my battery is pure love

For my final feature covering the CanAsian Dance Festival of 2015, I am lucky again in getting to interview another great of Canadian dance, Lata Pada.  Her career is vast and varied, her work personal and universal in its storytelling. Vivarta,  Lata's work for her company, Sampradaya Dance Creations, will be part of this year's festival. Lata Pada photo by Onward & Upward photography LR: How do you begin creating? What is it like in the studio at the start of a process? LP: Ideas for a new work come sometimes out of nowhere; a phrase from a song, a personal turning point, reflections on life. Even though the ideas have been percolating in the head for over several years and start taking shape for a new work, collaborators contacted, discussions had, outlines formed, when one gets into the studio, it is a terrifying experience. Where and how to start is the most traumatic feeling I am confronted with.  For me, the most intuitive and important sta...

Lee Su-Feh is a Canadian dance force. A choreographer, a teacher, a dancer, a dramaturge, an innovator, she has been rocking the Vancouver dance realm since 1988. Cofounder of battery opera with multi-disciplinary artist David McIntosh, Su-Feh is a fiercely intelligent, fiercely gripping performers. And she'll be here next week with CanAsian Dance Festival 2015. Don't miss her. Despite a hectic time for her, Su-Feh was gracious, frank and wonderful in answering my questions.  I am inspired. I hope you are too. Lucy: Y ou have referred to the dancer as activist not object. I am curious: how do you make this happen? What steps do you take, approaches, goals, physical or psychological tactics re alize this goal? Su-Feh: A fundamental tool I use is the eyes, the gaze. On a concrete level, I, the dancer, must ask myself, what do I see? Do I see the room I am dancing in, do I see the colours in this room? Do I see the shapes? Do I see the other people in this room? And do...

When you meet an artist like Peter Chin you realize what diversity is: artistic, cultural, disciplinary, philosophical. Often called an  archetypal "Renaissance man", Peter is a choreographer, dancer, a singer, instrumentalist, composer, designer, writer, director, and performance artist. He started training as a classical musician, then attended York University for Visual Art, where he he studied experimental directions with Vera Frenkel,  (also painting, sculpture and video art), music composition with James Tenney and creative writing with bp Nichol. Through his company Tribal Crackling Wind he choreographs and performs, allowing his many other skills take flight as well. "I was fortunate to be born into diversity because of my mixed background – black, white and Asian in Jamaica. The way I grew up there was always a mixture.  Jamaica is very racially integrated and has been for a long time. Jamaica's motto “Out of many, one p...

Denise Fujiwara wears many hats. An imaginative choreographer, a profound performer, a generous and rigorous teacher, artistic director of Fujiwara Dance Inventions and artistic director of CanAsian Dance Festival. She is resourceful, fiercely intelligent, uncompromising and nurturing. She knows what she's talking about. She knows what she's dancing about. And luckily, amongst the many demands from her multiple jobs, she took the time to answer a few questions for me about this year's festival. This year the CanAsian Dance Festival offers one program featuring all the artists in the festival. The talent in the 2015 festival is staggering. LR:  The program for the CanAsian International Dance Festival this year is dynamic —it’s an overused word I suppose, but there is a real sense of dynamism between the artists, their aesthetics and drive, not just varied but radically diverse and yet still connected somehow. How did you come to this programming? DF: The ...

The legendary Natsu Nakajima joins CanAsian Dance Festival this year. Not only is she a mentor of festival artistic director Denise Fujiwara, she is also an artist who was at the forefront of the development of butoh dance in Japan.                           Butoh evolved in Japan post-World War II in a movement that vehemently rejected both classical dance forms and dance that imitated western forms in order for Japanese artists to discover what their own art could become. In the politically charged times of the 50's butoh emerged through the minds and bodies of Tatsumi Hijikata and Kazuo Ohno. Hijikata is credited with conceiving the name "Ankoku Butoh", dance of utter darkness. Later the shortened term Butoh became more common as other artists began to dance and perform from this approach.  The team of Hijikata and Ohno, sometimes called "the architect" and "the soul" of butoh re...