Biennale College Danza is committed to investing in the future generation of choreographic dance talent, through a focus on emerging dance-makers. Through co-productions, residencies, and invitations, we can make significant support early for young makers, and facilitate projects they could not easily access without us. This year, two more emerging talents selected from a pool of 50 international applications have been in residence, developing their practice through a bespoke programme. Scott Elstermann and Hai-Wen HSU have been commissioned to create new work on the Biennale College dancers, receiving intensive time, space and mentoring for choreographic and conceptual development. These exciting new pieces are showcased in the Arsenale.
Mosaic (choreography by Scott Elstermann). Responding to binary tensions, a futuristic capsule sets the parameters for a double rupture; an oscillating performance of extraction and struc- tural uplift signalling generational transition and renewal. Static, picture-perfect moments of control and connection are dismantled, hurled and overlaid with historical imagery that reach deep into our movement archive to create something of the present. Our imagined future may appear bleak but, by retracing our past and peeling back the layers of heritage, we have the capacity to yield to an alternative future; to reveal and reflect a new narrative, where threads of old are delicately collated into a patchwork of progression.
Ténèbres vacillantes (choreography by Hai-Wen HSU). Temperature, human body, heat, cold, space, emotions: an unprecedented union between the power of a relationship and the poetry of the moment. We are made of interfaces; life is exchange, imbalance, evanescence.
