By Eleanor Wilson
In a busy, increasingly digital world, it is rare to get the chance to slow down and breathe.
But award-winning choreographer Liesel Zink hopes her new experimental public performance Us And All Of This will do just that.
Launching early next year at three premier arts centres across Victoria, including Narre Warren’s Bunjil Place, the project will incorporate 100 local individuals for a large-scale, sculptural dance work centring reflection, meditation and pause.
Ms Zink said the project provides an opportunity to “move at a beautifully slow pace at a time when the world seems to be speeding up”.
“There have been so many really challenging world events that have happened recently and it brought me to question how we can cope with a really challenging and complex world we live in at the moment,” Ms Zink said.
“This project for me sticks with that, the realisation that we’re better if we do it together and I think this work looks at togetherness at a time when we’ve felt really isolated.“
Commissioned by Arts Centre Melbourne as part of the Betty Amsden Participation program, Us And All Of This will feature at the Arts Centre Melbourne forecourt on 11 March, Bunjil Place on 25 and 26 March and the Geelong Arts Centre on 2 April.
Ms Zink said the concept of the project started a few years ago with her interest in bringing contemporary dance to public spaces.
“I wanted to play with the beauty of us as a collective and us as individuals,“ she said.
“I’m trying to work with these 100 bodies to create a big beautiful slow moving sculpture that sees individuals move beyond the individual and work as a whole group.“
Ms Zink, along with dramaturg Martyn Coutts and composer Lawrence English, are currently looking for 100 participants for each venue, varying in age, ethnicity, gender and body type, to make up the large-scale project.
The only prerequisite for participants is that they must be at least 15.
“The participants just need to be open and dance curious, they don’t need to have any experience in dance, everyone is invited to come along and take part in this project.”
Once the participants are chosen, they will attend a series of workshops on the project and will also be guided by Ms Zink during the 45-minute performance.
“For the participants, I hope these rehearsals are a space of rejuvenation and joy and a chance to get back in their bodies,” Ms Zink said.
“We’ve been on 2D screens for a long time, so I hope they can just appreciate being able to stretch and move their bodies in amongst others and enjoy that process, and hopefully take some of the ethos of the work home with them into their everyday lives and maybe share those experiences with others.”
The public is also encouraged to attend one of the three locations to witness the 100 participants weave throughout the space.
Zink is well known for her large-scale public space performances, most significantly ‘The Stance’ which was performed on over 80 dancers in 10 cities worldwide.
‘The Stance’ won the 2017 Australian Dance Award for Outstanding Achievement in Independent Dance.
To sign up to be a participant in the Bunjil Place project, head to bit.ly/3UrrlKO
