PRODUCTION PORTFOLIO 2012/13

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Retina Dance Company, under the artistic direction of Filip Van Huffel, has established itself as an innovative and dynamic voice in both the British and European contemporary dance scene. Founded in September 1995, Retina has created 18 company works and has toured in the UK, Belgium, France, Germany, India, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland, South Korea and Venezuela.

Retina is a company producing high quality performances for a range of different settings.

Corporalis (new work for 2013)A dance production inspired by architecture, incorporating a solo, duet and quartet. Available in parts or as a full evening production.

Layers of Skin (2011/12)A work for a minimum of six dancers, with the potential to be performed with live music and 20 local professional and community dancers.

La Lutte (2010)A male duet wrestling with communication, 30 minutes of power and complexity.

The company, having been selected as an Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisation, is in a position to build on its optimism and bold artistic vision.

Following the success of current productions Retina is touring a three production repertoire during the coming season to offer a range of work to suit the needs of a range of venues.

PRODUCTIONS AVAILABLE FOR BOOKING/PROGRAMMING

“…a sweatily intense statement of physical prowess…really watchable…dancers at the top of their game.”Mary Brennan, The Herald

COMPANY BACKGROUND

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Corporalis explores the relationship between personal space, architectural space and three-dimensional space; the exchange between the inside and the outside; the awareness of our body and its relationship to the environment.

Corporalis is the third episode in a trilogy about the relationship between the body and different art forms which began with Eleven Stories for the Body, Distance to our Soul collaborating with text in 2005 and This is not a Body collaborating with visual art in 2007.

How does the body respond to its environment, colour, texture, soundscape and visual stimuli? Corporalis explores the significance of how the body relates to architecture. Architecture is both a functional and visual art form but also has an important influence on the behaviour of our bodies and psyche.

Retina is working with Belgian architects Karolien De Schepper and Christophe Engels (www.ruimtevaarders.be) to create an environment for Corporalis that will evolve throughout the three sections of the work. Ruimtevaarders will create a unique environment for this new production that will enhance the movement and create a continuity and individuality between the three sections of the work.

Programming options Corporalis is a multimedia production comprising of three separate shorter works:Solo (10 minutes)Duet (20 minutes)Quartet (40 minutes)

Corporalis can be performed as a full production of 70 minutes, however, the three distinct but integrated units of Corporalis can also be performed individually as part of a wider festival programme. In addition, each of the works can be performed in unusual settings, non-theatre venues or outdoor spaces, providing Retina and host venues with additional marketing and audience development opportunities.

Corporalis will premiere in Cultuurcentrum Berchem, Antwerp in January 2013 and Nottingham Playhouse, UK in February before touring internationally.

Check Retina’s websitefor video updates. !

Corporalis | 70 MINUTES - NO INTERVAL

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Layers of Skin is a multi-layered performance event with bold choreography by Belgian/English choreographer Filip Van Huffel and his Retina Dance Company with music by Joris Vanvinckenroye and his acclaimed Belgian chamber rock ensemble Aranis.

The result is an energetic rollercoaster of power, excitement, sensitivity and intrigue.

Layers of Skin unites Retina’s skills in creating artistic touring productions as well as leading large-scale participatory projects. With this ambitious production, Retina has firmly established itself as a company that enables dancers to excel.

Layers of Skin has been an astounding success in every venue it has toured to. It has a core structure of the Retina performers, who excite their audiences with their power, technicality and theatricality. However, where possible, the company come to a venue for up to one week prior to the performance and lead a daytime residency for local professional/experienced dancers and evening rehearsals for local community dancers. All participants then perform alongside Retina in the final performance, and where possible Aranis play their inspirational music live.

Six incredible Retina dancers can be joined on stage by seven Aranis musicians, and 20 local professional and community dancers. A minimum of six dancers to a maximum of 33 performers on stage.

Programming optionsThe format of Layers of Skin can be tailored for a venues’ specific needs, ranging from a straight 70-minute performance by Retina company dancers accompanied by recorded music to a residency for local professional and community dancers culminating in a performance with Retina company dancers accompanied by live music.

For the six Retina dancers version a minimum space of 10x8m is required. For the full version with 33 performers a minimum space of 12x12m and a piano is required.

Layers of Skin premiered in 2011 during the 30-year celebration of Cultuurcentrum Berchem in Antwerp, Belgium and Nottingham Playhouse, UK in January 2012 and has since toured internationally.

“This is the coolest thing I have ever seen at the Drill Hall” Simon HollingworthManager, Lincoln Drill Hall

Promo clip of Layers of Skin:www.vimeo.com/28920034

clickthe

link !

laYErs oF sKiN | 70 MINUTES - NO INTERVAL

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La Lutte (French for ‘The Wrestle’) is a male duet created by choreographer Filip Van Huffel and performed by Retina’s long-term members Matthew Slater and Steven Martin. Their performance demonstrates how intricacy and power can seamlessly interweave.

La Lutte deals with the struggle to communicate to oneself, one another and the outside world in an aggressive yet playful environment. A physical and emotionally charged work encompassing Van Huffel’s signature complex movement style layered with psychological intensity.

La Lutte is set in a theatrical environment, with floodlights reminiscent of a boxing arena, creating an intense space for two men, wrestling with themselves, one another and the world around them. La Lutte is a highly physical, extreme work, where the seemingly uncontrollable limbs are constructed into atight framework. The setting is bold and bright with powerful, playful and competitive movement content.

