photo credit: Sarah Chase

Art Circulation represents The door opened west

Starting this fall, Art Circulation, a non-profit organization composed of contemporary dance companies and independent artists, will be representing the solo The door opened west, a choreography by Sarah Chase dedicated to Marc Boivin:

With The door opened west, Chase develops a poetics of memory related to Boivin’s childhood memories, with a strong focus on architecture and natural elements. This complex piece combines gesture sequences with specific lighting patterns, illuminating this biographical work with a bright and mysterious arithmetic.

The door opened west will be presented in Montreal as part of the OFF-CINARS program, in Circuit-Est’s Studio C, at 1881 St-André, on November 9, 2022, at 2:30 p.m. (English version) and on November 11, 2022, at 12 p.m. (French version).

For more details, please contact Jamie Wright at Art Circulation: jamie@artcirculation.org.

Moins au sujet de moi at Danse-Cité

On October 21, 22, 23 and November 18, 19 and 20, 2022, Moins au sujet de moi, a solo by Sarah-Ève Grant, inspired and performed by Marc Boivin, will be presented at Danse-Cité:

For the past ten years, creator and choreographer Sarah-Ève Grant has been working on a portrait series of artists from different fields, with a specific curiosity about the people behind the art. What happens when an artist teaches and devotes their life to dance? Sarah-Ève’s work Moins au sujet de moi turns to dancer and teacher Marc Boivin. Walking the line between truth and fiction, the choreographer uses documentary fiction to look behind the scenes, share secrets, and reveal the infinitely small.

Tickets
Danse-Cité: (514) 525-3595
https://danse-cite.org/en/billetterie

Dates
October 21, 2022 – 5 p.m.
October 22, 2022 – 11 a.m. + 8 p.m.
October 23, 2022 – 3 p.m.
November 18, 2022 – 5 p.m.
November 19, 2022 – 11 a.m. + 8 p.m.
November 20, 2022 – 3 p.m.

Déclarations at Théâtre Prospero

This is her dying breath
This is my heart in the morning
This is her laughter
This is her absence
This is the state of things to come

On a plane, shortly after learning that his mother has terminal cancer, world-renowned Canadian artist Jordan Tannahill frantically writes out hundreds of statements. These short sentences aim to capture the essence of a life, to encapsulate an existence that is slowly fading.

On stage, a compelling theatrical device comes to life while five actors perform movements set to each of the short statements. The movements change from one performance to another. Each evening the spontaneous, dynamic work is created anew.

Déclarations is a complex and fascinating ballet, choreographed by Mélanie Demers and performed by Vlad Alexis, Marc Boivin, Claudia Chillis-Rivard, Macha Limonchik, and Jacques Poulin-Denis.

Tickets
November 1 to 19, 2022

The door opened west premiering at the FTA

The door opened west, a new solo performed by Marc Boivin in a choreography by Sarah Chase, will be presented at the 15th edition of the Festival TransAmériques.

After months of lying fallow, we welcome with great pleasure the return to the stage and the premiering of the show at the FTA! However, the sanitary requirements greatly limit the capacity of the venue. We therefore encourage you to purchase your ticket as soon as sales open, on May 11, 2021 at noon.

 

The door opened west will also be presented in digital version from June 12 at 6 p.m. to June 29 at 11 p.m. Single tickets and tickets packages for webcast shows are available for purchase.

 

The door opened west
Mirroring the intricate architecture of a life narrative, the solo piece reveals the enigmatic geometry of memory, as told by gestures, words and light. An ode to maturity and to the beauty of recounting our existence.

Presented in theatre on June 1, 2 and 3, 2021
At 5pm (French) and at 7pm (English)
Agora de la danse, Espace Orange

Trailer and more details on the FTA website

photo credit: Sarah Chase

The door opened west, a new creation by Sarah Chase

The memory of someone

The shape of a rock

The wind

Pulling the glitter

The light

The distant land

The pool

 2020! First project of the year : the culmination of Sarah Chase’s solo that began in 2015, at the other end of the country, on Hornby Island in British Columbia. The creation of this new piece in residency at Agora de la danse’s Espace Bleu will end on January 17, and be ready for presentations next summer.

