Opening Program Program I  Program II  Program III Program IV Program V Program VI Program VII   Program VIII  Program IX Program X Program XI Russian Dance Film Competition Closing Program

Program X: From Festivals Around the World

Uzes Quintet 26 min, 2003, France
Director: Catherine Maximoff;
Choreographer: Javier de Frutos, Emanuel Gat, Kitt Johnson, Peeping Tom, Nathalie Pernette et Andreas Schmid
Producer: Heure d’ete productions, ARTE France
Recognized best film at the Dance for the Camera International Film and Video Festival - Durham, North Carolina (USA)

Five choreographers, five worlds, singular body languages. A choreographic breakaway from the stage. A cinematic tale where each of the characters creates strange echoes with their environment.

Catherine Maximoff was born in 1971. She studied violin at the Lyon Conservatory and graduated from the University with a degree in English & Literature. She has written scripts for two short films Chrysalis (directed by Olivier Mégaton) and 99 duos (directed by Dominique Thiel). She also wrote & directed a short Daïté.

Cost of Living 34 min, 35mm on video, 2004, England
Director: Lloyd Newson
Choreographer: Lloyd Newson and DV8

Photo by Lloyd Newson

David and Eddie are street performers struggling to get by in a seaside town. The Cost of Living follows them as they work, argue, fail at romance and fall out with old friends. The Cost of Living is part dance film, part drama. The stories are told through a combination of stylized movement and dialogue.

The Cost of Living is the fourth film of the DV8 Physical Theatre (http://www.dv8.co.uk/). DV8's work is about taking risks, both physically and aesthetically, dealing with personal politics and, above all, communicating ideas and feelings clearly and unpretentiously. It is determined to be radical yet accessible, and to take its work to as wide an audience as possible.

As the Artistic Director of DV8 Physical Theatre since 1986, and DV8 Films since 1989, Lloyd Newson has had a dynamic impact on contemporary dance by challenging the traditional aesthetics and forms that pervade most modern and classical dance. Instead, Newson concentrates on connecting meaning to movement and addressing current social issues. Newson has created 14 works for stage, consistently receiving major British and international awards. After studying psychology, Newson won a full scholarship to London Contemporary Dance School. He went on to dance with many notable choreographers of the era before founding DV8. His work has included commissions from the Sydney 2000 Olympic Arts Festivals and Tate Modern, and films for the BBC and Channel 4.

Human Radio 9 min, 2002, United Kingdom
Director/Choreographer: Miranda Pennell
2002 Audience award for Best Video at Video-Dance, Athens
2002 Nominated for the IMZ ‘Screen Choreography’ award, Monaco

Photo by Miranda Pennell

People dance in private moments of personal abandon, across London in the summer of 2001. The film is the result of the director’s work with respondents to a local advertisement seeking ‘living-room dancers’ - people who love to dance behind closed doors.

Miranda Pennell trained as a dancer before she started making films. Her recent films explore movement and choreography located in the world around us. They offer an intimate observation of human behavior, ritual and display, in the spheres of private and public life. Miranda’s award-winning films Tattoo (2001), Magnetic North (2003) and others, have been widely screened at major international film-festivals, and broadcasted in the UK, France, Germany, Australia, Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, and Spain.

When I am little again 6.5min, 2003, USA
Director: Vita Berezina-Blackburn
Choreographer: Kareen Balsaml
2003 Honorable Mention, Dance on Camera Festival, New York
2004 Cinedans Festival, Netherlands

Photo by Vita Berezina-Blackburn

A choreographed collage of video, motion capture animation, text, and family photographs that embrace the healing process of Jewish evolution through remembrance.

Kareen Balsam is originally from Southern California where she received a BFA in Dance from University of California, Santa Barbara. She received an MFA in Dance &
Technology from The Ohio State University where she studied video dance and motion capture animation as a tool for choreography for the camera. Her video and performance works have been shown in New York City at Lincoln Center, Judson Church, Dancespace Center, Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater, and also in California, Utah, Las Vegas, Germany, and Holland. “When I am little again” recently had its television debut as part of the PBS series, Reel New York.

Vita Berezina-Blackburn is a digital and animation artist born and raised in Soviet Siberia. The downfall of the empire opened Vita’s eyes on impermanence of material reality, and thus her journey into the virtual began. Vita holds an MA in Computer Art from West Texas A&M University, and an MFA in Art and Technology from the Ohio State University where she began collaborating with dancers. Her current work focuses on 3d animation and motion capture and has been screened at animation festivals and venues around the world. Presently Vita works as an animation specialist at ACCAD (Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design) at the Ohio State University, teaching computer animation and participating in animation-related multidisciplinary art projects.

chrysalis ['kriz∂lis] 26min, 2003, France
Director: Olivier Mégaton
Choreographer: Wayne MacGregor
2002 Nominated for the IMZ ‘Screen Choreography’ award, Monaco

Photo by Olivier Mégaton

K has discovered that he is different from other insects. He thinks, he exists, he wants to become … a human being! Will his love affair with this lost young girl succeed? Basing his film on the latest choreography by the talented young UK dancer Wayne MacGregor, director Olivier Mégaton constructs a surprising fantasy world which is half-insect, half-human.

"..bursting with creative energy." - The Times

Wayne McGregor studied dance at University College Bretton Hall and in New York at the Jose Limon School. In 1992 he founded Random and was subsequently appointed choreographer in residence at The Place in London. He has represented in Britain and throughout the world in Bancs d’Essai Internationaux. His project SKITE was seen in Lisbon and the European Choreographic Forum. McGregor was awarded the Outstanding Achievement in Dance Award by Time Out’s Live Awards 2001, and was nominated for both the South Bank Show Award for Dance, and the Outstanding Contribution to Dance award for the Critics’ Circle Dance Section. In 2002 he was again nominated for the Critics’ Circle Award in the Best Choreography category for The Trilogy and Symbiont(s).