Troy Emery Twigg's IITAHPOYII Set for 2015 dance: made in canada / fait au canada Festival, Beginning Tonight

Artistic Director Yvonne Ng announces more programming updates for princess productions' biennial dance: made in canada / fait au canada (d:mic/fac) festival. This celebration of cutting-edge Canadian contemporary dance runs tonight, August 13 to Sunday, August 16 at the Betty Oliphant Theatre in Toronto and features 12 different dance events (including 6 world premieres and 1 Toronto premiere) from across Canada (Alberta, Newfoundland, Ontario and Quebec) in three Mainstage Series and a lottery-drawn What You See Is What You Get program, as well as various Arts Encounters. For info and tickets, call 416-533-8577 or visit online at www.princessproductions.ca

Added to d:mic's roster is the Toronto premiere of choreographer Troy Emery Twigg's Iitahpoyii in collaboration with dancer Justin Many Fingers, which replaces his They Shoot Buffalo, Don't They? in the Sinha Mainstage series.

Also added, in partnership with Dance Collection Danse, princess productions screens the avant-festival Toronto premiere of the compelling full-length dance documentary A Good Madness - The Dance of Rachel Browne, written, directed and produced by Danielle Sturk, on Wednesday, August 12, 2015 @7:30pm at the Betty Oliphant Theatre. This feature documentary on Rachel Browne (1934-2012), founder of Winnipeg's Contemporary Dancers, Canada's oldest professional modern dance company, captures the essence of the woman and the power of the dance she created, exposing her unwavering desire to create dance to the exclusion of all else. Official Selection: International Festival of Films on Art (FIFA), Montreal, March 2015. A Good Madness is curated by Yvonne Ng and Kathleen Smith.

Ng has also released an extended trailer (01:35) for d:mic at princessproductions.ca/dance/what-we-do/current-festival.

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dance:made in canada/fait au canada MAINSTAGE SERIES

I. Robinson Series:
Thursday, August 13, 7pm | Friday, August 14, 9pm | Saturday, August 15, 4pm
Tedd Robinson is the Artistic Director of 10 Gates Dancing, an award-winning choreographer and, most recently, the 2014 recipient of the Walter Carsen Prize. He is a National Arts Centre Associate Dance Artist. Robinson chose Lina Cruz's work for its physicality and intimacy, and Andrew Tay's work because it is intriguing and curious in concept.
o WORLD PREMIERE - Lina Cruz / Fila 13 Productions (Montreal) performs Waiting for a Sleepless Night, choreographed by Cruz. On an imaginary terrain, two buddies wander into the heightened sensitivity of a sleepless night. Performed by Jean-François Duke and Fabien Piché (musician: Philippe Noireaut).
o WORLD PREMIERE - Andrew Tay / Wants&Needs danse (Montreal) performs You can't buy it (but I'll sell it to you anyways) SUCKA, a solo which questions modern society's connection to spirituality using the body, elements of ritual and the relationship between the performer and spectator.

II. Morrison/Ng Series:
Thursday, August 13, 9pm | Saturday, August 15, 7pm | Sunday, August 16, 7pm
Named after the late, great lighting designer David Morrison, this series is curated by princess productions' Artistic Director Yvonne Ng, recipient of a Soulpepper Community Arts Award, K.M. Hunter Artist Award, the New Pioneers Arts Award, Chalmers Arts Fellowship, Dora Award for Outstanding Performance (Ensemble) and Ontario Premier's Award for Excellence in the Arts - New Talent Award. Ng chose the work of Kate Hilliard, Marie France Forcier and the Throwdown Collective because each choreographer is a performer within their own works, giving each piece immediacy, intimacy and a touch of compelling irrationality.
o WORLD PREMIERE - Kate Hilliard (Toronto) choreographs and performs the duet La Jeune Femme et La Mort with Robert Abubo. The piece questions mortality and the unknown suspense that death creates.
o WORLD PREMIERE - Marie France Forcier (Toronto) performs her solo Little Guidebook for Using your Suffering Wisely, an ironic journey through post-traumatic stress disorder. A character embarks on a self-help audiobook journey, guided by a narrator.
o WORLD PREMIERE - Throwdown Collective (Toronto) performs Various Concert. The piece explores the dynamic form of the trio as a choreographic structure relating to the themes of perspective and time.