Lighting by James Proudfoot, sound environment by Antoine Bédard.

More details soon…

photo credit: Michael Slobodian

Une idée sinon vraie... back at the Gesù theater

January 24 and 25, 2019 Marc will perform Une idée sinon vraie… with the Quatuor Bozzini. Set to Ana Sokolović’s Commedia dell’arte I et II, a musical composition inspired by the archetypal figures from this theatrical form, this performance is a tight-knit collaboration between choreographer and dancer Marc Boivin and the Quatuor Bozzini. The score proposes a “mise en abyme” of the many emblematic characters in Commedia dell’arte. Like a Russian doll, it navigates through each character in an effort to understand their essence, their universal proportions eliciting feelings of vertigo, and their irrevocable attractions to the mysteries of the individual, questioning our own freedom of being.

 

Le Gesù
1200 de Bleury, Montreal
Facebook Event
Tickets

At yes of day in Ottawa

The piece choreographed by Yvonne Coutts will be presented by Series Dance 10 at the Ottawa Dance Directive from November 22 to 24, 2018.

photo credit: Claudia Chan Tak

La vie attend at OFF-CINARS

Parts+Labour_Danse’s La vie attend will be presented at l’Agora de la danse, Espace Paul-André Fortier on November 16, 2018 at 1PM

Choreographers : David Albert-Toth, Emily Gualtieri
Dancer-collaborators : Joe Danny Aurélien, Marc Boivin, Simon-Xavier Lefebvre, Milan Panet-Gigon, Nicolas Patry
Texts : The dancer-collaborators
Music : David Drury
Costumes : Angela Rassenti
Lighting designer : Paul Chambers
Outside eyes : Mélanie Demers, Ginelle Chagnon, Étienne Lepage, Jamie Wright

photo credit: Mathieu Doyon

Animal triste at Off-CINARS

Animal Triste by Mélanie Demers will be presented at the Maison de la culture Frontenac on November 13, 2018 at 8PM.

Direction and choreography: Mélanie Demers
On stage: Marc Boivin, James Gnam, Brianna Lombardo and Riley Sims / Rehearsal assistant: Anne-Marie Jourdenais / Original Lighting: Alexandre Pilon-Guay / Music: Jacques Poulin-Denis

photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

WOULD by Mélanie Demers in Montreal's Maisons de la culture

From November 5 to 29, 2018, WOULD will be touring in the Maisons de la culture in Montreal (free entrance).

 

November 5, 7.30 p.m. – Cégep de Saint-Laurent, Salle Émile Legault

November 6, 7.30 p.m. – Maison de la culture Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie

November 8, 7.30 p.m. – Maison culturelle et communautaire de Montréal-Nord

November 9, 7.30 p.m. – Maison de la culture du Plateau-Mont-Royal

November 28, 8 p.m. – Maison de la culture Claude-Léveillée

November 29, 8 p.m. –  Notre-Dame-de-Grâce Cultural Center

photo credit: Dominique Bouchard

Technique classes at RQD

October 1 to 4 and 9 to 12, 2018
from 10 AM to noon

Musician: Iohann Laliberté

Classes will take place at the Centre de création O Vertigo – 175, Sainte-Catherine Street West

5$/class, with the support of Emploi-Québec and Compétence Culture

At yes of day in Toronto

From September 27 to 29, 2018 Marc will dance with Sylvie Bouchard in Yvonne Coutts’ At yes of day in a shared evening at the Winchester Street Theatre in Toronto.

Crying in Public at Escales Improbables

From September 10 to 15, 2018 Marc will dance in Tedi Tafel’s Crying in public at Montreal’s Escales Improbables.

photo credit : Dominique Bouchard, on the picture Melina Stinson and Nicolas Labelle

In residency at offta with Sarah-Ève Grant-Lefebvre and participation at OFF.Radio

From May 28 to 31, Marc will dance in Sarah-Ève Grant-Lefebvre’s project, Danse ta vie, in residency at the Maison de la Culture du Plateau-Mont-Royal during the offta.

