Category: Dance

Mountain

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Mountain

Long-time collaborators UK electronic music producer Clark and award-winning choreographer Melanie Lane join musicians from the Canberra Symphony Orchestra, alongside celebrated fashion designer Akira Isogawa and four dancers, to present an evocative new work MOUNTAIN.

MOUNTAIN is a negation between humans and the mythic world, it contemplates the terror of descent and the transcendence of conquering unreachable peaks. Echoing the human struggle “upwards”, this sonic and choreographic work is a metaphor for ascension and descent, and a catalyst for the exploration of these sacred and mysterious landscapes.

An original score composed by Clark draws from his recent works for film. Interweaving electronics with strings and piano to create a haunting and arresting sonic world that sits between acoustic and synthetic textures. Dancers Tyrel Dulvarie, Sara Black, Yolanda Lowatta and Max Burgess climb, collapse and take flight, carried by music that both threatens and promises a realm beyond our own.

Choreographer –  Melanie Lane

Composer – Clark

Costume Designer – Akira Isogawa

Dancers – Sara Black, Max Burgess , Tyrel Dulvarie, Yolanda Lowatta

Musicians – Canberra Symphony Orchestra Chamber Ensemble and Clark

Orchestrator – Tristan Coelho

Producer – Freya Waterson

Images – Juzzy Kane

Alterum

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Alterum

Alterum – Latin for ‘other’, steals from ancient and current mythologies of the supernatural body, Alterum manifests newfound heroes in a parallel existence that is both urgent and obscure.

Six hybrid bodies march, wrestle, writhe and fly in a collective dance that reflects the human desire to reach beyond the limits of our bodies whilst seeking to maintain the primal instincts of connection, protection, intimacy and desire.

With a bold, original score from long time collaborator Clark, Alterum celebrates the potential of the supernatural body by navigating and negotiating a meeting between hyper-reality and human-ness.

Creatives

Choreography: Melanie Lane

Music: Clark

Lighting Design: Glenn Hughes

Costume Design: Alana Sargentin collaboration with Melanie Lane

Costume Realisation: Gayle MacGregor, Sharon Clarke and Frances Pyper

Photos: David Kelly

Us 50

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Us 50

Us 50 is a grand-scale work by Gideon Obarzanek, set to an electronic score by UK musician Clark (composer of WOOF), featuring 50 performers made up of former dancers that have graced Sydney Dance Companies stage, current Company dancers, and members of thei community.

“When we speak about 50 years of a dance company we also speak about 50 years of dance making,” says Obarzanek. “What is made, however, is ephemeral. The dancer’s body… can be videoed and photographed but dance itself only truly exists when it is danced. So the history of the Company is stored and transmitted through the bodies of its dancers and collected in the memory of its audiences.”

Choreography: Gideon Obarzanek 
Assistant Choreographer: Charmene Yap
Composer: Clark
Costume Design: Harriet Oxley 
Lighting Design: Ben Cisterne

Slow Haunt

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Slow Haunt

A re-imagined romantic ballet, Slow Haunt re-visits the timeless ghost lores of broken hearts that are embedded in our histories. Echoing mythic tales of jilted lovers suspended between real and supernatural worlds.

Choreographer: Melanie Lane

Costume Designer: Akira Isogawa

Lighting Designer: Damien Cooper

Composer: Clark

Photo Credit: Oscar Valdés

Sentinel

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Sentinel

Commissioned by Skanes Dansteater, Sentinel premiered in March 2016 as part of the programme Above And Below, in a double bill with Lucy Guerin’s Weather. Sentinel continues the ongoing fascination with the human relationship to the constructed environment, ritual behaviour and the totemic power of material objects.

CAST & CREW

Choreographer – Antony Hamilton  
Lighting Designer – Ben Cistern  
Costume Designer – Paula Levis  
Sound Composition – Clark 
Sculpture Design – Boris Tellegen 
Rehearsal Director – Melanie Lane 
Production Manager – Anna Ekstrand 
Dancers – Graham Adey, Hazuki Kojima, Sarah Bellugi, Peter Jansson, Kristian Refslund, George Pelagias, Brittanie Brown, Laura Lohl, Jing Yi Wang, Patrick Bragdell, Astrid Bramming, Roman Petit.

CO-PRODUCERS

Skanes Dansteater Artistic Directors – Åsa Söderberg, Ben Wright

Tilted Fawn

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DANCE PERFORMANCE / INSTALLATION

Tilted Fawn

Through a visual sound installation constructed by utilising 12 individually composed yet simultaneously performed audio recordings, integrated with sculptural objects and choreography, Tilted Fawn builds a universe that offers a dialogue between sound, space and movement. In the intimacy of a solo, the environment transforms into sculptural illustrations of sonic landscapes in which the performer is confronted by the merging of bold sensorial dimensions. Through the development of utilizing the ‘old’ technique and functionality of tape machines, the sound composition becomes its own entity that stirs a melancholy and introduces a stark, intimate and utopic world.

Winner of the ‘Best Dance Award’ – Fringe World Award 2012.

CAST & CREW

DIRECTION Melanie Lane
CO-CREATION & PERFORMANCE Melanie Lane
ASSISTANT DRAMATURGY Bart Van der Eynde, Morgan Belenguer
SOUND DESIGN & COMPOSITION Chris Clark
LIGHT DESIGN Max Stelzl
TECHNICAL DIRECTION Max Stelzl
SCENOGRAPHY/PROPS Melanie Lane
PRODUCER Doreen Markert | Enthusiastic Encounters
IMAGES Maik Reichert

CO-PRODUCERS

Uzès danse CDC, in partnership with TanzWerkstatt Berlin and O Espaço do Tempo, and with the support of the Culture Programme of the European Union, and Tanz im August

PERFORMANCE HISTORY

Merge

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DANCE PERFORMANCE

Merge

Merge unearths the sensorial nature of the relationship between body and object, questioning the modern-day understanding of material necessity. It acknowledges the beauty, absurdity and humour inherently present in this realm, and looks at the visual and aesthetic manifestation that is constructed and de-constructed in space.

