Dance Central May/June 2016 by The Dance Centre

May/June 2016

Dance Central A Dance Centre Publication

Content Betroffenheit A conversation with Jonathon Young Page 2

Dancing The Spirit Thinking Bodies: A conversation with Madelaine McCallum Page 8

Welcome to Dance Central

Betroffe

Tragedy is in no small way at the heart of this issue of Dance Central, which appears later than usual in part because of a series of losses that have affected our guest editor Mique'l Dangeli's family. We offer our sincere condolences and look forward to her return to Dance Central. At the same time, we are very pleased to feature, in the Thinking Bodies series Madelaine McCallum, whom Mique'l Dangeli had recommended for this issue, and who speaks eloquently about her personal journey of overcoming tragedy and her relationship to dance as a healing activity. We are also featuring a conversation with Jonathon Young, the current Artistic Director of The Electric Company and writer and co-creator, with Crystal Pite, of Betroffenheit, an extraordinary work that explores the impact and lingering effects of trauma and tragedy. The July/August issue of Dance Central will appear at the regular publication time, and we look forward to Dr. Dangeli's next contribution. As always, we thank all the artists who have agreed to contribute 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 email to members@thedancecentre.ca or call us at 604.606.6416. We look forward to the conversation! Andreas Kahre, Editor 2

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Photo by Chris Randle

enheit

AK: Where are you spending most of your time these days? JY: In Vancouver. I made the move to Toronto, but about a year after that, Kevin Kerr who was running Electric Company at that time, got a job teaching at UVIC and suddenly the question was who would be running the company, and I was the only one without a job. I had

A conversation with Jonathon Young

always said that I never wanted to be the sole Artistic Director, but I

Betroffenheit is a Kidd Pivot & Electric Company Theatre co-produc-

came back.

wanted to make Betroffenheit and I realized it was now or never, so I

tion, created by Crystal Pite and Jonathon Young that premiered on July 23, 2015 at Bluma Appel Theatre, Toronto, Canada. Written by:

AK: Betroffenheit is still touring?

Jonathon Young, Choreographed and Directed by: Crystal Pite Performers: Bryan Arias, David Raymond, Cindy Salgado, Jermaine

JY: Yes, we finished the first leg of the tour in London this May, and

Spivey, Tiffany Tregarthen, and Jonathon Young. Composition and

now it's all packed up, and we will resume again in February, going to

Sound Design: Owen Belton, Alessandro Juliani and Meg Roe, Set

Australia and into the States and then back to Europe for a number of

Design: Jay Gower Taylor, Costume Design: Nancy Bryant

dates, and I suspect it will tour again in 2018, if there is enough interest,

Lighting Design: Tom Visser, Rehearsal Direction: Eric Beauchesne

if everyone is available — and if I can still do all the moves.

Additional Choreography: Bryan Arias and Cindy Salgado (salsa), David Raymond (tap)

AK: How do you find performing in a dance theatre show, compared to a play? Do you get beat up? JY: Yes, in a good way. There is a healthy amount of fear in the beginning because it's so fast and so physical, but at the same time the challenge is quite exhilarating, and there is such good camaraderie in the group. It's one of those great shows where you go through everything beforehand, and then you just have to turn off that side of your mind, because everything happens so quickly, and there are so many corners that you just have to stay as present as possible to be in it. No matter what the subject matter is, there is always some kind of exhilaration or thrill in a show that we disappear into. AK: Do you find yourself in an actor’s body, or is it more of a hybrid physicality? JY: I think it's a hybrid body. After we had been doing it for a while I realized that I had to use actors' questions that I hadn't asked myself during the choreographic sections, like 'Where did I begin this and what has happened to me?’ in terms of my character’s journey, rather than going through a physical engagement and then resuming my ‘acting’ part. But the cool thing is that it gets a bit loose in terms of how you get from A to B; it isn't as direct as when the journey is entirely scripted.

