Intoxicating collaborations create a unique Balancing Point
Anu Khapung at Princess Bay on Wellington’s South Coast. Photo by Caroline Atkinson Photography.
A consistently creative and experimental company of outstanding professionals are enticing new audiences to dance up and down the country. New Zealand’s longest running contemporary dance company, Footnote New Zealand Dance, is thriving
after a sell-out nation-wide tour of Search Engine, and will now showcase their talent in another dynamic new season, Balancing Point.
Fulltime company dancers, Georgia Beechey-Gradwell, Tyler Carney, Joshua Faleatua, Anu Khapung, and Adam Naughton, have attracted high praise, with reviewers calling recent performances ‘beguiling’, ‘spellbinding’, and ‘impressive.’ The company attracts top local and international choreographers to give their dancers innovative and exciting pieces to work with, and draws upon other artistic talent to give deep textural layers to their performances.
For Balancing Point, Footnote has gathered together a heady mix of New Zealand’s top musicians, designers and artists. “We’ve been successfully experimenting with new forms of collaboration this year in our Search Engine season, so for Balancing
Point we wanted to keep pushing and see how far we could go.” says Richard Aindow, General Manager.
Georgia Beechey-Gradwell at Princess Bay on Wellington’s South Coast. Photo by Caroline Atkinson Photography.
New Zealand artist, Zahra Killeen-Chance, has created Elliptical Fictions for Balancing Point. In collaboration with accomplished Wellington composer Emi Pogoni, Zahra Killeen-Chance has choreographed a visually mesmerising dance
that transcends the conventional limits of the form by drawing on martial arts she learned during a residency in Taipei. Adding to her hypnotic work is projected imagery by legendary New Zealand artist Richard Killeen, Zahra’s father, whose
work has exhibited widely internationally and across Aotearoa. This is the first time he has collaborated with his daughter. With costumes woven with continuous loom by Auckland University of Technology faculty members, this work brings together a potent combination of creativity.
In their captivating offering for Balancing Point, Australian choreographers, James O’Hara and Eliza Sanders, have created a tender ode to home. Having settled on the Wellington’s south coast, this rugged landscape is the silent collaborator in this piece and provided the backdrop for the vivid photoshoot for the season. Set to the cadences of acclaimed New Zealand songstress Nadia Reid, this dance speaks of the elation and comfort a sense of home brings for two international choreographers who have chosen to call Aotearoa their home. In this new collaborative work, the whirling energy of the Footnote dancers is accentuated by the costumes from New Zealand’s ethical fashion house, Kowtow, from their brand new Summer 2019 collection.
Balancing Point promises to be a rich, sophisticated, and global dance heightened by the performance of this vibrant contemporary company and its line-up of notable New Zealand creators. Footnote perform Balancing Point in Wellington, Christchurch and Auckland.