The Four Seasons, JamesWiltonDance, The North Wall, 10th March 2023 – Maggie Watson reviews

On Friday evening as part of an intensive Dancin’ Oxford week of events, JamesWiltonDance presented The Four Seasons before a packed auditorium, preceded by a lively ‘curtain raiser’ by a dozen local students who had attended a company workshop. Choreographers and performers James Wilton and Sarah Jane Taylor have created a truly immersive dance work, with designs by Vibeke Andersen, to Vivaldi’s music as recomposed by Max Richter with extensions by Michal Wojtas. The entire audience seemed to hold its breath from the first moment, as Taylor slowly emerged like an amoeba from a chrysalis, while the light gently glowed and dimmed, suggesting the passing of day and night.

Taylor and Wilton seemed to move in perfect unison, using every part of their bodies to support themselves, creating the illusion that they were drifting in space. Embracing, carrying, catching, and holding each other, they sometimes seemed to swim in the air, opening up to the warmth of the sun. Their arms were like slowly beating wings when they carried one another, back-to-back, and the mysterious globe that descended from above like the moon seemed to draw them as if they were the tides of the sea. They danced alongside the score rather than slavishly following it, yet when they stood vertically, close together, there was an almost Baroque formality that echoed colours in the music. The choreography carried ideas that it is impossible fully to capture in words, reminding us of the overwhelming extent of the cosmos, and our tiny part in it.

Maggie Watson
11th March 2023

 

Dancin’ Oxford Festival 2022 4th-16th March

Dancin’ Oxford‘s Spring Festival features exciting guest companies, local companies and newly commissioned work as well as a host of participatory activities such as workshops and discussions. Here follows a list of performances, with links to more information and booking details:

Moving With the Times, now in its 11th year, features three new works from exciting emerging companies, co-commissioned by Dancin’ Oxford and Pegasus Theatre. In Excessive Human Collective‘s piece Post Truth Whatever, three female performers create and broadcast propaganda in a fictional world which is eerily similar to our own. Night People Events present The Rave Girl; housed within a colourful visual landscape, the rave girl explores how hype, rave, and expression can collide, creating a complex, yet otherworldly persona that demands to be seen. In light of the horrific murders of Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa, Phoebe Tompsett Dance work The Daily Male casts a stark light on the measures that women are forced to take every day simply to remain safe.

Date: Friday 4th & Saturday 5th March 7.30pm

Venue: Pegasus Theatre, Magdalen Road, Oxford OX4 1RE

Tickets: £13, concessions £10 Book online here

Recommended age: 12 years+

For the Festival Opening Oxford’s Westgate shopping centre will come to life with a series of short shows from national and local companies to make you think, smile and want to dance. Richard Chappell presents Infinite Ways Home – a multisensory production that explores ritual, rave and human connection. Unlock the Chains Collective depicts a community united in grief and anger as it remembers and mourns the lives of those lost at the hands of the state. This outdoor piece is commissioned by Dancin’ Oxford and supported by TORCH. Joli Vyann presents an innovative duet fusing circus, dance and theatre – blurring the boundaries of dance and circus skills. Also performing will be vibrant and talented youth dance troupes from across Oxford including Step2 Dance, Body Politic, TPD Young Artists and Mini Professionals. Join the Zumba party for fun and to learn some moves.

Date: Saturday 5th March 12.00-5.00pm

Location: Leiden Square, Westgate, Queen St, Oxford OX1 1TR

Free, and suitable for all ages

KHAOS & HYMNOS – Chhaya Collective

A double bill of two extraordinary dance pieces about women resisting oppression. In HYMNOS, inspired by the story of Iranian artist Saba Zavarei and her online platform Radio Khiaban,”even the most captured woman guards the place of the wildish self, for she knows intuitively that someday there will be a loophole, an aperture, a chance, and she will hightail it to escape.” In KHAOS live musicians join six contemporary dance artists to revel in the joy, tenderness and the power of wild women.