Due to the range of works and the flexibility and variations on offer with each production Retina does not have set fees. However as a guide prices range from £800 for a single performance of La Lutte to £8,000 for a residency and full performance of Layers of Skin with live music.

Every package is tailored to your specific needs and a price will be calculated accordingly. To discuss the options and find the best fit for your venue, please contact our General Manager.

The movement was generated from two sources. Firstly, a collaboration in a day centre for children with disabilities through observing and inhabiting the movement content as the children wrestled to communicate, move and express their emotions. And secondly, a return for Van Huffel to the ancient martial art of Jiu-Jitsu, in which he gained his black belt at the age of 15. This fighting technique looks at neutralising an enemy by using the attacker’s energy against him, rather than directly opposing it. As a choreographic tool Jiu-Jitsu presents unusual material that is dramatic in its physicality.

Programming optionsLa Lutte can tour as part of mixed evening bills or in festivals. With a minimum performance area of 7x7m La Lutte can also be programmed in smaller or non-traditional venues.

Promo clip of La Lutte:

www.vimeo.com/13745288

clickthe

link !

la lUTTE | 30 MINUTES - NO INTERVAL

FEE sTrUCTUrE

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Each work comes with a dedicated marketing pack including brochure copy, suggestions for promotional angles, Box Office briefing information, press quotes, company biographies, example press releases and download details for official images. A range of printed publicity materials, including posters and flyers, is available for each work, as are links to online video clips and interviews with Artistic Director Filip Van Huffel.

Retina uses online networking as a direct communication tool and has an active Facebook page and a Twitter profile. In addition to promoting Retina’s activity both networks are used to post imagery, ask questions, run competitions to encourage and create a dialogue with Retina’s audience.

Retina’s Marketing Manager co-ordinates press coverage for all touring productions and works with each venue to maximise opportunities and facilitate specific needs and requirements.

Retina helps to open up dance to a new and wider audience through the participation of professional and community dancers local to your venue. These active and engaged participants bring their friends and family along to the final performance so a number of venues in previous tours of Layers of Skin enjoyed sold out performances. In addition, the participation of local people in a national piece of work is a good sell for local press and media, offering many interview and photo opportunities.

“I found the whole evening so thrilling and exciting I could hardly sleep.”Audience memberThe Spring

“This dynamic company…is garnering quite the reputation for its energetic approach.”TimeOut

MarKETiNG

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Education forms a large part of Retina’s activity and supports the company’s programme of touring work. As well as producing high quality artistic productions, Retina’s Artistic Director, Filip Van Huffel is known for his incredible ability to motivate people to dance. He has a unique gift that unites artistic integrity with physical skills and enables people of any age and ability to dance.

Filip teaches the Retina company dancers his approach to dance in education and every production and tour incorporates dance workshops, ranging from one-off workshops to month long residencies. This participatory element of Retina’s programme of activity is a hugely successful aspect of Retina’s audience development.

Retina’s company dancers are all highly technical and skilled dancers and teachers. Some of the dancers have been with the

company between three and six years and subsequently have developed the unique ability to embody Filip’s movement style and are able to communicate the movement language to students across the country. However this shared movement style is still layered with the company dancers’ individuality and personality, a quality that Filip values very highly. The result is a pleasure to watch.

In addition to the delivery of dance workshops and residencies Retina offers a range of other activities including pre- and post-performance discussions, post-performance choreography workshops and, in relation to Corporalis, discussion groups with set design and architecture students.

“I learnt more in two weeks [at a Retina residency] than I have in two years at college.” Krystal Campbell - participant

rETiNa’s EDUCaTioN proGraMME

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Filip comes from Belgium and has lived in London for ten years. He trained with a range of contemporary dance teachers around Europe and has danced for Claudio Bernardo, Air de C and Company Thor in Belgium, Frey Faust in Germany and Random Dance Company in London before co-founding Retina in 1995. For the past 12 years Filip has worked as the sole Artistic Director.

Filip is also regularly commissioned to create works for other companies, including several commissions for the South Bank Centre London, EDge, Verve, Royal Conservatoire for Dance in Belgium, Fontys in Holland, Akademi, Tardis, Shobana Jeyasingh, StopGap, Ludus and X:ida Dance Companies. He also created a Dance for the Camera production Freeze for BBC/ACE. Currently Filip is the artistic director of Staffordshire’s Get Dancing Cultural Olympiad project and for Nottingham’s Royal Centre 30th year celebration; tak30ver.

Filip Van Huffel - Artistic Director

Natalie Gordon - Producer - natalie@retinadance.com

Lee Ann Bannerman - General Manager - leeann@retinadance.com

Sally Hodgson - Marketing Manager - marketing@retinadance.com

Matthew Slater - Education Manager - education@retinadance.com

Andy Hammond - Production Manager - technical@retinadance.com

Lucie Mirkova - Administrator - admin@retinadance.com

”Many of our students have never danced before and to see the transition from the start of the workshop to their confident performances at the end was incredible.” Nickie Ledger - Head of Drama, St Leonards, Scotland

Retina Dance Company acknowledges support from

Registered address: College Street Centre, College Street, Nottingham NG1 5AQ | Registered in England Number: 3237783

UK officeCollege Street CentreCollege Street Nottingham NG1 5AQTel: +44 (0)115 947 6202 Ext 224

Belgium officeBeernaertstraat 172600 AntwerpenBelgiumTel: +32 (0)3 218 8753

Filip VaN HUFFEl | ARTISTIC DIRECTOR/ChOREOGRAPhER