J u n e 2 0 1 3 1 2

D a n c e C e n t r a l S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 4 3

IE: Yes, I have seen that as well, and I think in part it comes

back to what I said earlier: The choreographers don't say to the

lighting designer: "Can you create an environment that I will

choreograph for?" They have their work planned when they

approach you. That's what I was doing with Alison and Billy: I

approached them and initiated the work.

AK: What do you use as inspiration when you are 'in the lead'

like that. Do you use visual sources, literary sources, is it a

matter of emotional feeling, or all of the above?

IE: It is a bit of everything. In this case, I used all three sources.

I was inspired by the imagery of James Turrell statues, but also

technical ideas and things we discovered in the room. For

example, we had a light two feet off the ground in the wings,

with a hard square edge. You couldn't see the source or where

it was hitting, and you couldn't see the dancers who were lying

on the ground— except when they brought their hands or feet

or faces into the light. They discovered all kinds of movement

that they had never thought of before because they could only

work in that two foot box. But that is a very rare luxury.

AK: You have been creating shows that you have written and

performed in yourself, such as How to Disappear Completely.

Has working like that changed or informed the way you think

about lighting? Especially with a show like Lights which is ex-

plicitly about the meaning of lighting.

IE: The first thing that comes to mind is that I really under-

stood how much you can't see a thing when you are standing

on stage, and you are pretending to look into people's eyes

while the front light completely blinds you. Speaking into the void

and making them believe that you are looking at them is something

I only discovered by being a performer. Funnily enough, because I

was on stage and telling a personal story, I really trusted my director

to be the lighting designer because he was looking from the outside.

The choices he made are not the ones I would have; many times the

scenes are lit with only one light, which is very dramatic but some-

thing I would never do. I would always have a back light, and side

lights, but in a show about lighting that exposes lighting it actually

works that the lighting is so simple. Even though I was credited and

even nominated for a Jessie Award for the lighting, really my director

designed it. The other thing I learned is that having someone who

knew less about the process actually helped the piece.

AK: What's next? I know you are working on theatre shows, but will

there also be dance?

IE: There is nothing on the horizon. Dance companies often call at

the last moment when theatre has already booked me. I love doing

dance, but there is less and less. Right now I am in a workshop with

Anita Rochon and Marcus Youssef. We are working on a two-hander

about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, with James Long directing for

my company, The Elbow. It is very early in the process, but we are

very excited. There is a wealth of material.

AK: Many thanks!

"There is more freedom and more responsibility

in lighting dance, compared to other kinds of

performance"Itai Erdal

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D a n c e C e n t r a l S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 4 3

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AfterThe GatheringA conversation with Jay Hirabayahsi

continued from page 3

an artist, and a publicist. Perhaps it might have been better

to have included patrons, because the panelists have dance

experience and are going to look at things differently, but I

thought it was challenging enough for them to have to look

at work from Anusha Fernando, Byron Chief Moon, Dancers

of Damelahamid, Kitt Johnson, Gibson Muriva, and Barbara

Bourget, so they had a cross section of dance coming from

a lot of different cultural contexts. Another element was to

have people talk about the different ways they use to get their

work out. For example, Majdi Bou-Matar from Empty Space in

Kitchener/Waterloo, where he runs the Impact festival every

two years, tells people "I'll present you if you present me." and

that's how he gets his work out. Other artists create artistic

collaborations by going to meet people in different places, like

Alvin Tolentino

AK: This may be easier for a solo artist who doesn't have to

take a company. Were most participants solo artists?

JH: Some, but companies also manage to collaborate with

others. Wen Wei Dance has done it with Beijing Modern

Dance Company. Barbara choreographed for the Aura Dance

Theatre of Lithuania, and we presented their company here,

but I thought there are different levels and ways that people

can have an exchange: Invite someone to do a workshop,

or a festival like Jai Govinda's Gait to the Spirit. Talking Stick

and CanAsian Dance Festival are other examples. It would

be great if there could be artist-driven festivals around the

country.

AK: How did artists respond to being defined through their

ethnicity or cultural background?

JH: Well, the Canada Council has always done that. When

the Equity Office was started and their first grant programs

appeared we were invited to apply. I was a little bit put off

by it — not by the money they offered, but I asked them what

their strategic intentions were. Was it always going to be

a separate arm of the Council, or was there going to be an

attempt to integrate it with their mainstream funding, and if

so, how was it going to happen. At that time we had waited six

years and gotten our first grant, and were now clients of the

Dance Section. I had been on a national jury and I had seen how

some companies were set aside because the dance officers

knew they could get money from the Aboriginal or some other

program, and so they kept them out of the competition and said

we don't need to tap our money because we can fund them

through some other program. I was worried that Equity com-

panies would be limited in how far they could grow, because

juries would believe that they wouldn't need to be funded

through the regular programs. I was happy when they finally

consolidated the program.

