Dance diary. December 2015

‘Creative minds’: Stephen Page

I was, earlier today, doing a bit of ‘last day of the year’ exercise on the treadmill at the gym when I accidentally turned on a television channel I didn’t mean to select. It was a fortuitous accident as it happened. The program that came on turned out to be an interview with Stephen Page conducted by Robin Hughes in her series called ‘Creative Minds’. Somewhere along the line I managed to miss it when it was originally screened some three years ago, but I have since put in an order to add it to my collection.

So much stood out in the interview, which included some great archival material from the earliest days of Bangarra. In particular, footage of Russell Page, who was seen in a range of situations across several years, showed what an exceptional mover he was. In addition, the recording showed so beautifully what makes Stephen Page the outstanding director that he is as he answered the often quite probing questions put to him. I was also completely charmed, as ever, by Page’s great sense of humour, humility and passion for his heritage.

I can’t wait to watch it in more comfortable conditions. But I did stay on the treadmill for longer than usual so I could see the whole program!

Papers of Dame Margaret Scott

I am pleased to be able to report that Dame Margaret Scott has agreed that her collection of dance material be housed in the National Library of Australia, where it will join the collections of so many dance artists she has taught, performed with, commissioned, and mentored. In the early days of January I will be working to organise the material for its move to Canberra.

Maggie Scott, South Africa 1930s. Collection of Dame Margaret Scott

Best of 2015

My 2015 ‘best of’ selections will appear in the February/March issue of Dance Australia. I also have had things to say about 2015 in Canberra and that article appears below in ‘Press for December’. What I didn’t mention in either situation was the show that really stood out for me in 2015—Quidam from the Montreal-based Cirque du Soleil. I did review it, however, for The Canberra Times and that review appears below, also in ‘Press for December’. Although not dance in the strictest sense, but circus, a cousin of dance as it were, Quidam was especially impressive for being a production in which every single moment in the show had been thought through with care and theatrical intelligence. A rare experience.

Press for December

‘An exhilarating experience.’ Review of Quidam from Cirque du Soleil, The Canberra Times, 12 December 2015, ARTS p. 19. Online version.

‘Dance highlights and hankerings.’ Overview of dance in Canberra in 2015. The Canberra Times, 28 December 2015, Times 2 pp. 6–7. Online version.

Michelle Potter, 31 December 2015

With thanks to all who have visited my website in 2015, especially those whose astute comments have added so much to the posts.

A happy, dance-filled 2016!

Dean Cross, Caitlin MacKenzie and Gemma Dawkins in 'Walking and Falling', 2015. Photo: © Lorna Sim

Dance diary. November 2015

Canberra Critics’ Circle Awards: Dance 2015

The Canberra Critics’ Circle annual awards ceremony took place on 23 November and, in a special moment for dance in the Canberra region, Elizabeth Dalman was named ACT Artist of the Year. A well deserved award in a year when Dalman, currently teaching in Taiwan, worked extraordinarily hard to bring attention to the diverse history of Australian Dance Theatre, which celebrated fifty years of creativity in 2015.

Elizabeth Dalman in Taiwan, 2014. Photo: Chen, Yi-shu — Elizabeth Dalman in Taiwan, 2014. Photo: © Chen, Yi-shu

Among the Circle’s general awards, which go to innovative activities in the performing and visual arts, and literature, two dance awards were given for 2015. Dalman received an award for her works Fortuity and L, both of which highlighted the range of her choreography dating from her time as director of Australian Dance Theatre to her recent work for her Mirramu Dance Company. Ruth Osborne, director of QL2 Dance, received an award for her work Walking and Falling, commissioned by the National Portrait Gallery and made in conjunction with its World War I exhibition All that Fall.