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Betroffenheit

act. In your work, an important aspect is that Betroffenheit

A conversation with Jonathon Young

leaves you speechless, and yet, here you are writing a piece,

AK: Crystal is credited as the director. What is it like to be

JY: When I started to work on the piece on my own, I was

directed by a choreographer?

working on an ‘image/language system’, where I was allow-

trying to give a shape to that sensation—in language.

ing myself to leave passages unfinished, where verbal diaJY: I think it is a constant conversation. I wrote a script that

logues or images or spatial definitions could remain broken

I don't think calls for a virtuosity of acting, and there were

or incomplete, based on the idea that we are ill-equipped

some things I didn't feel like acting or thinking about how

to process certain events and experiences verbally. There

to act. Of course you have to do that because your are on a

has to be something happening on a somatic level. When

stage in front of an audience, but some of the text I simply

I approached Crystal, it was obvious that if we can come

wanted to recite, especially the material that is closer to be-

together and work this terrain, her genius is to create zones

ing autobiographical. I thought it would be disrespectful to

where events are being processed in the abstract way of

‘perform’ it or to ‘act’ it. The collaboration between Crystal

contemporary dance—which as an audience member has

and me was fantastic; there was virtually no conflict and

me doing a lot of verbal stuff; I try to be deliberate in asking

we got into a real feedback loop; a real passing of the ball.

questions about what I am seeing: Who is the protagonist

Crystal is a good writer and an extraordinary editor, and I

here? What conversation is happening?—and we kept that

did a lot of writing that was descriptive—essentially stage

at the forefront of every conversation: How is the language

directions, which informed the choreographic sections, even

tied to the physicality and how do they come to each other's

though I didn’t do any choreography per se, of course. On

rescue, or get into each other's way. That was the fun part of

the acting side, I had to ask her questions most of the time,

the puzzle.

just to get the dialogue going, because I think Crystal wasn’t always sure of what she should discuss or what territory she

AK: I was watching a talkback session, where Jenn Griffin

should get into with me. But I got a great acting note from

asked a question about the difference between a witness

her; one of the best notes I have had from a director: ‘I think

and an audience. What have you learned from audiences?

you don’t have to worry about taking care of us as much as

Are they witnesses?

you do.’ Occasionally in the written part of the piece, I work too hard to get the point across. I thought that was a well-

JY: I don’t think we quite answered her question, but the

phrased note.

most rewarding aspect of performing this in front of live people, and the greatest relief, is that people are seeing

AK: I have been thinking about the word Betroffenheit, and

themselves in the piece, and that it is reaching out beyond

its various dimensions in German; it rings in different ways,

my personal internal world and communicates to others. It

depending on how it is used. I wonder if it could be turned

is interesting to do something that feels, on some level, like a

into 'affectance'—which in English doesn't have the emotion-

monument to what happened, or a ritual to process it once

al overtones, but comes close to parsing some of its different

again, with a shape and order, a beginning, middle, and end.

elements.

It is also interesting to then go: ‘I am a professional actor performing a show for people who bought a ticket to see me.’

JY: Interesting. What are the elements?

That is a strange situation, because I have never written or performed in something that was as personal, although there

AK: The root verb, 'treffen' refers to a physical encounter, in

are, of course, vast sections that are pure fiction.

the sense of 'meeting', but also in the meaning of 'hitting a target', 'striking what you aim for', while the passive use is re-

AK: I recently worked in a two–year process with Horse-

lated to ' concern', to being affected by something, with both

shoes and Handgrenades Theatre, in a work based on bio-

a melancholy aspect, and, in current German usage, with an

graphical experiences of shame and trauma called This Stays

assertive connotation of claiming to be traumatized or of-

in The Room. The source material was autobiographical, and

fended by an act, or more and more frequently, by a speech

the physical setting of the performance in a gallery meant

Dance Central May/June 2016

"There is a healthy amount of fear in the beginning because it's so fast and so physical, but at the same time the challenge is quite exhilarating, and there is such good camaraderie in the group. "