Sarah-Ève Grant-Lefebvre continues her research on the project Danse ta vie, title of the fourth iteration in the ongoing series Portraits begun 5 years ago. A cross between documentary and fiction, the project unfolds as a choreography on the transmission of knowledge in a time when everything is felt, but rarely documented from an intellectual perspective.

Presentation Thursday, May 31 at 3 p.m.

http://offta.com/en/event/residencies-sarah-eve-grant-lefebvre/

Video capsule produced by Circuit-Est around the Danse ta vie project

Wednesday, May 30, Marc will also participate in an episode of OFF.Radio about issues of choreographic archiving with Mélanie Demers and Lise Gagnon from the Fondation Jean-Pierre Perreault.

http://offta.com/en/event/off-radio-en/

photo credit: Maxime Côté, on the picture: Benjamin Harvey and Amanda Petropoulos

hic et nunc at EDCM

hic et nunc, a choreography created by Marc for the first year students at EDCM will be presented during Les danses à deux temps, featuring first- and second-year students at Tangente from May 16th to 19th, at 7 p.m..

Details and tickets: http://www.edcm.ca/fr/les-danses-deux-temps

Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/432181223906383/

Between traces and writing - Focus days at the Fondation Jean-Pierre Perreault

As president of the Fondation Jean-Pierre Perreault and member of the scientific committee of the Focus Days, Marc will attend the event focusing on the concepts of traces, notation, documentation, memory, body/archives and digital technologies in dance. The event organized by the Fondation will be held at Hexagram UQAM from May 15 to 18 and streamed on Facebook.

More informations on the event here

May 15 AM streaming

May 15 PM streaming

May 16 AM streaming

May 16 PM streaming

Une idée sinon vraie... at VivierMix créatif

May 9th, Marc will present an excerpt of Une idée sinon vraie… at the VivierMix créatif. The event will take place at the Gesù theater and Marc will perform with the Quatuor Bozzini.

photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

WOULD by Mélanie Demers at La Chapelle

I’ll be ending the season with a new performance of Mélanie Demers’ work WOULD at the Théâtre La Chapelle, with the dancer Kate Holden, on December 11, 12, 14 and 15, 2017 . . . It’s a must-see!

Drawing its inspiration from all possible futures, WOULD is a meditation on potentiality, utopia, and our mania for projecting ourselves into the future. Imagining the best, fearing the worst. And adapting as best we can to the present. Fuelled by the energy of two powerful dancers, WOULD is a reflection on the failures, falls and miscues that inevitably mark our imperfect paths. Marc Boivin and Kate Holden confront each other like two wild beasts warily approaching each other.

For this piece, Marc Boivin received the 2014 Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Performance—Male.
Mélanie Demers received the Prix du CALQ for best choreographic work of the 2014-2015 season with WOULD.

We can only applaud the consistency of the choreographic language of Mélanie Demers, the excellence of the two performers and the address with which the bilingual text has been included.
L. Renaud, Revue JEU, April 15

No wonder WOULD […] has earned Marc Boivin an award for his performance, as well as nominations for choreography and sound design. […] A beautiful piece which opens up a whole world of possibilities for Mélanie Demers.
I. Gagnon-Paradis, La Presse, April 15

http://maydaydanse.ca/english/home

http://lachapelle.org/en/calendar/would

New website

It’s quite a job to redesign a website and keep pace with the ever-changing communication tools of the 21st century! But this work-in-progress is not just about staying up to date; it’s about the pleasure of creating, communicating and sharing. A big thank you to Ariane Dessaulles, who designed and uploaded the new site, and to Jean Logan for his work on the visuals.

To archive my activities, organize my teaching and performance calendars, and post writings in the same place, I’ve updated my website and given it a new, more personal look. In addition to information on my current projects, you’ll find my calendar for the year, and a list of activities. In the coming months, we’ll be adding links to the pages of choreographers with whom I’ve worked in the past, creating a web of the collaborations that define us and to which we owe so much. Visitors will likewise be able to access archival material from these shows. It’s a lengthy process, but does time really exist? Or does it simply take diverse forms as it unfolds—presence and memory, traces and the anticipation of things to come…

Fall 2017 and 30-year anniversary of my teaching career

Fall 2017 is almost behind us. After a shorter-than-expected stint in August at the Arts Umbrella International Summer Dance Intensive in Vancouver, followed by a stopover in Bassano del Grappa in Italy for a performance of Animal triste by Mélanie Demers at the B-Motion Operaestate Festival, I returned to Montreal in September for the premiere of the new work La vie attend by PARTS+LABOUR_DANSE, and then went back to Vancouver with Animal triste in October.

