The producers of LIVE, a bi-annual performance art festival in Vancouver, join forces with local performers, community members and dance and theatre groups to present Procession of Performing Circles, a ceremonial parade of lights, dance, music and a bit of magic through the city’s Downtown Eastside neighbourhood.
Curated by Glenn Lewis, the event includes works from choreographers Margaret Dragu, Colleen Lanki and Karen Jamieson with her Carnegie Centre troupe, as well as performances by Leaky Heaven Circus, Vancouver Carnival Band, Vancouver Morris Men and others.
Glenn Lewis has a broad and distinguished career in the arts: including working with Intermedia in Vancouver (1966-71); teaching in the Fine Arts Department, U.B.C. (1971–74); serving as Director of the Western Front, Vancouver (1977-87); and as head of the Media Arts Section, Canada Council (1987–90). Lewis has curated projects including Canadian video at the Cologne Art Fair in 1983. His work encompasses photography, ceramics, collage, film/video, performance and installation, and has been shown in Oboro, Montreal; Belkin Satellite Gallery, Vancouver; Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver; La Chartreuse, France; Millenium, New York; A Space, Toronto; MuHKA Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp; and the 2008 7a11d Festival, Toronto. Lewis has performed in Valladolid, Spain, Warsaw, Budapest, Den Haag, Amsterdam, Lienz, Austria, and Berlin. Commissions and public art works are at the National Science Library, Ottawa, and UBC, Vancouver.
Karen Jamieson, dancer, choreographer, teacher and artistic director established the Karen Jamieson Dance Company in 1983 as a vehicle for the creation and production of works exploring dance as a mytho-poetic language, creation of stage-based performances with dance professionals, engaging in cross-cultural dialogue in dance with First Nations, Asian and European artists, addressing the spirit of place and creating dance within communities. The company has toured nationally and internationally. Karen is a recipient of the Chalmers Award for Choreography. Her work Sisyphus was recognized in Canada’s Dance Collection Danse magazine as one of the top ten Canadian Choreographic Masterworks of the 20th Century.
>Margaret Dragu began her art practice in 1971 as a dancer and choreographer. She collaborated with many artists in Toronto, New York and Montreal moving into film, visual art, theatre, publishing, television, radio, and burlesque. Her work has been shown across Canada and Western Europe. Dragu is the first artist featured in Canadian Performance Art Legends (a performance and publication project initiated by the Toronto-based organization FADO) to highlight the work of senior Canadian performance artists. She has created many large-scale performances and videos that include participants from all of her communities.
Colleen Lanki began in musical reviews and music hall, extended into other theatre styles through theatre school and the beginnings of her professional career. She has a BFA in Theatre Performance from Toronto's York University and an MFA in Asian Theatre and Directing from the University of Hawaii, and now concentrates on experimental theatre, interdisciplinary work, and intercultural performance practice. She has been directing, choreographing and performing internationally for over two decades in shows of every variety. Colleen was based in Tokyo in from 1995 to 2001, where she studied nihon buyoh under master dancer FUJIMA Yûko (1938-2002), and in April 2001 became a natori taking the professional name Fujima Sayû. She now studies with Fujima Shôgo. She also studied noh (traditional Japanese theatre) under noh expert Richard EMMERT and noh master Ômura Sadamu. She recently choreographed and performed in The Komachi Variations, a dance-theatre piece incorporating nihon buyoh (shows in Vancouver and Tokyo), She is based in Vancouver and works with Tomoe Arts.
Northwest Morris is danced by at least nine men and is of a processional nature in that the dancers move around in set figures accompanied by much stepping. A very elaborate costume is worn, and the somewhat militaristic dances are performed in clogs, which accentuate the rhythmic stepping. The music is generally loud, with lots of percussion.
Founded in 1999 by a few like-minded Vancouver theatre actors and writers, the award-winning Leaky Heaven Circus has combined popular traditions — such as comedy, clown, circus arts, melodrama and cabaret — with so-called “high” forms to create unique vehicles for exploring cultural, social and regional issues. Whether inspired by Shakespeare and classic parables, the animal kingdom or life itself, the end results are original multi-disciplinary productions that challenge the mind, fuel the imagination and celebrate the human spirit. The company’s roots in the Canadian social movements and theatre experiments of the late 20th century are also evident in its work, as is the influence of 19th century philosophers, cultural theorists and the great physical theatre artists, such as Jacques LeCoq. Shows are designed to be challenging for adults, yet accessible to children.
The Vancouver Carnival Band is a community music project with ten years of history, based out of Commercial Drive’s Britannia Community Centre. Musical direction is provided by Ross Barrett and Tim Sars. Instrumentation ranges from brass, woodwinds, drums, and percussion, to accordions, and voice. Other than original tunes crafted by band members, their impressive repertoire includes samba, calypso, swing, afro-beat, jazz, funk, disco, and traditional music from around the globe. “We believe that community music is grounded in collaboration, with the aim of empowering the individuals involved. Songs and performances are a means to creative expression and community cohesiveness, rather than an end in themselves.”