Date: Thursday 10th March 7.30pm

Venue: The Mill, Spiceball Park, Banbury OX16 5QE

Tickets: £16 Book online here

Recommended age: 13 years+

Body Politic – Them

Directed by Emma-Jane Greig and with choreography by L’atisse Rhoden, THEM flicks through the journal pages of three survivors of sexual violence, exploring the women’s struggles to navigate the trauma and its impact on their mental wellbeing, their loss of self, and finding healing. Inspired by American poet and novelist Kim Addonizio’s poem To The Woman Crying Uncontrollably In The Next Stall, this powerful and gripping display of hip-hop dance draws movement from the stark and vivid imagery of her words.

Date: Friday 11th March 7.30pm

Venue: The North Wall, South Parade, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets: £14 (concessions £12, under-25 £10) Book online here

Recommended age: 14 years+

Stay after the show for Talk About Dance, an opportunity to join Body Politic Artistic Director Emma-Jane Greig in conversation with independent dramaturg Miranda Laurence, share your thoughts, ask questions and join the discussion. 8.45-9.30pm, free.

Wriggle Dance Theatre – Squidge

Do you squish or squash, handshake or hug, stretch out or snuggle in like a bug? A truly magical and funny interactive dance show with live music and digital projection, taking a light-hearted look at our sense of touch and how it influences our everyday lives; at its heart a tale of  friendship and compromise. An immersive shared experience to delight children and their grown-ups alike.

Date: Saturday 12th March 11.00am and 2.00pm

Venue: The North Wall, South Parade, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets: £8 (concessions £6) Book online here

Running time: 50 minutes Suitable for ages 3-8 years

Watch the Squidge film and participate in a workshop at the Mill Banbury – find out more here

Richard Chappell Dance – Infinite Way Home

Critically acclaimed choreographer Richard Chappell presents his most ambitious work to date, a multisensory production that explores ritual, rave and human connection. Using a diverse choreographic language of ballet, contemporary dance and improvisation, Infinite Ways Home looks to redefine our sense of community and home, in a mesmerising feast of colour and pulsating sound. Performed by an ensemble of extraordinary dancers, it features electronic music by award-winning experimental duo Larch, alongside live violin by acclaimed soloist Enyuan Khong.

Date: Monday 14th March 7.30pm

Venue: Oxford Playhouse, Beaumont Street, Oxford OX1 2LW

Tickets: £10 – £16.50 Book online here

Duration: 60 minutes Suitable for ages 7 years+

Stay after the show for Talk About Dance, with choreographer Richard Chappell and Miranda Laurence, to share your thoughts, ask questions and join the discussion. 8.45-9.30pm, free.

Botis Seva – BLKDOG

A beautifully brutal commentary on how the youth of today are coping in a world not built for them. Through emotionally charged Hip Hop dance, BLKDOG reveals how self-discovery leads to self-destruction. Through haunting childhood memories and adult life traumas, how do we fight through our vices to find a sense of peace? The music has grown from a long-standing collaboration with Torben Lars Sylvest and words performed by  Far From The Norm and guests. Tom Visser’s lighting brings a dark smog of disillusion, while hooded caps and padded costumes by Ryan Laight echo the protection and comfort of childhood. BLKDOG won an Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production in 2019 and in 2021, and has been was nominated for a Black British Theatre Award 2022 for Best Dance Production.

