Indigenous Women Dancing Stories of Transformation
June 20-22, 2019 – Vancouver, Canada
A weekend of performances and events focusing on women in the arts, and dance works by contemporary Indigenous female artists. Curated by Olivia C. Davies and supported through The Dance Centre’s Artist-in-Residence program.
Special thanks to public funding support from the Canada Council for the Arts, City of Vancouver Cultural Award Program, and private donors who made this festival possible! Additional thanks to our partners at 8EAST/ Now Society, Made In BC Dance on Tour, Skwachàys Lodge , logo designer Joshua Mangeshig Pawis-Steckley, and participating artists Cheyenne Rain LeGrande, Jessica McMann, Kaha:wi Dance Theatre, Maura Garcia Dance, Raven Spirit Dance, and dubaikungkamiyalk | Mariaa Randall.
Check out the press!
Radio Play – CJSF 90.1 Intravenus Interview with Hosts Ciara and Robin
Matriarchs-Uprising-Celebrates-Powerful-Works/
matriarchs-uprising-indigenous-women-gather-build-international-dance-community
PERFORMANCES
Cheyenne Rain LeGrande (Canada) + Mariaa Randall (Australia)
Thursday June 20 | 7pm
At 8EAST, 8 East Pender Street, Vancouver – FB EVENT
In Painting the Dance, Mariaa Randall creates her world with one step, one gesture, one movement. Linking country to stories and stories to country, she creates a world that reflects her, that she can be seen in. A place where her image is controlled by her. Mariaa belongs to the Bundjalung and Yaegl people of New South Wales, and has choreographed with companies and artists including Jacob Boehme (Blood on the Dance Floor) and Ilbijerri Theatre Company. Pimiy in the Nehiyaw language means oil. In this work, Nehiyaw Isko emerging artist Cheyenne Rain LeGrande is thinking and working through ideas around oil and the environment. This work is also a response to her Nimâmâ, Connie LeGrande, who sings and hums into a drum. Her voice vibrating as it hits the drum and then she moves into spoken word.
Running time: 70 minutes + intermission | Post-show artist talkback | This performance includes nudity
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Photos: (L-R) Michelle Olson, Maura Garcia, Mariaa Randall
Raven Spirit Dance (Canada) + Kaha:wi Dance Theatre (Canada)
Friday June 21 | 8pm
Frost Exploding Trees Moon is a solo choreographed and performed by Michelle Olson of Raven Spirit Dance following the journey of a woman traveling her trap line. She finds a place to set up camp, builds her temporary home, and settles into the centre of her world of breath and perception. The piece tracks a physical human journey as well as a spiritual one. It asks: How does one house one’s spirit? What keeps us close to earth and what makes us long for stars?
Blood, Water, Earth is an embodied incantation, weaving performance, video and music/song. Channeling the ancestral, elemental and sacred, the imagery explores what is woman, from warrior, creator, sustainer of life, and huntress. Blood Water Earth places a Konkwehon:we worldview in the vanguard and is inspired by the concepts emerging from Kaha:wi Dance Theatre’s triptych series on Re-Matriation: Re-Quickening, Blood Tides and Skennen. Created and performed by internationally-acclaimed Artistic Director Santee Smith with key collaborators Louise Potiki Bryant (video designer), Cris Derksen (composition) and Andy Moro (lighting design).
Running time: 90 minutes + intermission | Post-show artist talkback
Jessica McMann (Canada) + Maura Garcia Dance (USA)
Saturday June 22 | 8pm
Cree dance artist and musician Jessica McMann’s iihksiisiinatsiistostiimao nipaitapiitsiin is an excerpt of a full-length solo in development. It layers indigenous creation methods with two years of land-based research on Alberta’s Nose Hill and the Ghost River, and shares personal histories connected to land and displacement. Soundscapes, visuals, and movement create an intimate space, where we witness a personal story that draws us into a different time.
Maura Garcia’s They Are Still Talking pays homage to our connection to our ancestors through air, gesture, intergenerational trauma and laughter. We are physically formed from all that our ancestors were. As we speak, the air that travels through our bodies carries their essence. Using dance, music and sculpture, this expressive work blends elements of narrative and ritual.
Running time: 90 minutes + intermission | Post-show artist talkback | This performance uses haze, and includes voluntary audience participation
Photos: (L-R) Olivia C. Davies, Santee Smith, Jessica McMann
CREATIVE LABS | CIRCLE CONVERSATIONS | MASTERCLASSES | SHOWINGS
Creative Lab: Poetry in Motion with Mariaa Randall
Thursday, June 20 | 1-4pm
Poetry in Motion invites participants to create movement from one of their favourite poems or write their own as source for creative movement and choreographic expression.
Creative Lab: Community Connections through Indigenous Dance
Friday June 21 | 5-7pm
Indigenous dance artists cultivate meaningful dance-related activities in their communities by sharing stories using traditional and contemporary dances. This lab features an opportunity for peer-to-peer knowledge exchange geared towards facilitators and community-engaged artists of all disciplines.
With Jessica McMann, Maura Garcia, Olivia C. Davies.
Free admission
Open Rehearsal and Studio Showing – FB EVENT
Saturday June 22 | 1pm-3pm
Choreographers Starr Muranko and Olivia C. Davies share excerpts of new works in development and host talk-backs with witnesses.
Free admission
Starr Muranko: Chapter 21 A visceral and honest experience shared by Starr through her personal healing journey and motherhood: A new baby boy. Chromosome 21. The big ‘C’ diagnosis. 21 days between treatments. 21 days to re-pattern my beliefs. Courage. Faith. Resilience.
Olivia C. Davies: Gidaashi (solo excerpt) zaagidaashi is translated as the action of being tossed out by whirlwind (Anishinaabemowin ~ translated by Elder Jacob Wemigwans from Wiikwemkoong First Nation). This new work in development attempts to translate the choices made through experiences of displacement.
Circle Conversation: Alone and Surrounded
Saturday June 22 | 6-7pm
An examination of the practice of creating solo works that are imbued with ancestral spirit; where we are alone and simultaneously surrounded by spirit.
With Mariaa Randall, Michelle Olson, Starr Muranko, Olivia C. Davies
Free admission
Master Classes with Contemporary Indigenous Choreographers EVENT
Participants must have some dance experience. Ages 16+
June 20, 10-11.30am Kaha:wi Dance Theatre | $20
June 22, 10-11.30am Raven Spirit Dance | $20
Skwachàys Artists in Residence Exhibit
June 15- August 15
The festival takes place on the ancestral and unceded Indigenous territories of the ʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) First Nations.
Matriarchs Uprising 2019 was supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, City of Vancouver Cultural Projects, Australian Consulate, Made in BC – Dance On Tour, NOW Society / 8EAST, The Scotiabank Dance Centre, community partner and individual donors. Thank you!