Dance and Music Short Film Program

Saturday, August 24 | 5 PM | Cinematheque
Program running time: 69 min

Followed by a pop-up performance in The Cinematheque courtyard by Danza Descalza from Montreal. Co-presented by New Works.

Curated by Adriana Contreras and Sonia Medel

WHITE NOISE (BRUIT BLANC)
Director: Joleen Mitton
Cree/Canada | 5.50 min

Inspired by an original performance piece by Joleen Mitton. Two Indigenous youths are subjected to the threat and dangers of colonization since its beginnings to the modern day. A ceremonial cleansing of the white influence is followed by a return to the land.


MUSIC OF THE RIVER
Director: Nadia González Bautista
Colombia/Argentina | 7.30 min

Music of the River refers to the musical expressions that emerge from the towns surrounding the Magdalena River. Rhythms like cumbia have defined and represented the cultural identity of Colombia throughout the world.


MAZOCAHUI (MOUNTAIN RANGE DEER)
Director: Hiram González
Yaqui tribe, Sonora, Mexico | 3.28 min

A teenager performs the ancestral folkloric ballet of the northwest of Mexico where a deer flees from its hunter, who requires its divine flesh.


DD
Director: Victor Guzmán
Colombia/Argentina | 3.37 min

A body asleep, used to stillness, habituated to rigid inexpressive forms, daydreams with movement. Space can define a body but movement can redefine a space.


LIGHT THEM UP (LUZ PARA ELLAS)
Director: Celina Escher
Cuba/Switzerland | 27 min

Debbie, singer-songwriter, and Afíbola, poet fighter. Two Afro-descendant women that through their music are freed from the stereotypes imposed by society.


NÓMADAS
Director: Henry Daniel
Canada | 6 min 

This short film introduces its audience to an evening-length performance work and an audio/video installation about transnational movement. It is about people crossing borders of one kind or another, searching for one thing or another; a stable life, a safer environment, better jobs, to escape persecution, war, famine, etc. nómadas looks at patterns in these large-scale movements of bodies across international spaces by thinking of them as a transnational choreography, one that speaks to the deep fragmentation that exists between communities within as well as outside national borders, between nationalized and personalized bodies, and between social and political institutions and the ordinary people they were meant to serve. 

A short excerpt of nómadas will be performed on August 22 before the Opening Night Film, LOS SILENCIOS.


RUBY’S SON (EL HIJO DE RUBY)
Director: Gisela Rosario
Puerto Rico | 16 min

Lio narrates how he discovered his father’s legacy as a Bomba dancer, an Afro-Puerto Rican music genre, and makes it his own.


Pop-Up Dance Performance
Danza Descalza: AKO

Danza Descalza, AKO. Photo: David Wong.

Directly from Montreal (QC), Danza Descalza brings us AKO, a performance that invites audiences to enter a mesmerizing, warm and colourful universe. Designed for public spaces, AKO brings forward a unique aesthetic approach that combines the expressiveness and rhythms of traditional Afro-Colombian dance through contemporary writing.
AKO is a production that is both approachable and unique, and part of a growing movement to make dance more democratic and accessible.

Danza Descalza is on tour in BC and will be part of New Works’ All Over the Map Series on Sunday, August 25 at 1:00 and 3:00 PM on Granville Island. They will also present two dance workshops on August 26 at The Roundhouse. For more details, visit newworks.ca.


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