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Dance Central The Dance Centre Scotiabank Dance Centre Level 6, 677 Davie Street Vancouver BC V6B 2G6 T 604.606.6400 F 604.606.6401 info@thedancecentre.ca www.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 Kahre Copy Editor Hilary Maxwell Contributors to this issue: Madelaine McCallum, Jonathon Young Photography: Ribbon Ajung Kim, Michael Slobodian Dance Centre Board Members Chair Beau Howes, CFA Vice Chair Josh Martin Secretary Margaret Grenier Treasurer Matthew Breech Past Chair Ingrid M. Tsui Directors Carolyn Chan Angeline Chandra Eve Chang Susan Elliott Kate Franklin Anndraya T. Luui Starr Muranko Dance Foundation Board Members Chair Linda Blankstein Secretary Anndraya T. Luui Treasurer Jennifer Chung Directors Trent Berry, Kimberley Blackwell, Janice Wells, Andrea R. Wink Dance Centre Staff: Executive Director Mirna Zagar Programming Coordinator Raquel Alvaro Marketing Manager Heather Bray Venue and Services Administrator Robin Naiman Development Director Sheri Urquhart Technical Directors Justin Aucoin and Mark Eugster Accountant Elyn Dobbs Member Services Coordinator Hilary Maxwell

Betroffenheit

A conversation with Jonathon Young that the audience was literally six inches away from the performers, and that half of the audience knew everybody in the room. That created specific conditions for what was revealed, and what was kept ‘safe’— surprisingly safe, and formal, considering the material we began with. JY: It is about that tension between what is revealed and what is deception. AK: And how to make it repeatable. The whole apparatus of 'theatricality' asserted itself at the end of the process, to contain and confine what the process had been designed to break open, to allow for a performance with an audience at close quarters. Betroffenheit takes place on a much larger physical scale. What is it like for you, yelling into the black void? JY: I love it; it's my favourite way to perform: This dark expanse, that could be anybody and that I can project whatever I want into. We did do three studio showcases at Progress Lab, and that was the moment of truth where we went from thinking 'we may have nothing here' after two months of working, to ‘we might have some material, and now we are going to find out!’ It was in that intense, super– close, work–lights–on mode of ‘Hi everybody, we’re going to show you what we've got.’ That was a bit too close, and not particularly pleasant, and I have to say that in performing Betroffenheit in Vancouver, I really had to work hard to stay professional, and not let the sense that this is a story that everyone knows overwhelm me. It was a beautiful thing to bring it to Vancouver, but I was also glad it was over, simply because it was harder to do my job. AK: With audiences in Australia and elsewhere, some will

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 bynumerous individuals. Many thanks to our members, volunteers, community 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, the BC Arts Council, and the City of Vancouver through the Office of Cultural Affairs.

know the story but many won’t. How do those who don’t get a sense of what it is based on? JY: We talked a lot during the creative process about the question of how much needs to be laid bare, but we tried to rely on good storytelling, and hopefully it can remain universal and people can project their own particulars into it. The feedback we have been getting from the post–show discussions has revealed a mixture: Some people really see

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

it from the addiction angle, while others put their own traumatic experience onto our accident. In one talkback session, we got into that conversation and a woman stood up and said ‘I knew nothing about this, but I got it, and was glad I didn’t know.’ AK: There is an interesting tension between continuity and discontinuity in traumatic incidents. They literally tear reality apart, and create a complete rift between what was and what is that leaves no way, and the way forward remains always illuminated by that discontinuity or gap, until over time, a new kind of continuity forms, but one that has a different texture, like scar tissue. JY: Yes, and there is the desperate attempt that the truly traumatized self gets locked into, to try to bridge that gap, or reseal it, or reclaim whoever is still on the other side, in an act of reliving it over and over. You have to go forward and somehow honour it or become interested in its particulars, I think, to go to its edge and make a little base there and stare into the gap, leave and come back again. That kind of returning self is one who is moving on, or has healed in the acceptance of the chasm, which is of course surrounding us all the time anyway. AK: One aspect of the work is the focus on addiction, and with it the shame, which is intensely personal and ultimately incommunicable. How did you deal with that aspect of trauma and addiction? JY: Even the word 'Betroffenheit' contains hints of shame, or embarrassment, and the whole ‘shame strain’ that goes through the piece is such a driving force in addiction, and so farcical in that the shame drives one to do the shameful thing; I find that so human, and so terrible and so funny. I also found the paradox of survivor's guilt, which is different but close to shame, interesting in the mechanism called ‘peritraumatic dissociation’, where you are yanked away from the event right at its peak, but if you dissociate too strongly you end up in a shame cycle for not having been there, or not having suffered it, or not killed, or not carrying a wound that is deep enough. The paradox is that the very mechanism that exists to save and protect you also produces shame, which of course is also what addiction is about at its core: A protective mechanism on overdrive. AK: The difference between someone who approaches trauma therapeutically and your work is interesting. I watched continued on page 14