Date: Wednesday 16th & Thursday 17th March 7.30pm

Venue: Oxford Playhouse, Beaumont Street, Oxford OX1 2LW

Tickets: £10 – £26 Book online here

Suitable for ages 11 years+

Find a full programme of Festival activities including participatory workshops here

 

Jane Pritchard talk Photographing Dance and Dancers, exhibition opening of Backstage at the Ballet, The North Wall Arts Centre, 11th February–7th March 2020 – Maggie Watson reports

Backstage at the Ballet, an exhibition of photographs by Colin Jones, opened yesterday 11th February with a well-researched and entertaining presentation by Jane Pritchard, Curator of Dance at the Victoria &  Albert Museum, on Photographing Dance and Dancers.  Pritchard spoke interestingly and informatively about dancer-turned-photographer Colin Jones, the history of dance photography, and Jones’ photo-journalism, focusing on his work with dancers.  She drew attention to the wealth of social and historical information in his images, from evidence of the terrible quality of studio floors in the 1960s, to the way in which dancers used to spend their ‘down time’ knitting before there were mobile phones.

 

The Collaborative Research of Science and Dance, a talk by Dr Bronwyn Tarr and Joshua Bamford, The North Wall Arts Centre, 4th March 2020

Another fascinating opportunity for discussion springing from the Backstage At The Ballet exhibition at The North Wall.  Researchers Dr Bronwyn Tarr and Joshua Bamford will bring Colin Jones’ photographs to life with an engaging discussion on their creative research into the psychological and physiological effects of dance and movement. Bridging the gap between science and dance – and photograph and the viewer – the conversation will invite the audience to explore how science can help uncover the power of moving with others.

Bronwyn and Joshua are based in The Social Body Lab at the Institute of Cognitive & Evolutionary Anthropology, University of Oxford, and both have experience as performers, as well as scientists. They are interested in uncovering the nuts and bolts behind the benefits of being part of a dancing community.

Joshua’s doctoral work aims to understand the social and cognitive processes involved in synchronised movement, through a range of audio-visual perception experiments.

Bronwyn (a TORCH Knowledge Exchange Fellow) is currently exploring how dance-movement therapy might help alleviate loneliness, and is collaborating with local artists to choreograph a performative piece on the embodied experience of feeling alone, and feeling connected.

Date:  Wednesday 4th March, 6.00pm

Venue:  The North Wall Arts Centre, South Parade, Summertown, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets:  Tickets for this event are free, but spaces are limited. Please email Nicky Laird, Gallery Manager, on lairdn@thenorthwall.com to book.

Further details on Backstage At The Ballet can be found here

 

Photographing Dance and Dancers, a talk by Jane Pritchard, The North Wall Arts Centre, 11th February 2020

The North Wall offers a perfect introduction to its exhibition Backstage at the Ballet with an expert guide.  Jane Pritchard‘s illustrated presentation will place Colin Jones’ photographs in the context of the work of his contemporaries. It will contrast the candidly captured life of a dancer on stage and off with the more formally composed photograph encapsulating the art of dance.

Jane Pritchard is curator of dance at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, where she curated the exhibition Diaghilev and the Golden Age of the Ballets Russes and displays of the work of photographers Chris Nash and Anthony Crickmay. She also writes, lectures and broadcasts on many aspects of dance.

Date:  Tuesday 11th February, 5.30pm

Venue: The North Wall Arts Centre, South Parade, Summertown, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets:  Tickets for this event are free, but spaces are limited. Please email Nicky Laird, Gallery Manager, on lairdn@thenorthwall.com to book.

Further details on Backstage At The Ballet can be found here

 

Backstage at the Ballet: exhibition of photographs by Colin Jones, The North Wall Arts Centre, 11th February -7th March 2020

As part of Dancin’ Oxford 2020 The North Wall displays a collection of remarkable photos, Backstage At The Ballet.  Colin Jones (b.1936) is one of Britain’s most significant photojournalists but he began his creative career dancing with The Royal Ballet.  This dancer-turned-photographer focused his lens on fellow dancers as his subject matter, capturing hardworking bodies and backstage drama.

Jones’ backstage ballet photographs show not just the emotional intensity and beauty of ballet but also reveal the sustained physical exertion and discipline of a dancer’s life.  Photographs from the 1960s include Britain’s iconic ballerina, Margot Fonteyn and the Soviet-born Rudolf Nureyev as well as later images from the 1990s, featuring English National Ballet star Tamara Rojo.