Featuring sound design from renowned UK electronic musician Clark (Warp)and props designed by visual artists Ash Keating and Bridie Lunney, Merge is a collision of bodies, sound and material, revealing the madness of humans’ incessant compulsion to accelerate and adapt with their environment beyond what natural limits impose.

CAST & CREW

DIRECTION Melanie Lane
CO-CREATION & PERFORMANCE Antony Hamilton, Melanie Lane, Ashley McLellan, Sophia Ndaba
SOUND DESIGN & COMPOSITION Clark
LIGHT DESIGN Mat Adey | House of Unvoly
TECHNICAL DIRECTION Richard Dinnen | Megafun
SCENOGRAPHY / PROPS Ash Keating and Bridie Lunney
PRODUCER Jessica Morris Payne
IMAGES Dian McLeod, Sarah Walker

CO-PRODUCERS

Presented by Arts House and Melanie Lane as part of Dance Massive 2015, Lucy Guerin Inc., Creative Victoria, The Australian Council for the Arts, City of Melbourne.

PERFORMANCE HISTORY

Re-make

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Re-make

Contemplating the language, craft and technology of the classically trained body, Melanie Lane, in collaboration with ballet dancer Juliet Burnett, creates a solo for two – an excavation of physical archives that are shared and negotiated through their encounter with one another.

Re-make reflects the preservation of tradition in parallel within an increasingly accelerating world. A convergence of past, present and future bring into question the human desire to re-visit, re-spond and re-invent.

CAST & CREW

CHOREOGRAPHY/DIRECTION Melanie Lane
CO-CREATION/PERFORMANCE Juliet Burnett, Melanie Lane
SOUND DESIGN AND COMPOSITION Clark
LIGHT DESIGN Mathew Adey | House of Vnholy
COSTUME DESIGN Paula Levis
DRAMATURGY Adena Jacobs
IMAGES Gregory Lorenzutti

CO-PRODUCERS

Commissioned and presented by Chunky Move.

PERFORMANCE HISTORY

Wonderwomen

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PERFORMANCE

Wonderwomen

“Wonderwomen” invites the two female professional bodybuilders Rosie Harte and Nathalie Schmidt to meet in a performance context. They contemplate their highly demanding sport that amplifies and transforms the body. While striving for an ultimate physical form, the women navigate their profoundly trained bodies and the potential for a new body language. “Wonderwomen” is a dialogue that brings together strength and vulnerablility, representation and transformation, athleticism and femininity.

”Wonderwomen‘ creates something extraordinary, even if the very ordinary phrase has to be used here now: the staging succeeds in breaking open habits of perception and underneath perceptions’…’in several respects this is a rare, strong performance.’ Steffen Georgi | Leipziger Volkszeitung, 28.11.2016

‘Wonderwomen‘ was the winner of the 2017 Leipziger Bewegungskunstpreis.

CAST & CREW

CONCEPT AND DIRECTION Melanie Lane
PERFORMANCE Rosie Harte and Nathalie Schmidt
LIGHT DESIGN Fabian Blesich
SOUND DESIGN AND COMPOSITION Clark
PRODUCTION DESIGN Robert Bartholot
DRAMATURGY Frances d‘Ath
CHOREOGRAPHIC ASSISTENCE Florian Bücking
PRODUCTION MANAGEMENT M.i.C.A.

CO-PRODUCERS

A Production from Melanie Lane in Co-production with LOFFT – DAS THEATER and HAU – Hebbel am Ufer. Funded by the City of Leipzig, Kulturamt and the NATIONALE PERFORMANCE NETZ (NPN | Koproduktionsförderung Tanz aus Mitteln der Beauftragten der Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien aufgrund eines Beschlusses des Deutschen Bundestages.)

PERFORMANCE HISTORY

Nightdance

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PERFORMANCE

Nightdance

Deftly transgressing the realms of traditional dance forms, Lane and her co-performers slide between exotic dance, techno, burlesque and pop as they navigate sound, space and light, and the social, sensual and cerebral offerings-up for consumption after dark. As performers oscillate between entertainer and punter, Lane shines a spotlight on the economy of entertainment, the labour and currency of the body, and our complicity as audiences, voyeurs and consumers.

A collaboration with UK music producer Clark and light designer Ben Bosco Shaw.

CAST & CREW

CHOREOGRAPHY/DIRECTION Melanie Lane
CO-CREATION/PERFORMANCE Lilian Steiner, Gregory Lorenzutti, Melanie Lane, Christopher Clark, Benjamin Hancock
GUEST ARTISTS/PERFORMANCE Benjamin Hancock, Sidney Saayman, Ryan Ritchie
GUEST ARTISTS/ADVISORS Lily Paskas, Holly Durant, Lauren Runge
SOUND DESIGN AND COMPOSITION Clark
LIGHT DESIGN Ben ‘Bosco’ Shaw
PRODUCER Freya Waterson
PRODUCER | CULTURELAB Jessica Morris Payne
IMAGES Bryony Jackson

CO-PRODUCERS

This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body, Creative Victoria and Arts House through its CultureLAB program 2016.

PERFORMANCE HISTORY

  • 24-27.08.2017 Arts House Melbourne Australia (Première)
  • 21-24.03.2019 Meat Market Dance Massive Melbourne Australia