AK: From the point of view of the Council, Equity Office fund-

ing may have been a good option because it is politically much

more difficult to cut,

JH: Perhaps, but the reverse side is that for several years we

had to fill out a questionnaire where we had to detail how many

people in our organization were not white: Board, staff, and

audiences, and they had a ratio, so if you had less than fifty per-

cent you were cut off the program. That was absurd. It is totally

conceivable that you are from India and your work is Bhara-

tanatyam and your whole board is white and your staff is white,

and your audience is mostly white, and your work is classical

Indian dance… but as you say, they may have been doing it for

strategic reasons. For ourselves we have always defined cul-

tural diversity as inclusive rather than exclusive, as work that is

different from what we do, and so the festival presents cultur-

ally diverse work, such as Margie Gillis or Dancers Dancing,

because to us they are culturally diverse. It is a loaded term, so

much so that I would rather diffuse it and say Canada is a mul-

ticultural society, with French and English culture entrenched in

all the systems of funding.

AK: Does the First Nations dance community appear coherent?

JH: It's the same process that is happening with Indian dance,—

there are many styles, and some of them define that as con-

temporary because they are doing it, even though it is built from

classical forms or rebuilt from lost forms. And then there are the

new forms of expression such as what Nova Bhattacharya and

Natasha Bakht are performing, and in Aboriginal dance it's the

same, because the dance of Dancers of Damelahamid is more

traditional and more of the handed-down generational form,

but obviously changing when you look at them, while Raven

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Spirit and Byron Chief Moon are completely contemporary but

with Aboriginal roots. I am sure within the First Nations commu-

nity there is the same kind of politics as everywhere else.

AK: Did that come up at the conference?

JH: No, and I didn't want to talk about it there. It is something

everybody has to figure out among themselves. Nationally,

there is the Quebec faction and the Ontario faction, and the BC

faction, and some of those factions work better together than

others. The inequities of funding across the country create dif-

ferent situations for different communities and BC's community

has unfortunately not learned as well as the Quebec community

how to work together, but that wasn't what we were focused on

at The Gathering.

AK: Were you surprised by what emerged, or did it take the

shape you had designed for it?

JH: As they say in hockey: Keep it simple and good things will

happen. We tried to keep it simple, and we will see. As I said,

for me it was just a starting point, and when we get the website

up, it will be up to people to use it and carry on. The people that

came seemed excited and seemed to think that it was fruitful.

Many said they wanted to take these ideas and work on them.

AK: Will it happen again?

JH: No. My original dream was that it would run over seven days,

with three full-length shows each day by 21 companies from

across the country, so that everybody could actually see every-

body else, and we could talk about the works and the challenges

of building audiences and networks. We really would have been

able to create a national network right away, but the budget for

that was astronomical, and when I applied to all the agencies,

they all turned me down. It took years to get the funding, and

it kept getting smaller, but that made it workable as a starting

place.

AK: The website is going to be the ongoing hub?

JH: Yes. We will model it on the Pecha Kucha format as de-

scribed at The Gathering by Jane Cox from Cause+Affect.

Pecha Kucha was started in Japan by some architects, where a

template using twenty slides running for twenty seconds each

allowing only six minutes and forty seconds to provide the

most essential information about yourself concisely. We will

develop something similar to keep uploads of information to a

manageable and effective length.

AK: A mix of speed dating and elevator pitch?

JH: Yes, but it is workable, because everybody will have to

stick to that template, and it is effective in making people

really focus on what is important and what they want people

to know about their work. I was hoping that we would have

the ability on the website to let anybody upload information

about themselves in a defined format—how many pages, and

what they have to consist of, and we want to have it so that

people can have private conversations, discussion groups and

get others to join — similar to other social media sites but ini-

tially focusing on marketing and networking issues. If people

want to initiate and develop their relationships through this

portal they will be able to do that.

AK: What happens next?

JH: When the website is up, I will send a reference to more

than 200 people whom I had initially contacted, and invite

them to get involved if they are interested. We, VIDF and

Kokoro are going to administrate it, but I am hoping that other

people will want take it up.

AK: When do you expect the website to go live?

JH: Hopefully, by the end of July. It is in development now.

AK: What do you hope it will do for the dance community?