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Dancing The Spirit Madelaine McCallum. Photo by Ribbon Ajung Kim ÂŠ 2016

g t

Thinking Bodies:

A conversation with Madelaine McCallum Alberta, so I went to go find him to say ‘Look, here I am, ready for you to take care of me and love me, and have the perfect life, but it didn’t happen the way a child imagines that love, or that TV portrays it, so within six MM: I think each style of dance helps me to exmonths of getting there, my dad brought me press a mood; I mean, I respond to the personality to BC, and I left him because he was also that I am feeling each day, so if I feel happy, that is going through his journey of healing, and he how I feel like moving. Just as walking expresses had a partner that his focus was on. So I was your feelings, I get to dance what I am feeling that on my own again, which I have been pretty day. There is Métis jigging, which is super happy much my whole life, and I journeyed. I was and upbeat, clapping and cheering because it's so on the streets when I was a teenager, and social, and the fiddle music is so lively. Then there in foster care, and I share my story because is powwow, which is more stoic and prideful, and Métis jigging specifically was what saved my you have that hundred yards stare, because we life, when I lived a life of sadness, pain and used to look back at our ancestors, and we look as trauma. I think I cried every day of my life far forward as we can, so if I am feeling like that, I until I was twenty four. I still cry now, but I dance in that style. I do hip hop as well which is a cried every single day for that feeling of love. different expression, and I do some Zumba classes, When I was about 27, 28, I started to look which is such a different movement than what I back on my life, and wondered how I got do every day, and I find it is a nice expression for throughofallTakaya. that. I had never thought about me, with the sensuality of the body. I have loved Figure 2: Children Photo: Mique'l Dangeli that while I was in it, and I had no happy dance since I was a child, but the place I am from memories— except the one happy memory in Northern Saskatchewan is five hours north of that was when I jigged. When I dance, the Saskatoon, in the middle of the bush, and we didn’t energy changes so much in me, and none have any dance classes or programs. It is beautiful, of that sadness and trauma that I have witbut I never had access to that, and now I just want nessed could touch me; it was so far out of to do it all the time. my mind at that moment, that I say I owe my life to Métis dance, and to dance expression. AK: How did you make your way to Vancouver? So I should be able to show to young kids in our communities that whatever healthy MM: I am a motivational speaker as well as a hobby they have, whatever makes them dancer, and I share my story: I actually hitchhiked feel free—dance, sports, drawing, whatever out of my community at twelve years old, because it is—to do it, because those might be the my family was broken, and my mum was on her moments that will take you out of your situown journey; she still is trying to heal and deal ation when you are sad or traumatized or with what she is dealing with. My dad was off in AK: You cover a broad range of dance styles, from clogging to contemporary and hip hop. How do all these different styles fit together in one body?