I was back in Montreal in early September. This fall marked the 30-year anniversary of my teaching career in Montreal. I’m really proud and would like to say thanks again to Linda Rabin who started me on this wonderful adventure and who, quite frankly, nourishes my heart and soul at every opportunity.

In early November, I gave two weeks of classes, at the Wilder Building and Circuit-Est, as part of RQD’s technique class program. In the early fall, I also had the pleasure of working with young dancers in training at the École de danse contemporaine de Montréal . . . an annual tradition since September 1987!

photo credit: Claudia Chan Tak

La vie attend

September 27 to 29 and October 4 to 7, 2017

8 P.M.

Theâtre La Chapelle

A Danse-Cité production in collaboration with Parts+Labour_Danse

September 27 to 30 and October 4 to 7, 2017 – 8 PM
Jeudis-causeries : September 28th & October 5th after the show.

In LA VIE ATTEND, five performers face the audience, tackling a delicate balancing act. They are teammates, enemies, victors and mourners, instigators and witnesses. All of their visceral and vulnerable contradictions, their pride and their shame, their hope and their fear, are laid out on the stage. Life as a game waiting to be played.

A theatrical work born of an intuitive and intellectual inspiration, seducing on the surface, physical and deceptively playful, LA VIE ATTEND deftly manipulates the deep primal tendencies we often avoid. Creative duo Emily Gualtieri and David Albert-Toth, the co-founders of Parts+Labour_Danse, kick off our Traces-Chorégraphes series with an illusory work, performed by five dancers who will no doubt win you over. It’s anyone’s game.

Choreographers : David Albert-Toth, Emily Gualtieri
Dancer-collaborators : Joe Danny Aurélien, Marc Boivin, Simon-Xavier Lefebvre, Milan Panet-Gigon, Nicolas Patry
Texts : The dancer-collaborators
Music : David Drury
Costumes : Angela Rassenti
Lighting designer : Paul Chambers
Outside eyes : Mélanie Demers, Ginelle Chagnon, Étienne Lepage, Jamie Wright

Partners:
Danse-Cité www.danse-cite.org
Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec (CALQ)
Conseil des Arts du Canada / Canada Council for the Arts
Circuit-est centre chorégraphique
CCOV (Centre de création O Vertigo)

photo credit: Paula Zacharias

Workshop at Studio 303

Spontaneous Performative Compositions in Dance and Music with Andrew Harwood et Diane Labrosse

Studio 303 – January 16 to 20, 2017

Open to Professional dancers and creators interested in a comprehensive experience in real-time composition and stage-performance work/ Bilingual teachers
An intensive coaching project focused on improvisation, performance and related work for the inventive minds and bodies of professional dancers and creators interested in a comprehensive experience in real-time composition and stage-performance work. Our time will be spent tuning and stretching our physical, perceptual and imaginative capacities. Dancing, watching, critical discussion, feedback and in-house showings will be part of our daily research and practice. The intensive culminates in a public performance on Friday evening, January 20th, 2017. It is crucial to commit to the entire process. Solo practice is a dynamic ‘of-the-moment’ process of exploring movement as a unique way to build a kinetic philosophy and personalized technical base to draw upon for expression and can serve as a microcosm for building structures within an ensemble. When observing natural processes found in nature or citing organized activities in certain species such as schools of fish, flocks of birds or colonies of ants, you are witnessing some sort of inherent cooperation and fundamental process of evolutionary design. This approach will serve as a model for ensemble work.This act of spontaneous performative compositions is created by performers who are constantly adapting to internal and external stimuli, urges and interactions combined with the ability to self-organize where there is no continuous leader and no predetermined narrative, where singular voices intertwine with ensemble work.