JH: I went to an Equity event in Toronto six or seven years ago,

where they had invited all of their clients, so there were two

or three hundred people in a big room, and I was sitting at this

table with all these people—I had no idea who they were, and

although we were introduced and talked, we had no context,

which I found really frustrating, so I was happy that people

could actually see performances and experience and react to

something together. Perhaps they were more complimentary

in their comments because the artists were present, but each

of the performances I thought were great. I was really moved

by all of them.

AK: Thank you!

D a n c e C e n t r a l S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 4 3

Calendar of Events May/June 2013

For a regularly updated calendar of dance performances and events, please visit our website www.thedancecentre.ca.

April 30 –May 4The Cultch presents Tara Cheyenne Performance - Highgate. 8pm at The Cultch, Vancouver. Tickets and Info: www.thecultch.com

May 3 & 4Mozaico Flamenco Dance Theatre presents Cafe de Chinitas. 8pm on May 3; 2pm & 8pm on May 4 at the Norman Rothstein Theatre. Tickets: www.vtixonline.com Info: www.normanrothsteintheatre.com

May 3Project CPR (Choreographic Practice and Research) Studio Sharing. 7:30pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre -Jandali Studio. FREE. Info: http://projectcpr.wordpress.com

May 4The Vancouver Korean Dance Society presents The 17th Annual Korean Dance Festival. 7pm at the Red Robinson Show Theatre, Coquitlam. Tickets and Info: www.koreandance.ca / 604.999.0220

May 5 &7Coastal City Ballet presents A Midsummer Night's Dream. 7:30pm on May 5 at The ACT Maple Ridge; 7:30pm on May 7 at Centennial Theatre, North Vancouver. Tickets and Info: www.coastalcityballet.com

May 7, 14, 21, 28Mascall Dance presents BLOOM Dance Tastings. 4:30-5:15pm (Cash Bar), 5:15pm informal performances. 1130 Jervis Street, Vancouver. Info: www.mascalldance.ca

May 7, 8, 9The diskordanse Contemporary Company presents DISLOKATION: Layer THREE. 8pm at Surrey Arts Centre. Tickets and Info: www.tickets.surrey.ca

May 11, 12Sujit Vaidya presents Sadhana..."in Pursuit". 7:30pm on May 11; 1pm on May 12 at Scotiabank Dance Centre. Tickets: www.ticketstonight.ca

May 11Crimson Coast Dance presents TWiSTED: SOLO / MERIDIAN created and performed by Martha Carter. 7:30pm at Malaspina Theatre at VIU, Nanaimo. Tickets and Info: www.crimsoncoast.org

May 17, 18Caravan World Rhythms & SFU Woodward's presents Gamelan Gita Asmara - Balinese Gamelan Performance with Music and Dance. 8pm at Fei and Milton Wong Experimental The-atre, Goldcorp Centre for the Arts, Vancouver. Tickets and Info: www.gitaasmara.ca

May 21-26Upintheair Theatre’s rEvolver Festival presents Safe/Guard & Feast: A Visual Poem & Dinner Table Battle created and performed by Robert Leveroos in collaboration with Mirae Ros-ner (Feast). At The Greenhouse Basement at The Cultch. Tickets: www.thecultch.com / 604.251.1363For show times visit: http://www.upintheairthe-atre.com/festival-about

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May/June 2013

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May 24, 25Pena Buleria Flamenco Club and SFU Woodwards present the 9th annual International Jondo Flamenco Festival Zyryab. 8pm at Fei and Milton Wong Experimental TheatreGoldcorp Centre for the Arts, Vancouver. Tickets and Info: www.flamenco.ca / 604.767.5522

May 30 – June 8The Vancouver International Bhangra Celebration presents the annual City of Bhangra Festival. Various venues around Surrey and Vancouver. Full schedule: www.vibc.org

June 1, 2Karen Flamenco presents Sleeping Beauty. 7pm on June 1; 3pm & 7pm on June 2 at the Vancouver Playhouse. Tickets and Info: www.karenflamenco.com / 604.721.4869

June 1Goh Ballet presents Dance My Dreams 35th Anniversary Gala. 7:30pm at The Centre in Vancouver for Performing Arts. Tickets and Info: www.gohballet.com

June 21-22dumb instrument Dance, The Contingency Plan and Anne Cooper, in partnership with The Dance Centre, present we all know Jane.8pm at Scotiabank Dance Centre. Tickets: www.ticketstonight.ca Info: www.weallknowjane.ca www.contingencyplan.ca www.dumbinstrumentdance.com