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

hurt. That’s how I ended up here: I just journeyed. Then, one day Yvonne Chartrand with company V’ni Dansi saw me jumping on a trampoline and she asked my dad if I could dance. He said yes, and she invited me and let me jig in her Louis Riel show at Scotiabank Dance Centre. That was actually my first performance in Vancouver, and I have been performing ever since. Sometimes people see you and they see something in you. AK: Is jigging a social form of dance with a set repertoire, or does the form change and you continue to learn new aspects all the time? MM: It definitely changes, because the form I do now is more contemporary, whereas my dad has the old style steps — the oldest traditional step, as far back as we can trace it. It’s totally different, but it always has that 'horse trot' sound. Mine is much more contemporary, like the outfit I like to wear which is a square dance outfit rather than the traditional, long dresses. Shoes are different too; we now pack a punch by using clickers, whereas it used to be soft moccasins. It’s constantly evolving. Some groups now do a tap routine before they get into a jigging routine, and I think the younger generation is definitely doing the more contemporary form while the older generation is doing the traditional style. I am kind of in–between, because I grew up in the traditional style, but I have caught on to the contemporary; I love them both and I like to teach them both to show people that there is so much to learn; sometimes it’s overwhelming for them, but you don’t have to get there before your 50… AK: I imagine it is physically demanding but not impossible at any age. 10

Dance Central May/June 2016

"When I dance, the energy changes so much in me, and none of that sadness and trauma that I have witnessed could touch me; it was so far out of my mind at that moment, that I say I owe my life to Métis dance, and to dance expression." MM: Yes, because there is a basic step, called a ball change, that is like a 1,2,3 step. All the elders do it and they can dance all night at the festivals, so you can always access that; whether it’s the basic step, a double step, a clicker step or the traditional step, there are many styles, and wherever you’re from it will be different. AK: Is there resistance from the older generation to changing the form?

Thinking Bodies:

MM: There is resistance; some of them want to keep the culture of the tradition, and yet they love the flashiness of the young people, because it is so bold: There are eight or ten dancers on stage; it’s loud, and the crinoline under the skirts is flying, and it’s an amazing blast of visual energy and colour. The traditional form is very beautiful, but not extravagant, and uses very low steps. And still, even in the community I have come up against people who think that Métis dance isn’t a cultural dance, or an indigenous dance. I don’t go there to prove that it is, but I honour what they are saying or thinking, and then I dance and I show the spirit of it, because how can you deny the spirit of something that has saved somebody's life? AK: In your journeys, have you found different jigging styles in different places? MM: Yes. In Northern Saskatchewan, the rhythm is a kind of side to side, and that's how I started, so when I came here and started jigging with V'ni Dansi, they jigged straight, and they saw how I jigged and asked ‘Can you jig straight?’ So I taught myself to jig straight and to mold myself to what they were looking for. Then, one summer, I went back to Saskatchewan, and there was a group from Northern Saskatchewan who needed a dancer. I learned a routine, but their movement is very different from here in BC, where few Métis grew up with jigging, whereas it is much more present in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario, because that’s where the community is. But a lot of people here are beginning to jig, and they want to learn the spirit of it. That's what I try to bring: ‘It’s in in you’, and I am trying to get them to find their rhythm within the music to connect to. So it’s definitely a different connection. Just

A conversation with Madelaine McCallum over the mountains there is a complete difference in the style of jigging. AK: Have you seen it elsewhere in Canada? MM: Yes, I went out East, to Winnipeg, and to Ontario, and it’s a completely different energy. We all have different journeys and we have different lenses. AK: How do the different styles of dance affect your body? MM: When I jig, it’s the happy, bubbly side of me, and when I do hip hop, I feel hard. It is a very different expression for me. When I do powwow dancing, people say ‘We can tell you are a jigger’, so I guess maybe that jigging stays with me. I went into powwow eleven years ago, and maybe my jigging comes with me in whatever style I am doing. Music moves me, and I capture whatever the spirit of the person making the music is. Our spirits dance together. AK: Do you dance hip hop to live music? MM: Sometimes. I just did a contemporary piece where I am using my body as the music, with someone playing flute and creating the beat on the floor. Fiddle music is live, of course, and every fiddle player’s changes will be different. That’s what we call 'crooked' music, because it is never the same number of bars on a high and a low note. Even if you say ‘We are going to do 12 bars here and 12 bars there,' the fiddle could do 8 and 6, or 8 and 10. It's like a little game to make sure you are listening.