Caitlin MacKenzie and Gemma Dawkins in 'Walking and falling', 2015. Photo: © Lorna Sim — Caitlin MacKenzie and Gemma Dawkins in a moment from Ruth Osborne’s *Walking and falling*, 2015. Photo: © Lorna Sim

Keir Choreographic Award 2016

Eight emerging (and not so emerging) choreographers have been selected as finalists in the 2016 Keir Choreographic Award. Two have strong Canberra connections: James Batchelor and Chloe Chignell. Canberra audiences will remember their joint show earlier this year, when Batchelor showed Metasystems and Chignell Post Phase. The two have worked together frequently over the past few years with Chignell often appearing in works choreographed by Batchelor.

The other finalists are Sarah Aiken, also a finalist in the first Keir Award in 2014, along with Ghenoa Gela, Martin Hansen, Alice Heyward, Rebecca Jensen and Paea Leach. The eight finalists will each show a work, commissioned by the Keir Foundation, in Melbourne at Dancehouse in April 2016. Four works will then be selected by a jury and shown in Sydney at Carriageworks in May 2016, where the winner will be chosen.

Bodenwieser Ballet

Shona Dunlop MacTavish, former dancer with the Bodenwieser Ballet, recently visited Sydney from her home in New Zealand and, to celebrate the occasion, some of her Bodenwieser colleagues gathered in Sydney for a special get together. The image below shows Eileen Kramer (left) now 101 and Shona Dunlop MacTavish now 96. In the background they can be seen in a photograph in which they are dancing in Gertrud Bodenwieser’s Blue Danube, one of their best known roles.

Shona Dunlop MacTavish and Eileen Kramer, Sydney 2015. Photo: Barbara Cuckson — Shona Dunlop MacTavish (right) and Eileen Kramer, Sydney 2015. Photo: © Barbara Cuckson

Oral history interviews with Shona Dunlop MacTavish and Eileen Kramer are available online. Follow the links to the National Library of Australia’s online oral history site: Shona Dunlop MacTavish; Eileen Kramer.

Ian Templeman (1938–2015); Glenys McIver (1949–2015)

I was saddened to hear of the deaths in November of two former colleagues from the National Library of Australia, Ian Templeman and Glenys McIver. While perhaps not widely known in the dance community, both made a significant contribution to the growth of my career as a dance writer, historian and curator. Glenys appointed me as the Esso Research Fellow in the Performing Arts at the National Library in 1988. Among my many activities in that position, I began recording oral history interviews for the Library, which I continue to do now some 25 years later.

Ian was appointed Assistant Director General Public Programs at the National Library in 1990 and proceeded to expand the Library’s publishing program. This involved establishing the monthly magazine National Library of Australia News (now renamed The National Library of Australia Magazine and published quarterly), and the quarterly journal Voices (now no longer active). He encouraged my dance writing for both publications and was responsible for commissioning my book A Passion for Dance (now out of print), which consisted of a series of edited oral history interviews with some of Australia’s foremost choreographers.

Both Glenys and Ian made significant other contributions to my career. I will always be grateful for their mentorship.

Dance rattles (tied around the ankles during performance) from Bondé, New Caledonia

Michelle Potter, 29 November 2015

Featured image: Dean Cross, Caitlin MacKenzie and Gemma Dawkins in a moment from Ruth Osborne’s Walking and falling, 2015. Photo: © Lorna Sim

Hannah O’Neill. ‘First dancer’

Hannah O’Neill has been promoted to ‘first dancer’ [premier danseur—literal translation first dancer] with the Paris Opera Ballet. Follow this link for the results of the competitive round for female dancers, which took place on 3 November. O’Neill danced the set piece, Spring from The Four Seasons by Jerome Robbins, and her chosen piece, the variation from Act III of Nureyev’s production of Raymonda.

This is an absolutely astonishing feat given that O’Neill graduated from the Australian Ballet School only four years ago in 2011. Her seasonal contract with the Paris Opera Ballet began shortly afterwards with a permanent contract for life being offered in mid 2013.

Félicitations!

