Following Theo Clinkard’s recent commissions for Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch (Somewhat still, when seen from above) and Danza Contemporanea de Cuba (The Listening Room), his latest work, This Bright Field, for his own company will première on Thursday 25 May as part of Brighton Festival 2017.
Stage designs for This Bright Field will be created by Clinkard. He has worked as a stage designer for over 15 years (Sydney Dance, Malmo Opera, Skanes Dansteater, Opera La Scala, Scottish Opera and Scottish Dance Theatre among others) and conceives the designs for his own work in parallel with his choreographic thinking.
With live music by James Keane and lighting by Guy Hoare, This Bright Field draws on an international cast of dancers and performers: Temitope Ajose-Cutting (England), Pau Aran Gimeno (Spain), Natalie Corne (Wales), Nick Coutsier (Belgium), Luke Divall (England), Mathieu Geffré (France), James Keane (England), Meri Pajunpää (Finland), Colas Lucot (France), Leah Marojevic (England), Stephanie McMann (England), Antonin Rioche (France), and Crystal Zillwood (England).
This Bright Field is conceived in two parts. In the first, audiences are invited in small groups to share the stage with the performers as they collapse and expand a mobile installation. In the second part, the seated audience is presented with terrains of movement, sound and imagery.
Clinkard commented, “I'm incredibly excited that Brighton Festival have invited me to première This Bright Field at the glorious Concert Hall at Brighton Dome. It is a real pleasure to be sharing the work in my hometown and working with such a mindful and generous organisation.
"Rehearsals with the twelve dancers are underway and what is emerging in the studio is already absorbing to witness and has an urgent vitality that is somehow timely. Continuing the long standing collaborative relationships I have with my creative team and a new relationship with Independent Producer Annabel Dunbar will mean we can push all of our work further and, as I see it, craft a memorable event that contributes something distinct to the bigger conversation of this year’s Festival.
“Four years ago, Dance4 invited me to consider making a work for a larger stage and, in the time since, I have received some remarkable opportunities to create commissioned works to 'cut my teeth' as it were. This Bright Field constitutes the first work for my own group in three years and I am charged with the need to create a surprising and affecting event that is reflective of the new world we recently entered into. I am hopeful and I believe in the immense power of people dancing.”