Dance Central May/June 2016

Thinking Bodies: A conversation with Madelaine McCallum

AK: How did you learn the actual movement?

AK: Do you play music?

MM: I got lucky because my best friend, Shyama Priya, is a powwow dancer. We met eleven years ago on aboriginal day at the Vancouver Art Gallery, where I was jigging, and she was powwow dancing. We kind of swapped; I taught her jigging, she taught me powwow, and I got to watch her over the past eleven years. I have gone to the powwow and to dance practices with many different people, just to see the different styles, and I have watched videos, really trying to find my style, because there is a basic step, and from there you create your fancy steps and movements, which I base on my jigging. Jigging actually has some powwow steps in it, because while it mostly comes from French Step dancing, it has fused with other forms, because we are a mixed blood people and our dancing came from both, so naturally it was easy for me to catch on to it.

MM: No, I have tried, and I got to ‘twinkle twinkle, little star’, screech and squeaking, and I would like to learn, but I am learning so much else and I have so many amazing projects on the go, which is a blessing, that the problem is finding the time to sit down and focus on an instrument. But I have been looking into music schools. AK: You also do powwow dancing. What was it like to come to a new community and say 'Can I join?' Did you find it difficult to get invited? MM: I think it is like a mirror: If you have a blockage, you will come up to blocks. I think I was so open and really wanting some acceptance and love from a community and to feel like I belonged somewhere, that when I came into the community, people who became friends started to bring me around to these events, and they would introduce me —‘This is who she is and this is where she is from.’ I didn’t have to prove who I was, and I am who I am to them. I also approached everything in the community with respect. There are protocols for everything, and I didn’t just go in and say ‘I have this regalia that I threw together myself.’ I learned the teachings behind each of the dances, and I have someone to help me with regalia. I dreamt of it before I started to dance, especially the jingle dress because that is a medicine dance, and I had a vision of it, which is usually how they come. So I saw the vision and got the dress made exactly like I saw it in my dream. I think if it is clear that you are not going to disrespect them, they are open arms, and they'll house you and help with whatever you need. 12

Dance Central May/June 2016

AK: Does that mean you dance powwow with a jigging accent? MM: Exactly. There is a really fast speed in the women’s powwow dancing, which I do as well, and they jump so fast that my little jigging feet come into play and everyone goes "Oh, we can tell you are a jigger!" AK: Does your dancing mostly take place in the First Nations community, or does it cross over into the larger dance community? MM: First Nations community for sure. It is so strong; we perform at the aboriginal graduations, at all the ceremonies, and at youth conferences. I find that here it is West Coast

"I have come up against people who think that Métis dance isn’t a cultural dance, or an indigenous dance. I don’t go there to prove that it is, but I honour what they are saying or thinking, and then I dance and I show the spirit of it, because how can you deny the spirit of something that has saved somebody's life?" dancing, then powwow, and jigging is kind of last, because it is not recognized by everybody. I went to a school yesterday, and when I asked if they had seen powwow all their hands went up, and when I asked who had seen jigging, only three had seen it, and that’s what I am trying to change: I want to show our mix of Cree, French and Ojibwe movement as an indigenous dance.

AK: Apart from institutions that want to include First Nations dancers, is there more contact with the contemporary professional dance community? MM: Yvonne's company frequently hires professional dancers, and they embrace it, so we get into conversations, where I talk about the spirit of the dance, and the professional dancers catch on because they understand the expression from their contemporary perspective, which is to tell a story. That is what we do too. But if there was a jigging class at Scotiabank Dance Centre, I don't know how many people would say ‘I want to do that.’ Maybe that is a good question to ask the dance community; a lot of people want to learn salsa, and there are classes like powwow boot camp. If we did a jigging boot camp, would we get thirty people who would want to learn? AK: On the one hand institutions are looking for ways to engage First Nations communities, but they seem unsure what they are engaging with, and while the contemporary dance scene looks to Europe, Asia and to international connections, the connection with indigenous communities is a slow process. You are also a community activist. Is that integrated with your dancing? MM: It is. The dancing made me what I am, and carried me through the hardest parts of my life. So if I go speak at an event for children in foster care, I share my story of being in foster care, but also how Métis jigging was the one thing that helped me get through it. It is never separate; it is a part of me — it's my foundation. As soon as people see me in the community continued on page 17 Dance Central May/June 2016