Michelle Potter, 4 November 2015

Dance diary. October 2015

The return of Ochres

Bangarra Dance Theatre has a special program coming up at the end of November—a brief revival of Ochres at Carriageworks in Sydney beginning on 27 November.

Tara Gower in a study for 'Ochres'. Bangarra Dance Theatre, 2015. Photo: © Edward Mulvihill — Tara Gower in study for *Ochres*. Bangarra Dance Theatre, 2015. Photo: © Edward Mulvihill

Ochres was one of Bangarra’s earliest works and is still regarded as a milestone in the company’s history. Co-choreographed by Stephen Page and Bernadette Walong, it was first performed in Sydney in 1994. In 1995 it came to Canberra as part of the National Festival of Australian Theatre, the brainchild of Robyn Archer and for a few years one of the highlights of the theatre scene in Canberra. Anyone who was lucky enough to see Ochres back then in its first years will never, I am sure, forget Djakapurra Munyarryun smearing his body with yellow ochre as the work began.

Looking back through my archive, I discovered a review I had written for Muse, a monthly arts magazine produced in Canberra and initially edited by Helen Musa (Muse—like the Festival—is now, sadly, defunct). Re-reading the review I found I had speculated in 1995 on how Bangarra would develop in future years, especially in regard to the growth of a recognisable Bangarra style and vocabulary. Well that has certainly happened and it will be interesting to look back on Ochres as an early work in which Page and Walong were testing ways of doing just that—setting Bangarra on a journey to discover a contemporary, indigenous dance style.

Hannah O’Neill

One of my favourite French dance sites, Danses avec la plume, recently posted some news about Hannah O’Neill and the up-and-coming competitive examinations for promotion within the Paris Opera Ballet. Female dancers will face the jury on 3 November. O’Neill’s name has been suggested on a number of occasions for promotion into one of two positions as principal dancer. One author suggests O’Neill is an Etoile in the making and the future of the company! (Une promotion d’Hannah O’Neill me plairait beaucoup aussi. C’est une danseuse brillante, une future Étoile, elle est l’avenir de la troupe.)

The word is too that Benjamin Millepied, now directing Paris Opera Ballet, would have liked to have dispensed with this ingrained competitive system of promotion, but the dancers voted that it remain.

See this link for what is currently ‘trending’ regarding the promotions, and follow this this link to see an image of O’Neill (taken by Isabelle Aubert) with Pierre Lacotte after a performance of Lacotte’s production of Paquita. [UPDATE: Link to Paquita image no longer available}

All the things: QL2 Dance

As an annual event on its performance calendar, QL2 Dance produces a short program of dance for its young and less experienced dancers, aged from 8 to 17. This year the program, All the Things, included choreography by Ruth Osborne, Jamie Winbank, Alison Plevey and Joshua Lowe with perhaps the most interesting moments coming from Plevey’s ‘girly’ piece about shopping, ‘Material Matters’, and Joshua Lowe’s male-oriented ‘I Need’ about ‘needing’ technological devices in one’s life. It was an entertaining, if somewhat sexist juxtaposition of ideas in these two pieces, which had been strategically placed side by side in the program.

Scene from 'All the Things'. QL2 Dance, 2015. Photo: Lorna Sim — Scene from *All the Things*. QL2 Dance, 2015. Photo: © Lorna Sim

But the great thing about this annual event is the experience it gives these young dancers. James Batchelor (independent), Daniel Riley (Bangarra Dance Theatre) and Sam Young-Wright (Sydney Dance Company) are just three current professionals who had early dance experiences with Quantum Leap.

New book from photographer Lois Greenfield

One of the most pleasurable experiences I had while working in New York between 2006 and 2008 was visiting the studio of dance photographer Lois Greenfield. I was there to buy a collection of her images for the Jerome Robbins Dance Division. She is about to launch a new book. See this link for details.

