Resonance is a powerful new work by award-winning choreographer James Batchelor and Collaborators, uniting three generations of Australian dancers in a moving celebration of memory, connection, and reinvention.
The work brings Batchelor’s meditative choreographic language into a curious dialogue with the legacy of Tanja Liedtke – a rising star in the Australian dance scene whose life was cut short at the age of 29 on the eve of her ground-breaking appointment as Artistic Director of Sydney Dance Company in 2007. Liedtke’s untimely passing left an indelible mark on the dance community; this performance recaptures the creativity and potential of her ideas through the lens of the next generation in dance.
Featuring some of the dancers who worked closely with Liedtke, Resonance recognises the dancer’s body as a living archive. With an intergenerational cast, including guest dancers from the Victorian College of the Arts, Resonance invites audiences into an intimate act of choreographic transmission. It celebrates dance as a vital language of friendship, community, and continual transformation, revealing the boundless creativity that emerges through its circulation.
James Batchelor is a choreographer and performer working at the intersection of movement, sound, and visual design. His practice explores the body as a living archive – attuned to its surroundings, sensitive to time, and capable of carrying knowledge across generations.
His choreography unfolds through cycling repetitions, micro-variations, and improvisational logic that invites audiences into a meditative state of deep attention. Batchelor’s past works, including Deepspace, Hyperspace and Shortcuts to Familiar Places, have emerged from interdisciplinary research contexts, including a mapping expedition to remote Antarctic islands. His work continues to explore how the body absorbs, stores, and transmits embodied knowledge, both personal and collective.
Resonance will have its Victorian premiere Wednesday 1 October – Saturday 4 October, 7.30 pm at The Substation, Newport as part of Melbourne Fringe. For more information, visit https://www.james-batchelor.com.au/
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