"Even the word Betroffenheit contains hints of shame, or embarrassment, and the whole â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;shame strainâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; that goes through the piece is such a driving force in addiction, and so farcical in that the shame drives one to do the shameful thing; I find that so human, and so terrible and so funny." AK:

tap festival format, which is to bring in faculty and offer a

range of classes and master classes, and at the end roll out a performance, cobbled together with one day of techni-

seems that Vancouver has become one of the global

cal rehearsal. These are usually a series of solos; lovely

centres for tap.

performances, because the performers are the best in the world and the innovators that we have in the form, but not

SS: I don't know if it is, but I think we are recognized as

coherent shows. About seven years ago, I thought that we

one of the hubs for the art form, and in particular for the

could do more for audiences. I saw tap artists in the inter-

Vancouver International Tap Festival, where we bring in

national scene creating new work, but it was staying in the

masters and legends of tap. I think what makes us stand

studio because there just weren't any funders, which is a

apart from the hundreds of other festivals is that we are

systemic issue in tap. We are the poor cousins in the com-

a presentation festival; we used to follow the typical

mercial dance studios, where there is ballet and jazz, and

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Tiffany Tregarthen and Jonathon Young. Photo by Michael Slobodian

Betroffenheit

the psychiatrist in your talkback stating her purpose to treat trauma

A conversation with Jonathon Young continued from page 7

and provide a solution, and her somewhat perplexed curiosity about a work that explores the interior of the condition without aiming to 'solve' anything. JY: The main thing we talked about is that one of the most troubling aspects of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) is that you are suddenly the only one in the world, that you are completely alone, and the fact that people are seeing their own disordered world unfolding before them on the stage is comforting—at least that is something people who have come up to me have said, but of course there are all the people who don't come up, and we have no way of knowing what they are thinking. I think the most important thing for us as performers is to remember that it's bigger than us and, as we become more sure-footed, to try to maintain that. It seems especially important with this piece: To avoid mastering it, or displaying mastery at it, so that when we come back again next year we find a way to be flattened by it again. I am not sure how we will do that… AK: As you say, trauma isolates you, and the experience is essentially incommunicable. But in your case, it is a shared experience, both in your family and in the community, yet in the context of the piece, it follows your own, separate journey. How does that affect the work? JY: We have been blessed by a supportive community, which we found out in the early days, when as part of the club of people who lost their kids, we went to one church basement full of very sad people. Their story was that they couldn’t talk about it at work, that people didn’t want to talk to them, because they didn’t know how. Expressing what happened is an extraordinary thing, and also a risky thing, because you can’t use it to your advantage. I had to keep asking myself and my collaborators, and my family ‘Is this the right thing? Can we do this?’ AK: Do you think that when you go back to it, the process will change and become more of a dialogue, rather than a narrative that flows from you to collaborators to an audience? JY: I suppose that's happening now because we are having this discussion and the work is being written about. The conversation is about this kind of attempt, about the relationship between theatre and dance, between addiction and trauma and theatre, so the conversation is expanding, and the more you talk about it, the easier it is to talk about it. In the end, it doesn’t change the tragedy that happened, but hopefully it is doing more good than bad in the world. My fear of making it was that it would add more pollution, by pumping out another dark cloud of pain into the world.

