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This year’s SIDance International Collaboration is a Korea-Canada collaboration, inviting Toronto-based Korean choreographer Hanna Kiel. Though previously SIDance had invited artists from the Quebec region of Canada, this year’s program invited Hanna Kiel, who is not yet well known in Korea, and prepared a piece with dancers from both countries. This piece is meaningful not only because it is a Korea-Canada collaboration, but also because it introduces a Korean choreographer who has been recognized in the North American and Canadian dance world after many years of hard work. Also, one of the reasons for this collaboration was to look for a choreographer who respects movement and physicality as there is a growing reevaluation of conceptual dance that has been somewhat overpowered in the European dance world. This piece, featuring dancers from both countries, is scheduled to be performed in Canada next year.
This year’s overseas invitations highlights ‘accessibility.’ Until now, SIDance has been at the forefront of introducing most prestigious works in dance world. However, as the works of renowned dance companies have become larger in scale and their genres have become more comprehensive, it has become increasingly difficult for SIDance’s budget to invite the biggest names of the scene. Accordingly, SIDance has decided to look for works that can approach the general audience more sincerely and easily, rather than works with the aura of ‘best reputation’ or ‘leading experiments.’ In any situation, SIDance aims to make contemporary dance prosperous. In this light, 3-4 works that are ‘easy to understand but of high quality’ have been selected. It was possible as the SIDance’s vision of popularizing contemporary dance and the Eunpyeong Cultural Foundation, which has a will to introduce contemporary dance to the public more closely made a business agreement. The remaining 3-4 works are more authentic contemporary dance. In particular, Dewey Dell from Italy is a group created by the three descendants of Romeo Castellucci, and is attracting attention on the international stage. The ‘second Castellucci’ will be introduced for the first time at the SIDance.
Since its inception, SIDance has been striving to introduce Korean choreographers’ works to overseas through ‘Young Dancer’s Night’ and ‘Who’s Next’. Recently, due to budgetary difficulties, we are no longer able to open platforms like ‘Who’s Next’, but our will to advance Korean works overseas by any means remains unchanged. The works being introduced this time were also selected with the intention of meeting Korean and then oversea audiences.
Choreographer Bae Jin-ho of the Subverted Anatomical Landscape (SAL) is still in the early stages of development, but he has boldly expanded his own world. Korea and Germany-based choreographer Kim Hyoung-min's I Dance the Theater is a unique work that questions the identity of the theater, which presupposes numerous rules such as political correctness and trigger warnings. After the Seoul performance, it will be presented in front of about 100 foreign delegates at the Busan International Performing Arts Market (BPAM).
Goblin Party & Gamblerz Crew's The Drum’s Dream is a work that reinterprets traditional Korean culture in a modern way through modern dance and b-boying. Im Hee-jong of Cosmos in Art was selected from last year's SIDance Tomorrow and was invited to perform in Korea.
SIDance Tomorrow assigns mentors to young choreographers who are in the early stages of their creative career. Last year’s SIDance Tomorrow participant, Im Hee-jong, was invited to this year’s domestic invitation program. While considering the path that our contemporary dance should take to evoke empathy from people around the world in line with K-culture, we selected choreographer Jeong Bo-gyeong of Korean creative dance as a mentor so that we would not lose our Korean identity.
In the case of the A Performance Series of Lineages and Dances of Korea programs, there are many questions about why Korean traditional dance is performed at the contemporary dance festival. Since the first SIDance in 1998, we have been together because we believe that traditional dance is the root of the development of contemporary creative dance by recalling and reexamining tradition. Although we live in a globalized world through the process of Westernization, traditional dance, which has a completely different texture and breathing from the practices originating in the West, is the most natural movement for Koreans. Yeongnam Mu-ak will also be performed in front of about 100 foreign delegates at the Busan International Performing Arts Market (BPAM) in October.
Dance Eat Song is a program that SIDance attempted to popularize contemporary dance. This year, we are looking forward to inviting Seong Seungjung, a choreographer and video director who has produced dance films for many years.