The three organisations will work together for the first time to commission, develop and present a new work by Hofesh Shechter, one the UK's most exciting emerging choreographers.
The work, entitled In Your Rooms, will be premiered at The Place (27-31 March). It will then be performed with added live music at Southbank Centre's Queen Elizabeth Hall (4-5 May), before an expanded version, with additional dancers and live music, is presented at Sadler's Wells (28-29 September).
An outstanding company of 12 dancers will work throughout the year with Shechter on this project. They include Amy Hollingsworth (Rambert, Michael Clark Company, Bonachela Dance Company), Ino Riga (Richard Alston Dance Company, Random Dance), Leon Baugh (Jasmin Vardimon Dance Company, Stan Won't Dance) and Young Jin Kim (Akram Khan Company). Shechter will create an original score for the piece, collaborating with Nell Catchpole (The Gogmagogs).
The journey of the work between London's foremost small, middle and large-scale dance venues mirrors the journey that, over longer periods of time, many of today's star dancemakers have made. Artists including Wayne McGregor, Jonzi D, Russell Maliphant and the Ballet Boyz presented early works at The Place before creating larger scale works, initially for Southbank Centre and later for Sadler's Wells.
Recent research by Audiences London has suggested that the venues do not compete for the same 'dance' audience, but have their own, distinct constituencies. As a part of the project, Audiences London will work with the partners to further develop audiences for each venue.
John Ashford, Theatre Director of The Place said: "The Place, Southbank Centre and Sadler's Wells are sometimes cast as rivals, albeit friendly rivals. At The Place, we've never seen it that way; we want the artists that we discover - like Hofesh Shechter - to gain new, different opportunities elsewhere. In Your Rooms will show the complementary relationship between our three venues: offering a range of experiences to audiences, and advancing the career of an artist who's going places."Â
Julia Carruthers, Head of Dance and Performance at Southbank Centre, said: "This joint commission between the three venues is a great opportunity and a chance to experiment. Southbank Centre is unique in attracting a wider audience to dance events, and we want Shechter's unusual talent of gently suggesting narrative and character and his highly developed sense of theatre to reach new audiences as well as existing fans."Â
Alistair Spalding, Artistic Director and Chief Executive of Sadler's Wells, said: "It is wonderful to work in unison with The Place and Southbank Centre to showcase and fast-track the outstanding new work of choreographic genius Hofesh Shechter. In Your Rooms will evolve throughout the three dance venues with each theatre offering a different experience to audiences and I can't wait to see the results."Â
Hofesh Shechter said: "This is an amazing, challenging opportunity to present my work in front of different audiences and on different scales, to work with the best dancers, the best musicians, the best producers in London. I have complete artistic freedom and a generous amount of new technical possibilities. I must have a lucky star (or three!) shining over me."Â -- www.theplace.org.uk
Posted February 13th, 2007 by ruzik_tuzik