Dance Central May/June 2016

Betroffenheit

A conversation with Jonathon Young

AK: What happens next? JY: The show keeps going, and hopefully Crystal and I will collaborate again. This fall I wrote her a fifteen

AK: One of the challenges of putting theatre and dance in close proximity, is that they work differently at creating a journey, and the idea of biography takes on different shapes between them. Movement can undermine the specificity of the text, and text superimposed on movement flattens what makes dance engaging and affecting. It seems that depending on which part of an audiences brain has been invited to structure the experience of a performance, the addition of the other element creates a gap. How did you approach it in Betroffenheit? JY: I think we went into the collaboration with an awareness of exactly that danger, that we might describe what we had just seen, or physically illustrate what someone is telling you. That redundancy can kill a work, in the same way that happens all the time when video is used. If someone isn't conscious and aware of the materials they are using, there is an overlap that creates slackness. We had to keep thinking in terms of the â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;im-

minute play, which pushes further the idea of the chorus we developed for Betroffenheit (we call them the crisis mismanagement team). She created the piece for Netherlands Dance Theatre. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s called The Statement, for which we recorded four voices and again there was a sense of managing a crisis that was bigger than their capacity to manage. That show is now touring, and it was amazing what Crystal did with it, especially because she had to direct from a script, and the staging had to contend with dialogue configurations, and was great to see her directorial powers come into play. The next Electric Company show, which is a collaboration with John Korsrud and Hard Rubber Orchestra about the Vancouver hockey riots will be directed by Kim Collier, and I am in the process of circling, from about 300 miles out, toward what might be next. AK: Thank you!

"I think the most important thing for us as performers is to remember that it's bigger than us and, as we become more surefooted, to try to maintain that. It seems especially important with this piece: To avoid mastering it, or displaying mastery at it, so that when we come back again next year we find a way to be flattened by it again." age/language systemâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;, where part of the task was to somehow de-centralize the protagonist, to get the voice outside of me and onto or into the dancers who never spoke, so that they were sharing in the battle of the journey. We needed to make the voice one of the structural components that we were all inside of.

D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Thinking Bodies: continued from page 13

they say "Ah you're the mad jigger' —my social nickname is 'madjigga'. People know that about me, and the smiling face, because when I jig or teach I say ‘smile’, because that will change the way you carry yourself. Anything I do in the community I always end with a dance, just to show them. I could be tackling the worst things, with people who are sad and crying, and then I end with a jig or powwow dance, and people light up. AK: Does the distinction between dancer and choreographer mean anything in your work? MM: I have always been a dancer, and I danced the dances that I learned as a young girl in the community, but I guess now I am also labeled as a choreographer because I create steps for dancers, but if I am one person, how am I separate with those two things? I think it goes hand in hand. AK: Does it refer to ways of being and hierarchies that have begun to dissolve? MM: I guess some dancers really don’t choreograph, but for me it was natural, because I wanted to teach the spirit; that’s how it started I didn't just want to create my own dances and teach them; I wanted to show the spirit, so I started teaching and allowed people to find their spirit within the dance that connects with their identity so that they know who they are as a Métis person. AK: Is Vancouver the right place for your work, or would you be curious about other places?

A conversation with Madelaine McCallum

MM: I am happy here. I get to go home and teach and do motivational speaking to the youth, but I have built a really nice foundation, community and family and established myself as a dancer, performer and speaker in the community. It just doesn’t stop, and it is so beautiful that it just keeps growing, and that people would hear about the work so that it continually grows and branches. It brings me home, so I don’t have to move anywhere to do that. And I can show kids that if you want to leave a community you can always go back. I am completely happy here, with my community and all the artists, and especially the connection with Mique’l Dangeli. Her dance group inspires me. There is such an abundance of styles here, which I love, because I have so many styles within myself that I can express here. AK: If you were to say something to the dance community, what would it be? MM: What comes to my mind right away is there is room for everyone. There is a spot and a place for everybody on this earth to do exactly what they love to do. I honour my family and my community and I honour them every time I dance. My uncle, my aunt’s husband, used to play the fiddle in the basement and he called me and I would run downstairs and I would jig and he would play fiddle, and my dad, whom I watched taught me something and I am carrying that and passing it to future generations. AK: Thank you! D a n c e C e n t ra l M ay / Ju n e 2 0 1 6

Dance Central May/June 2016