dance as an effort to understand

Borrowed from Yong Wei's facebook:

thought while sitting by the pond today: the study of dance, perhaps is not just to perfect the craft of beautiful movements and/or developed aesthetic voice, but is also a science that is an effort to understand, or to understand better, the natural and social world and how it works, with observable physical experiences through the body as the basis of that understanding. It is done through embodying the natural phenomena, and/or through experimentation within a creative process and research. Perhaps...

Performance Updates Aug-Dec 2013

Dear friends,

I’m back from the summer tour of Focus on the Atlantic Coast of France, and working between Singapore and KL on my new performance/installation/creation at the Substation, among other projects.  The next few months for me will include some performances and teaching in Singapore (I’m picking up my lecturer’s pass at Lasalle!), and performances and labs in Sweden, Germany, Malaysia and Taiwan. As always, I would love to catch up with you and share my work here or overseas.  Do drop me a line if you’d like to connect while I’m in your part of the world!

Also for the first time in these updates, I’ve attached a publication from the volunteer team that I run at Oogachaga, a counseling and personal development organization for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning/queer (LGBTQ) community. It’s not an artistic pursuit at all – it’s about how we can support ourselves and others through emotional crises. We had an amazing team that worked very hard on this and its associated workshop on 18 Aug. I’m very proud of it and hope to make it available to as many people as possible, LGBTQ or straight, who might find it useful.

I don’t know if I’ll ever have another year like this one. I’m not sure if I should – but here goes!

love,

Sze

Contradiction

Sat 31 August 7.30pm

72-13 Mohamed Sultan Rd

Free admission

I’m part of the annual literary reading in Singapore’s pride festival Indignation this year.  The curators have picked an interesting selection of my work from six years ago to the present!  I’ll be reading and probably dancing them.  Curated by Ng Yi-Sheng and Jasmine Seah, you can expect an evening of excellent poetry, prose, spoken word and theatre script readings, often material that hasn’t had the chance to be published. All are welcome (not just LGBTQ folks!) but do come early to get a seat, because it’s usually packed to capacity. Details at https://www.facebook.com/events/669998949682641/?fref=ts

Do Gorillas Peel Bananas? with David Lim

Fri-Sat 13-14 September 8pm

The Substation

Tickets $10.  Email reservations boxoffice@substation.org

This is my labour of love for the year.  When I was selected for the Performance Open Call programme this year, I launched myself into a foolhardy adventure into forms and material that I have always wanted to do but never had the opportunity to try before. It’s finally come down to a crazy and I hope funny performance/installation/experiment on non-state censorship and control.  The piece developed out of conversations with David on the sides of the KL Contact Improv festival (where we are co-organisers) in the last two years. It’s the first time that I’m driving the concept and direction for a project of this scope, and I’m lucky to have the support of my collaborators (also Andy Lim and Brian Gothong Tan) and the mentorship of Natalie Hennedige of Cake Theatre and Noor Effendy Ibrahim of the Substation. It has been and continues to be a terrifying, thrilling gamble for me. Audience size is restricted to 40 pax per night so do book early if you’re planning to come!  You can view the synopsis and a fruit ninja promo video here. http://www.substation.org/event/do-gorillas-peel-bananas/

The Third Space – Explorations in Contemporary Asian Dance presented by Nanyang Academy of Fine Arts

Fri 11 Oct 2013 7.30pm/Sat 12 Oct 2013 6pm

The Esplanade Recital Studio

Tickets $15/$10 (concession) at SISTIC

This year NAFA decided to let its alumni choreographers step up for the Third Space platform at the Esplanade da:ns festival. Six proposals were selected, including my new short work “II”. It’s an improvised duet for three dancers, scored from the instructions on the back of a chopsticks wrapper! I am dancing in this piece with Laura Tham and Farliana Ghan.  The rest of the evening’s programme is a varied mix of lyrical, spiritual and experimental visions of five fellow graduates – Lin Juliana, Lee Ren Xin, Max Chen, Elizabeth Lee, Goh Shou Yi. Details at  http://www.dansfestival.com/2013/next-gen/the-third-space/

All Is Divine

October/December 2013

Dansens Hus, Stockholm/Kampnagel, Hamburg

At last year’s Singapore Arts Festival I got to take part in a workshop with Swedish director Charlotte Engelkes, who was developing a third instalment to her Wagner-comedy-dance-theatre trilogy “A Very Wagnerian Night”.  This year the workshop segment has developed into a fantastic full length show, where we spy into the private lives of the German/Nordic mythical pantheon as the world is coming to an end. At which point the gods turn out to be quite human, and quite Asian too. Together with a team of actors, opera singers, sound artists and designers from Sweden, Germany, and from Singapore singer Celine Rosa Tan and visual artist Brian Gothong Tan. Details at charlotteengelkes.com

Asia Pacific Impro!

4-10 November 2013

DPAC, Kuala Lumpur (PJ)

I’ve been invited to the first platform in Southeast Asia for improvised performance, along with dancers and musicians from Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia and Singapore.  We will be involved in a week of research labs, but also opening the doors to teach dance workshops and share performances. Details at asiapacificimpro.org

Be with Me - Self Care in Emotional Crisis a publication by Oogachaga/OC Women

http://issuu.com/oogachaga/docs/bewithme or http://www.oogachaga.com/congregaytion/website/detail/13

Practice

"You should not be practicing to have a 'good' practice, but instead to keep steadiness within yourself. Practice happily regardless of whether it is 'good' or not. Sometimes some postures will not be possible, but when you accept the good and the bad and everything becomes equal for you, that is yoga."

- R. Sharath Jois