'I have broken every bone on the left side of my body at least once. My knee ten years ago, my elbow five years later, a toe, a finger, and under my left eye I have a scar from a stone someone threw at me when I was a kid.' Jesús de Vega, dancer, choreographer, videographer and teremin player, has had the requisite...
Water and dance have agility in common. Yet there is much more to be gained from this interface. Two choreographies in the New Adventures series give audiences a water experience that is both playful and reflective. Under the title New Adventures, Dansmakers Amsterdam presents work by selected dancers and choreographers that they created during a four-week study residency at the production house,...
Is production house Dansmakers Amsterdam losing its housing? Together with other institutions in the dance sector, it has made every effort to align and further develop the whole spectrum of dance facilities in Amsterdam. In 2018, for example, the joint plan Danswerf was developed and submitted as an application for a two-year development grant to the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts (AFK)...
A new generation of leaders in culture rose in the Utrecht Academy Building on Thursday 9 November. The 39 leaders come from the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam to Schunck in Heerlen and from the VPRO in Hilversum to the Utrecht festival Le Guess Who. In a year and a half, they discovered new working methods and formulated new vistas for the arts. That could ...
The Amsterdam version of the Moving Futures festival 2017 has begun. For four days, young dance makers show all sides of their creativity. I experienced a cosmic journey with (SHIFT), was cheered by Third Culture Kid by Joseph Simons and saw the excitement slumped a little by a piano at the end of Your Mother at my Door by Timothy and...
'Many people find contemporary dance difficult. Especially performances by young makers who experiment and seek new ways. At the Moving Futures festival, everyone can discover how dance can touch you. We do this not only by showing good performances by young makers. We also offer activities around it, context programmes. By doing so, we give the audience tools to make a connection with...
In contemporary dance, artistic leaders are often in place for decades, at least in the Netherlands. This week, Leo Spreksel announced his departure from Korzo, as of September 2017. After 29 years, the director and programmer of dance at the theatre and production house in The Hague is calling it a day, because "in the Netherlands, commercialisation pushes away the voice of artists: procedures and formats are...
Today, Amsterdam Dance City sent a fire letter to funds and policymakers. Because things are going hard in the wrong direction with talent development. Especially independent choreographers lose out in the new subsidy plans. While these artists are already struggling to survive. Their own economic situation is hopeless and there are no good independent facilities to stage performances.
The Amsterdam Fund for the Arts would love a central 'vibrant dance venue' in Amsterdam. But surely such a Dance House has just been torpedoed? It was striking: in the Introduction to Dance to the grants awarded by the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts (AFK) for the 2017-2020 grant awards, they note an "ardent need" for a "dance house": a central place for development, production and the...
The Performing Arts Fund announced the awards for the 2017-2020 period. What does this mean for the dance sector? Pluralism and 'bleeding through'. While everyone is on holiday, the Performing Arts Fund announced the grant awards for the performing arts for the 2017-2020 period. And it was reiterated: the fund is facing a previously initiated budget cut of 30 per cent. That would...
Diversity in the Amsterdam art world is not yet flourishing. The Amsterdam Fund for the Arts, which announced its grant awards today, is getting a bit tired of it: "Across most disciplines, committees note that cultural diversity of audiences, staff and governance is disappointing, as are efforts to change this. Outside specialised organisations for which cultural diversity is a core business, ambitions are still not high, despite two decades of cultural policy in this area. If the ambitions are there, organisations do not always manage to give them hands and feet. There often seems to be a certain discomfort or 'not knowing how'."
So to start with the good news: Marmoucha grows 398 per cent compared to the previous grant round. The capital's producer and promoter of performing arts in the field of North African and Middle Eastern arts and culture in the Netherlands was severely cut back in 2013, but the Amsterdam Fund for the Arts found its work over the past four years to be so good that the grant has been more than deserved. In the new round of awards which became known on 1 August they rise from 25,070 euros to a tonne, adding that perhaps they should not be so ambitious.
Last weekend's workshop The Relevance of Dance, organised by Dansmakers Amsterdam and the European Dance House Network, sought to answer the question: What is the relevance of contemporary dance art for audiences? Suzy Blok, general director of Dansmakers Amsterdam, opened the atelier by talking about the desire of production houses to bring dance more to the...
While Amsterdam languished for years with a plan for a Dance House, Chassé Dance Studios will open its doors in December. The former Chassé church has been transformed into a multifunctional centre with eight professional dance studios, 45 hotel rooms, a gym in the ridge, and a grand café. Lenny Balkissoon, ex-dancer and actor (Zeg 'ns Aaa) financed, designed and organises the construction. Cultural entrepreneurship in turbulent times. It can be done.
''You would think: women are emancipated. But people long for the clichés and prejudices about women from the 1950s again. If you dress super-feminine, you get whistled at like a dog. But how should
PUNCH! is a fantastic festival. It shows how much beauty, news and surprise emerge when the line between dance and performance is dissolved. PUNCH! promotes a refreshing view of the world and shakes loose entrenched interpretations. The young dance makers and performers show tremendous originality and creativity that you will not only enjoy watching, you will go...
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