January 16 to 20, 2017 – 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. (Mon-Fri)
Studio showing on Friday, January 20, at 7:00 p.m.
$130 with the support of Emploi-Québec
Registration – Please contact (514) 393-3771 or info@studio303.ca

photo credit: Dominique Bouchard

Technique classes at RQD

November 21 to 25 and November 28 to December 2
from 10 AM to noon

Musician: Iohann Laliberté

November 21 to 25 classes will take place at the Centre de création O Vertigo – 175, Sainte-Catherine Street West

November 28 to December 2 classes will take place at Circuit-Est, 1881 Saint-André Street

5$/class, with the support of Emploi-Québec and Compétence Culture

photo credit: Alain Lefort

Nous (ne) sommes (pas) tous des danseurs

Danced roundtables
Agora de la danse
May 6 to 8, 2016 – 6PM

The carte blanche given to Sophie Corriveau and Katya Montaignac for the creation of a new Traces-Interprètes will allow audiences of the 34th season of Danse-Cité and Agora de la danse to witness an event unlike any other: an immersion into the intimate world of the dancer. Expressing themselves both verbally and bodily, 16 performers from a multigenerational dance community in Montreal will take over the stage and microphone, relating their anecdotes, sensations and reflections on their profession. On May 6, 7 and 8 at Agora de la danse, each of the participants in these three danced roundtables entitled Nous (ne) sommes (pas) tous des danseurs (“We Are (Not) All Dancers”) will give free rein to their imagination, recounting good things and bad, troubles and torments, stories imbued with truth and poignancy. With spontaneity, creativity, vulnerability and honesty, they will drop their masks to demystify, in the light of their respective experiences and careers, what it means to be a dancer today in Quebec.

In the company of Johanna Bienaise, Sarah Bild, Lucie Boissinot, Marc Boivin, Marie Claire Forté, Manon Levac, Marie Mougeolle, Dominique Porte, Enora Rivière, Daniel Soulières, Catherine Tardif, Andrew Turner, Vincent Warren and Jamie Wright, the project will reveal the uniqueness of each of the collaborators, enchanting audiences with their highly intimate and human presentations.

Concept: Sophie Corriveau, Katya Montaignac
Accomplices: Johanna Bienaise, Sarah Bild, Lucie Boissinot, Marc Boivin, Dany Desjardins, Marie Claire Forté, Manon Levac, Marie Mougeolle, Dominique Porte, Daniel Soulières, Catherine Tardif, Andrew Turner, Vincent Warren, Jamie Wright / Lighting: Marc Parent. Production Danse-Cité / In collaboration with Sophie Corriveau and Katya Montaignac / Copresentation Agora de la danse

photo credit: Julie Artacho

Pluton – acte 2

FTA @ Agora de la danse
May 28 to 30, 2016 – 7PM

Mélanie Demers, Catherine Gaudet, Frédérick Gravel, Katie Ward. La 2e Porte à Gauche upends prejudice toward the elderly by pairing seasoned 30 or 40-something performers with living legends of Quebec dance. An extraordinary challenge.

The dancers in these four short pieces of this second act were not born yesterday, but appear here as though newborn, revealed in intimate portraits sketched by younger colleagues. The magnificent Paul-André Fortier engages in dialogue with the hesitations of Frédérick Gravel. The ultra-sensitive Louise Bédard is rendered touchingly vulnerable by Catherine Gaudet. The unsettling Peter James crashes into the absurd universe of Katie Ward. And sensuous Linda Rabin and generous Marc Boivin are thrust into the furious poetry of Mélanie Demers. An extraordinary feat. A beautiful gift.

Created by La 2e Porte à Gauche / Produced by Danse-Cité

Artistic director: Katya Montaignac / Choreographed by: Mélanie Demers + Catherine Gaudet + Frédérick Gravel + Katie Ward / Performed by: Louise Bédard + Marc Boivin and Linda Rabin + Paul-André Fortier + Peter James / Composer: Tomas Furey / Lighting design: Frédérick Gravel + Caroline Nadeau / Outside eye: Marie Béland / Rehearsal director:  Chi Long / Production manager: Vanessa Bousquet / Co-produced by Festival TransAmériques + Fortier Danse-Création + MAYDAY

photo credit: Mathieu Doyon

Animal triste

Canada Dance Festival
June 6, 2016 – 8:30PM

Humans like to believe they are at the center of the world. Yet they know dinosaurs, fallen empires and glaciations. They know their fate but believe in eternity. On a clear day, they may see themselves poor and perishable. The next day, free, glorious and triumphant.