This is the first exhibition in a public gallery of Jones’ ballet photographs, featuring rarely-seen backstage images of British ballet from the late 1950s to the millennium.

With grateful thanks to Colin Jones, Topfoto and principal sponsor St Edward’s School.

Dates:  Tuesday 11th February – Saturday 7th March

Venue:  The North Wall Arts Centre, South Parade, Summertown, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets:  Admission free.

Opening hours:  The North Wall Gallery is open from Monday – Friday 10am – 4pm, and from 12pm – 4pm on Saturdays. Sundays & Bank Holidays: normally closed, except for theatre events.

Related talks:

Photographing Dance and Dancers, Tuesday 11th February, 5.30pm: further details here

The Collaborative Research of Science and Dance, Wednesday 4th March, 6.00pm: further details here

Find out more about Colin Jones here

 

Oxford Dance Writers 2009-2019

In November 2019 Oxford Dance Writers (ODW) celebrated its 10^th anniversary with a reception at the North Wall Arts Centre to mark the occasion. The evening provided a joyful opportunity for members of the wider Oxford dance and performing arts community to come together and catch up.  A panel of guest speakers discussed dance writing each from their own specific perspective.  Dance critic and historian Nadine Meisner entertained us with stories of the dance reviewer’s rackety life, but also described her experiences drawing together her authoritative biography of Marius Petipa published in the summer.  Dance artist Nicholas Minns, reflected thoughtfully on his emergence as a dance blogger and online critic covering a wide spectrum of dance performance, and the writers influencing him in developing a distinctive voice and perspective.  Professor Susan Jones, the driving force behind Dance Scholarship Oxford (DANSOX) which has scheduled so many fascinating events (talks, seminars, lecture demonstrations, residencies) in recent years, gave insight into the place and potential of dance within Oxford University, and its enriching contribution to innovative interdisciplinary research projects and outreach. Oxford University Press mounted an impressive display of its varied publications on dance for those attending to browse and purchase.

ODW emerged from Ballet in Small Spaces’ The Solos Project in 2009 as an initiative to encourage critical writing and online discussion of dance, and generate informed reviews of the work of local dance artists.  Since then it has become a valuable record of dance performance activity in and around Oxford, listing forthcoming events as well as reviewing, bearing witness to dance in Oxford; generating an archive of the diverse and idiosyncratic dance history of a particular place.  Aiming to be a space for informed debate it has played a significant part in raising the profile of dance in Oxford, and developing its audience.  ODW has run three Dance Writers of the Future competitions to encourage younger writers.  It tracks and reports on academic dance initiatives such as Dance Scholarship Oxford and Dance and Academia events, and regularly reviews dance publications both academic and popular.  It has had the support of Oxfordshire venues who provide press tickets for ODW reviewers, and of publishers who have provided review copies of dance books.

Over the last ten years 40 writers have been featured, with substantial contributions from Susie Crow and Maggie Watson.  As well as academics (such as Miranda Laurence, Dana Mills) contributors have included local dance artists (including Ana Barbour, Jane Connelly, Rachel Gildea, Lisia Newmark); occasional guest writers (Nicholas Minns of writingaboutdance.com, Rebecca Nice, Emily May, art historian Barbara Berrington, former Oxford Times dance critic David Bellan); local dance lovers (such as Jess Ryan-Phillips, Susannah Harris-Wilson, Susanna Reece); and young writers who have entered our competitions.   ODW reaches a significant number of dance professionals and enthusiasts in the Oxfordshire area, and despite its mainly local focus the site also has an international following.

