From May 10th - 18th the Contemporary Dance Practices graduate students present two original dance pieces; IN THE END by Inga Huld Hákonardottir and DON'T LET ME DOWN by Shannon Gillen & Jason Cianciulli.
Dear guests
A dancer's graduation performance is a rite of passage, concluding the time together as students while entering the professional community as dance artists.
In this double-bill performance, we follow ten grading students of Contemporary Dance Practices as they grapple with endings and beginnings, challenging the here and now, rising and falling to the beat with their hearts in hand.
They invite us to witness apocalyptic, intricate landscapes with their raw and energetic movement material, as rebels, poets, occultists, fighters, wanderers.
During their three-year BA education at the Iceland University of the Arts, these emerging artists have shown bravery, dedication and residency. I welcome you to celebrate their unique artistry and dedication to their craft as they dance - igniting a fire within their hearts and ours.
Katrín Gunnarsdóttir
Associate Professor and Program Director
Graduating students:
Alice Romberg
Christa Ropponen
Cristina Isabel Agueda
Juulius Vaiksoo
Lea Alexandra Gunnarsdóttir
Leevi Matias Rauhalahti
Olga Maggy Winther
Olivia Teresa Due Pyszko
Sara Lind Guðnadóttir
Vigdís Birna Grétarsdóttir
DON'T LET ME DOWN
Our origins start before we can remember, so invitably we have to take someone's word for how things began. And though we prize a sense of choice and causality, we are actually unthered, flailing around in space. Pushing against nothing, just to feel our bodies burn. And so we are drifting along in the current of something we don't understand (and the truth is we don't need to understand anything to accept to accept life) a bit of joy, some pain, and the sheer fucking luck of being here at all.
Choreographers: VIM VIGOR/Shannon Gillen and Jason Cianciulli
Choreographic collaborator: Katherine Kiessling
Costume & set design: Guðný Hrund Sigurðardóttir
Light design: Ólafur Ágúst Stefánsson
Lyrics: Shannon Gillen
Original Score: Marshall Chadbourne with excerpts from Orville Peck's ‘Fancy’ and an interview of Ruby Baker, an eighty-six year old Appalachian woman from Harlan County, Kentucky from the documentary ‘Soft White Underbelly’.
VIM VIGOR is a physical dance theater company under the artistic direction of Shannon Gillen and co-choreographer Jason Cianciulli. Found as a collaborative think tank, VIM breasts together innovative and originally married artists from around the world to create original, dancing theater. (Chile), DANCEworks (US), Gibney Presents (US), Perry dance (US), Perry dance (US).
IN THE END
In The End marks the end of the studies of the BA students of dance at LHÍ. In The End is a dance that reflect the transformative aspect of ends. What is born from the end of something? Is the end of the same as series of different durations dances to create new compositions. This concurrence of dances effects the movement, but this impact does not come from the quality of the evidence, all the changes.
Coreographer: Inga Huld Hákonardóttir
Co-creaton & performance: 3rd year students
Set design: Guðný Hrund Sigurðardóttir
Costume design: Guðný Hrund Sigurðardóttir & Kristrún Rut Antonsdóttir
Live music & composition: Stirnir Kjartansson
Light design: Ólafur Ágúst Stefánsson
Artistic advice & drama: Védís Kjartansdóttir
The work of Inga Huld Hákonardóttir is located in the field of performance and choreography and on occasion branches into music/ concert. Her work generally focuses on seeing friction between the symbolic and the sensorial. Inga graduated from the PRTS, Brussels in 2014 and has been working in the field of performance, with a home base in Brussels since.
http://www.ingahakonardottir.com/