In the great march of the world, humans are nothing more than sad little animals. But animals that console themselves in beauty and in desire for immortality. For this, men will invent religions, philosophies and civilizations. They will conquer, dominate, oppress. And procreate. They will make up stories and write History. But very rarely will they understand where they stand and never really escape their condition. And deep down, men are those animals of no significance who only aspire to more and better.

Animal Triste might be a freeze frame to try to understand the nature and posture of Man in all his humanity.

Direction and choreography: Mélanie Demers
On stage: Marc Boivin, James Gnam, Brianna Lombardo and Riley Sims / Rehearsal assistant: Anne-Marie Jourdenais / Original Lighting: Alexandre Pilon-Guay / Music: Jacques Poulin-Denis

photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

douce tourmente

Canada Dance Festival – June 9 and 11, 2016 – 8:30PM
The Citadel – June 15 to 18, 2016 – 8PM

Tracing the hypersensitive actions and exposed vulnerabilities of intimate human relationships, choreographer Sylvie Desrosiers’ douce tourmente reflects on the authentic moments and physical manifestations of a relationship’s evolution. Within an immersive environment of sound and video created by Jeremy Mimnagh, interpreters Heidi Strauss and Marc Boivin create a powerful private world. Dramatic purpose is revealed, relations are built, and through a fragmented exploration of spatial expansion and fragmentation that is reflective and provocative, the couples altering strength renders a moving fragility.
Choreographer: Sylvie Desrosiers
Performer:  Marc Boivin, Heidi Strauss / Projection and sound designer:Jeremy Mimnagh / Lighting: Paul Auclair
photo credit: Alain Lefort

Nous (ne) sommes (pas) tous des danseursTables rondes dansées

More details to come.
photo credit: Claudia Chan Tak

Research project with David Albert-Toth and Emily Gualtieri

More details to come.

Research project with Annik Hamel

More details to come.
photo credit: Jeanne Renaud

Research project with Jeanne Renaud

More details to come.

photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

WOULD

More details to come.

Publication in THEMA

More details to come.

photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh

WOULD

More details to come.

Book launch : Recréer/Scripter

More details to come.

25 years celebration of Louise Bédard Danse

More details to come.

New collaboration : Marc Boivin and Lori Freedman

More details to come.

Dora Mavor Moore Award

More details to come.

everyday

September 6-19, 2014
Les Escales Improbables de Montréal

Marc Boivin is participating in everyday a new research project by choreographer Tedi Tafel with dancers Bill Coleman, Dean Makarenko, Leslie Baker and Lin Snelling. everyday investigates notions of exposure and attention, creating performance situations that reveal what is normally passed over, unnoticed or hidden. Tedi Tafel leads an exploration in ways that the performer’s attuned presence, actions and responses can reveal veiled aspects of public life and help us see the transience and beauty embedded in the everyday.

photo credit: Alain Lefort

6,3 Évanouissements

November 12-15, 2014
Agora de la danse & Danse-Cité

Where do you go when you faint? Is it a disappearance, a temporary elimination of willpower, or a brief detour to nowhere?

6,3 Évanouissements will not answer any of these questions. Fainting is caused by an internal counterorder, an upsetting of the balance between two systems: acceleration versus deceleration of the heartbeat. These opposing commands invariably cause a blackout: 6,3 Évanouissements is thus fuelled by two antagonistic principles.

These blackouts will be enacted by a dream sextet: Catherine Tardif, Sophie Corriveau, Marc Boivin, Benoît Lachambre, Fortner Anderson and Michel F Côté.

photo credit: Michael Slobodian

Une idée sinon vraie…

November 22, 2014
CINARS

The Bozzini Quartet and Marc Boivin will appear at the 30th edition of CINARS, performing excerpts from Une idée sinon vraie… Created in collaboration with Ana Sokolović in 2012, the work is an unusual cross between contemporary dance and music.

crédit photo : Marc Boivin