ODW now extends its grateful thanks to all who have contributed writing and who have supported the site in other ways over the years.  A special thanks to Maggie Watson who has recently completed with distinction an MA in Ballet Studies at the University of Roehampton, for so regularly contributing thoughtful, perceptive and empathetic reviews of a wide range of performances and publications.  With particular reference to our anniversary celebration, special mention must go to our wise and encouraging speakers, to Oxford Dance Forum for its generous support, to The North Wall for hosting us in such welcoming fashion, and to Oxford University Press for its enticing display of dance publications which prompted much pre Christmas buying.  And a final shout out for local dance and visual artist Naomi Morris for her beautiful images for ODW publicity materials.

We look forward to continuing… watch this space!  Your interest and comments will be greatly valued.

Wishing you all the best for 2020 and the coming decade,

Susie Crow

 

You can find information about Nadine Meisner’s biography Marius Petipa: The Emperor’s Ballet Master here or why not drop into the OUP Bookshop at 116-117, High St, Oxford OX1 4BZ.

Read Nicholas Minns’ latest reviews on his blog writingaboutdance.com here

Find out about Dance Scholarship Oxford, DANSOX, here

and about Dance and Academia here

Information about Oxford Dance Forum and its activities can be found here

 

The Chosen, Company Chordelia at The North Wall, 14th September 2019 – Susie Crow reviews

Company Chordelia arrived for their third visit to Oxford’s North Wall with their latest production The Chosen garlanded with four and five star credits following a successful opening at this year’s Edinburgh Festival. While touring extensively north of the border this Scotland based company does very few performances in the south, so Oxford audiences are lucky to see it, and to have been able to trace the development of the company’s distinctive style through earlier works about legendary dancer Nijinsky, and Lady Macbeth. Director Kally Lloyd-Jones’ latest piece is a moving meditation on life and death, an intense hour which nevertheless reaches out directly to engage emotionally with its audience; a company of fine dancers come across as believable individuals whose moods and travails we can all identify with.

 

Company Chordelia presents The Chosen, The North Wall, 14th September 2019

The award-winning Company Chordelia (Nijinsky’s Last Jump, Lady Macbeth: Unsex Me Here) return to The North Wall with their latest production, direct from its world premiere at Edinburgh Fringe 2019.  Created and directed by Kally Lloyd-Jones, The Chosen is an intensely moving dance piece about dying and embracing the art of living.

How do we choose to live in the face of the inevitable and how do we think about the final stage of our life cycle? Increasingly, as medicine advances, knowledge of imminent death has become a reality for everyone; The Chosen addresses our individual mortality from the shifting perspectives of ourselves and our loved ones.

“elegant and eviscerating” ***** The Stage

Performance:  Saturday 14th September 8.00pm

Venue:  The North Wall Arts Centre, South Parade, Oxford OX2 7JN

Tickets:  Full Price: £16, Concessions: £14, Members: 15% off

Available online here, or call the Box Office on 01865 319450

Age Guidance: 12+

Dance Audience Club 6.30pm

If you are curious about dance, but sometimes feel a bit stumped about how to process it or talk about it, then Dance Audience Club is for you! A friendly, informal opportunity to give language to an art experience that can sometimes feel a bit difficult to pin down.

This pre-show discussion is an independent project led by Miranda Laurence, supported by The North Wall and Oxford Dance Forum. It’s free to take part, with discounted tickets to The Chosen. To book your place, email Amy Walters on waltersa@thenorthwall.com

Open Rehearsal 2pm – 5pm

Drop in to get a behind-the-scenes glimpse of The Chosen as part of Oxford Open Doors.

Find out more about Company Chordelia here

 

Mixtape: Dotdotdot Dance, The North Wall, 5th March 2019 – Maggie Watson reviews

Mixtape, by contemporary flamenco company Dotdotdot Dance, is a performance of four works: three dances, and a song by Lole y Manuel. Of the dances, the second, Alhelí la fea, was closest to traditional flamenco, being a ‘structured improvisation’ in which dancer Magdalena Mannion and singer Elena Morales responded to each other. Dressed in black, they stood close against the red brick of the back wall of the stage, interpreting the theme drawn from popular verse, ‘I’m like that old piece of furniture left against the wall’.