Daina Ashbee brings her intense, unflinching vision to her first group work
The artist, celebrated in Quebec and abroad, brings J'ai pleuré avec les chiens (Time, Creation, Destruction) home
A hypnotic work for five intergenerational women performers, J’ai pleuré avec les chiens (Time, Creation, Destruction) is a durational performance by creator and choreographer Daina Ashbee. For her largest work to date, Daina uses repetition to insist, to reach points of trance, transformation and catharsis, to evoke rhythm, to manifest energetic states, to ask both performer and witness to endure and to carry the room to a climax and back, again and again.
J’ai pleuré avec les chiens (Time, Creation, Destruction) explores lightness, pleasure and celebration as the result of the liberation of violence, the occupation of space and the exploration of the body from within and without. The darkness she has explored in previous works is present but challenged by the notion that the body is energy, and that energy can transform.
Daina Ashbee is an artist, performer and choreographer based in Montreal, known for her radical works at the edge of dance and performance. Recognized as one of the most promising young choreographers of the next generation, since 2015 her work has been presented more than 100 times in a dozen countries by some of the world’s most prestigious venues and festivals. Daina is currently the artist-in-residence at Agora de la danse in Montreal and the associate artist of Centre de Création O Vertigo - CCOV.
The National Creation Fund’s investment of $145,000 made it possible for Daina to collaborate with an international team of artists during an extended series of creation and technical residencies.
Co-production partners: Rencontres chorégraphiques internationales de Seine-Saint-Denis (France), Centre de Création O Vertigo – CCOV (Canada), KVS Brussels Stadstheater (Belgium), Festival TransAmériques – FTA, Agora de la danse, National Arts Centre (Canada), BIT Teatergarasjen (Norway)
Residency partners: Résidences KVS Brussels Stadstheater (Belgium), Conjunto Santander de Artes Escénicas (Guadalajara), MOVES Production, Gestion et promotion des Artes de Scène (Mexico), Harbourfront Centre (Toronto)
Funding partners: Canada Council for the Arts, la Délégation générale du Québec, et le Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec.
Developed with support from the National Arts Centre’s National Creation Fund.
Presented by Les Rencontres Chorégraphiques de Seine-Saint-Denis | Jun 9 - Jun 10, 2021 | Le Pavillon (Paris) |
Presented by KVS Brussels Stadstheater | Jun 15 - Jun 16, 2021 | KVS Brussels Stadstheater (Belgium) |
Presented by the Vancouver International Dance Festival | Mar 9 - Mar 12, 2022 | Scotiabank Dance Centre (Vancouver) |
Presented by Potsdamer Tanztage 2022 | May 17 - May 18, 2022 | Fabrik Big Stage (Potsdam) |
Presented by Circuit-Est | Jun 4 2022 | Studio A, Circuit-Est centre chorégraphique (Montreal) |
Presented by EMPAC | Jan 11 2023 | EMPAC (Troy, NY) |
Presented by Gibney Dance | Jan 13 - Jan 14, 2023 | Agnes Varis Performing Arts Center (New York City) |
Presented by The IMPACT Theatre Festival | Sep 28 - Sep 29, 2023 | Kitchener Gaol Yard |
The artist, celebrated in Quebec and abroad, brings J'ai pleuré avec les chiens (Time, Creation, Destruction) home
"À la fois classique et déroutant."
The Indigenous artist Daina Ashbee’s first group piece, at the Gibney, simmers with tension and offers an approach to healing.