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Laurence Lemieux and Erin Poole in Apolonia Velasquez and Ofilio Sinbadinho’s Uplica, October 15, 2014 Photo: Kristy Kennedy, courtesy of Coleman Lemieux & Compagnie The Toronto Urban Dance Symposium (TUDS) was perhaps an early form of Spicey’s question – “How can I innovate?” – while Gadfly was still formulating its own response. TUDS made public their own process of inquiry: how to make a living, how to make a life. “There was nobody helping street dancers,” says Sinbadinho. Christine Moynihan, then executive director of the Dance Umbrella of Ontario, encouraged them to apply for their first grant. The first edition of TUDS in 2010 was simple: workshops, information sessions and panel discussions. Its achievement was tremendous – it made visible a significant, young and diverse community, skilled and versed in an extraordinary range of styles. Arts funders, service organizations and presenters paid attention. Now in its sixth edition, TUDS has grown from a one-day event to a five-day festival. Its vision, says Velasquez, is “to highlight different angles of the culture, of the artist; to empower street dancers, but also to showcase the art form.” 42 Dance Collection Danse TUDS now also includes professional battles, solo and company and performances, commissions and the Gadfly Awards. This year, Sinbadinho and Velasquez are remounting works on young dancers who haven’t yet worked in a professional company context. TUDS, says Sinbadinho, was intended “to give the form a chance to become a practice.” He describes what has been the culture’s tendency towards entropy: “You’d go to a showcase, and you’d see someone who’d make you say, ‘Whoa – this one’s killin’ it.’ If this was classical dance, you’d think, in ten years he’ll be in The National Ballet of Canada. But in the context of street dance, even the most brilliant dancer might disappear: this one will end up waitressing; that one will devote herself to teaching without noticing that she’s stopped performing; another one will go back to college to study kinesiology. Three years later, at that same showcase, you’d find a whole new array of dancers.” Sinbadinho describes Gadfly’s vision to develop the culture so that “the commitment deepens and the art can evolve. Now, young dancers see dancers who are mature, who are thirty years old, who are training rigorously. They see a dancer like Lady C, and I hear them say: ‘That girl – every night, she goes home, she pushes back her furniture to the wall and she trains.’” Ronnie Brown of the Oakville Centre for the Performing Arts is among the presenters who have developed a long relationship with the company. Brown programmed Klorofyl in 2012; that same year, before the Oakville premiere, the Downtown Oakville Jazz Festival was featuring Dr. Draw, and Brown convinced the committee to present Gadfly alongside as an outreach strategy. It paid off: the company performed on an outdoor stage for an audience of 3000; that fall, when Gadfly performed at the Oakville Centre, the show sold out. “What they were doing wasn’t just for young people,” says Brown. “They were turning on all ages. Children came with parents and grandparents; teenagers came in social groups. I don’t
think anybody knew they were coming to see a street dance company … that was something they learned reading the program.” Brown describes Gadfly’s tremendous influence beyond the Oakville Centre’s walls, including the company’s recent work with the Hamilton Art Crawl, as well as ArtHouse, an Oakville youth arts organization that prioritizes lowincome families. “Apolonia and Ofilio are amazing with people, even if they’ve never experienced dance.” Brown notes both the waves of street dancers who are compelled by the possibilities of the theatre and contemporary dance artists who are influenced by a diversity of urban dance styles and says, “I see this as the future of contemporary dance.” Andrea Simpson-Fowler, founder of Leaping Feats in Whitehorse, describes an equally enthusiastic response in a wholly different context. Simpson-Fowler initially brought in Velasquez to offer workshops to the large body of students – up to 800 in a season – with a passion for urban dance. “She was incredible,” says Simpson-Fowler. “We have foster kids, kids with ADHD, autism; we deal with behavioural issues, coordination issues, learning disabilities. And we also have serious dancers who go on to study dance at Ryerson University. It’s rare to find an instructor who can manage every single point on that spectrum the way Apolonia does.” Like Brown, Simpson-Fowler has invited the company as often as possible, each time with deepening involvement. Through the Breakdancing Yukon Society, Simpson-Fowler’s emerging professionals initiative, she developed a collaboration between Gadfly, Tony “Ynot” DeNaro from Top Rock (New York) and Kim Sato from Vancouver to create a new work with young dancers. The subsequent year, Gadfly returned to mentor these artists to create works of their own. “You can see Gadfly’s impact across Canada,” says Simpson-Fowler. “Apolonia and Ofilio are encouraging street dance artists and companies who want to get into the theatre, with openness and generosity.” Street dance still faces significant hurdles in the broader dance community. This year, for the first time, two individual urban dancers were nominated for the Dora Awards: TUDS’ featured performers, Caroline “Lady C” Fraser and Axelle “Ebony” Munezero competed for the title of Best Female Performance. The award went to Lady C, but not before a dispute within the Toronto Alliance of Performing Arts (TAPA), which presents the awards. According to Scott Dermody from TAPA, the issue was the nature of the Lady C and Ofilio Sinbadinho battle at TUDS, 2014 Photo: E.S. Cheah No. 75, Fall 2015 43
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