After a 10-year hiatus, Bangarra Dance Theatre has announced the return of Dance Clan in 2023, presented at Bangarra’s own Studio Theatre on Gadigal Country, Walsh Bay, from 3 – 18 February, 2023.
Since its inception in 1998, Dance Clan has fostered the talents of a new generation of storytellers, designers, dancers and choreographers, springboarding choreographic careers of artists including Deborah Brown, Tara Gower, Yolande Brown and Frances Rings. In 2023, Bangarra Senior Artist Beau Dean Riley Smith, Dancers Glory Tuohy-Daniell and Ryan Pearson, and Alumni and Youth Programs Coordinator Sani Townson will each choreograph an original work, performed by the Bangarra ensemble of dancers with a NAISDA Dance Intern.
Dance Clan offers the unique opportunity for Bangarra’s artists to share their own stories alongside a brilliant team of Indigenous early career designers, as they express their creative voice, with the support of their elders and mentors.
Current and former David Page Music Fellows Brendon Boney, Amy Flannery and Leon Rodgers will compose the score for each work. Fashion designer Clair Parker will design for the show under the mentorship of industry veteran Jennifer Irwin, NIDA’s Maddison Craven will work alongside acclaimed Lighting Designer Karen Norris, and Shana O’Brien will create the set design under the guidance of Bangarra’s multi award-winning Head of Design Jacob Nash.
Bangarra Associate Artistic Director, and incoming Artistic Director for 2023, Frances Rings said, “Dance Clan is designed to cultivate the ground for our next generation of emerging Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Storytellers. This program of new creative works has seen various presentations of cultural and contemporary new expressions thrive, expanding our distinctive dance lexicon and its ongoing impression on the wider artistic ecology. I am proud to have seeded my early choreographic skills as a recipient of Dance Clan and honoured to promote the development of First Nations artistic and cultural vibrancy into the future.”
Tickets for Dance Clan 2023 go on sale 8 November via bangarra.com.au.
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