III. Sinha Series: Friday, August 14, 7pm | Saturday, August 15, 9pm | Sunday, August 16, 4pm
Driven by a deep commitment to the primacy of sound in creative expression, Debashis Sinha has realized projects in radiophonic art, electroacoustic music, sound art, audiovisual performance, theatre, dance and music across Canada and internationally. Sinha chose these works by Troy Emery Twigg and Jacob Niedzwiecki because they are driven by our collective unconscious - the experience of nature, perhaps, or of relationships, or how we place our human lives in a universe so much vaster than we are.
o TORONTO PREMIERE - Troy Emery Twigg (Kainai, Alberta) choreographs Iitahpoyii for dancer Justin Many Fingers. "Iitahpoyii" (pronounced Ee-tah-poy-ee) is a Blackfoot word meaning earth vibrations. In this expanded version (more than double the length of the original that premiered in Toronto in 2014 at MOonhORsE's Older & Reckless), Troy and Justin journey to rediscover their heritage as members of the Kainai Nation from Alberta, gathering stories from Blackfoot territory, exploring the body in relationship to the land, and discovering that ancestral forms imprint on the present.
o WORLD PREMIERE - Jacob Niedzwiecki (Toronto) choreographs Unfavourable Geometry, a dark dance-theatre comedy that documents a half-century's worth of small-scale nuclear accidents. The cold equations of radioactivity react with love triangles, workplace bureaucracy and geopolitics with deadly consequences for hung-over technicians, overconfident physicists and clueless managers alike. Performed by Luke Garwood, Linnea Swan and James Leja.

dance:made in canada/fait au canada WHAT YOU SEE IS WHAT YOU GET (WYSIWYG) Friday, August 14, 11pm and Sunday, August 16, 2pm
Drawn by lottery, this series features 10-minute works by:
o Susie Burpee (Toronto). Spirit and Veneer - A character arrives. We begin to think we know her, maybe even dare to love her. Then, a sudden transformation - and everything we believed to be true unravels.
o Benjamin Landsberg Dance Projects (Toronto). One-to-One - Performed by Benjamin Landsberg and Natasha Poon Woo.
o Louise Moyes docuDance (St. John's). Mavis Gallant Stories - A dance-theatre piece based on a short story of one of Canada's most distinguished literary figures, expat Montreal writer Mavis Gallant (1922-2014), who lived in Paris from 1950 to 2014.
o Parts+Labour_Danse (Montreal). La chute - Dance and performance merge to explore what happens to a man when his identity slips between his fingers until he no longer knows exactly who or what he has become.
o Alysa Pires (Toronto). i am vertical - Originally created as part of DanceEast's ChoreoLab in Ipswich, England, the work is inspired by the life and work of acclaimed American poet Sylvia Plath.

dance:made in canada/fait au canada ARTS ENCOUNTERS
Informal chats with the artists following their performances:
Friday August 14, 8:00pm with Troy Emery Twigg and Jacob Niedzwiecki (Sinha Series, post-show. Moderator: Mimi Beck)
Saturday August 15, 5:00pm with Andrew Tay and Lina Cruz (Robinson Series, post-show. Moderator: Robert Kingsbury)
Saturday August 15, 8:00pm with Marie France Forcier, Kate Hilliard and Throwdown Collective (Morrison Series, post-show. Moderator: Kathleen Smith)

Visual Arts Exhibit: Throughout the festival, the photography of Brianna Lombardo and Andréa de Keijzer will be exhibited in the lobby of the Betty Oliphant Theatre.
Walking Spaces: A participatory activation exploring walking as a meditative practice. Created with Anandam artists, members of Anandam's Audience in Residence program and you.
August 13 - 8:15pm | August 15 - 5:15pm | August 16 - 3:15pm

Dance Film Screenings: A selection of dance films will be screened. Curated by Yvonne Ng and Kathleen Smith.

The QLab workshop: Learn about QLab, the show control software that can create rich multimedia designs for live performances and installations from Debashis Sinha, our 2015 curator, sound designer and composer.
August 15 - 10:30am | Fee: $10

Intensive Rep: Toronto's Summer Intensive programs come together to share selected repertoire from celebrated choreographers. The program will consist of works from Peggy Baker Dance Projects, Cadence Ballet (Courtnae Bowman) and The Chimera Project (Malgorzata Nowacka).
August 15 - 2:00pm | Tickets: $10

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IF YOU GO:

princess productions presents dance: made in canada/fait au canada
August 13 - 16, 2015 at Betty Oliphant Theatre, 404 Jarvis St., Toronto
MainStage Single Tickets: $25; Artsworker/Student/Senior: $20
What You See is What You Get Tickets: $15; Artsworker/Student/Senior: $10
Arts Encounters on site throughout the festival: chats, visual arts exhibit, dance film screenings and more
For full list of Arts Encounters, visit www.princessproductions.ca
SAVE with MainStage Series Packs: 3 Ticket Pack: $65 (save 15%); $50 Artsworker/Student/Senior 4 Ticket Pack: $80 (save 20%); $65 Artsworker/Student/Senior 6 Ticket Pack: $112 (save 25%); $90 Artsworker/Student/Senior
For info and tickets, call 416-533-8577 or visit online at princessproductions.ca

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