Press for October

‘Lording it in high-tech high jinks.’ Review of Michael Flatley’s Lord of the Dance: Dangerous Games. The Canberra Times, 9 October 2015, ‘Times 2’ pp. 6–7. Online version.

‘Sizzling and simply sensational.’ Review of Natalie Weir’s Carmen Sweet for Expressions Dance Company. The Canberra Times, 13 October 2015, ‘Times 2’ p. 6. Online version.

‘Dancing our way next year.’ Preview of dance in Canberra in 2016. The Canberra Times, 26 October 2015, ‘Times 2’ p. 6. Online version.

‘Listless on the Lake.’ Review of Swan Lake by the Russian National Ballet Theatre. The Canberra Times, 31 October 2015, ARTS, p. 20. Online version .

Michelle Potter, 31 October 2015

Dance diary. September 2015

Remi Wortmeyer

News from a colleague in Amsterdam is that Remi Wortmeyer, formerly with the Australian Ballet and now a principal dancer with the Dutch National Ballet, is making a mark in that company’s Hans van Manen program. For more news about Wortmeyer’s activities here is a link to his website.

Remi Wortmeyer in 'Joel', 2014. Photo © Jack Devant — Remi Wortmeyer in *Joel*, 2014. Photo: © Jack Devant

New Helpmann book

A new book about Robert Helpmann is currently in preparation in London and will be published in 2016 by Dance Books. With the title The Many Faces of Robert Helpmann, it is edited by Richard Cave and Anna Meadmore. The book is being published as a companion volume to Ninette de Valois: Adventurous Traditionalist (Dance Books, 2012) and will include, in addition to a series of essays on various aspects of Helpmann’s career, a DVD of filmed material. I am working on a chapter on Elektra, Helpmann’s ballet that premiered at Covent Garden in 1963 and that was restaged by the Australian Ballet in 1966.

Elektra, the Australian Ballet 1966. Photo Australian News and Information Bureau — Scene from *Elektra*, the Australian Ballet 1966. Kathleen Geldard as Elektra. Photo: Australian News and Information Bureau. National Archives of Australia

William Forsythe and Dance Australia

I was delighted, on opening the October/November issue of Dance Australia, to see an article I wrote for the issue of February/March 1994 republished (with some new photographs) as part of an ‘Anniversary Collection’ celebrating 35 years of Dance Australia. That article, which was based on an interview I conducted with William Forsythe in Frankfurt while on a holiday in Europe in late 1993, was one of the earliest pieces I wrote for Dance Australia.

The experience of interviewing on that occasion is, however, still etched on my mind. It was funny—I had trouble getting past the very determined doorman at the stage door until I produced a letter and said in my very best school German Ich habe eine Brief (sic—I got the gender wrong); informative—Forsythe has an incredible intellect; and moving—Forsythe is also very personable and was so willing to engage with me, even at midnight when the interview took place. Before the interview, I was lucky enough to see the show that was playing that night, which was Forsythe’s Artefact.

But congratulations to Dance Australia for having survived for 35 years and having produced so many great stories, reviews and other dance-related pieces. May it continue.

Press for September

‘GOLDs head overseas.’ Preview of tour to the United Kingdom and Europe by Canberra’s GOLD company. The Canberra Times, 12 September 2015, ARTS p. 22. Online version.

‘Plenty to enjoy in diverse mix.’ Review of Circus Oz in ‘But wait…there’s more.’ The Canberra Times, 25 September 2015, p. ARTS 7. Online version.

Michelle Potter, 30 September 2015

Artist of the Australian Ballet in costume for 'Coppelia'. Photo: Justin Ridler

The Australian Ballet in 2016

Benedicte Bemet, 2015. Photo: Justin Ridler — Benedicte Bemet (left), Cristiano Martino (centre), and Jade Wood (right), 2015. Photos: © Justin Ridler

Cristiano Martino, 2015. Photo: Justin Ridler — Benedicte Bemet (left), Cristiano Martino (centre), and Jade Wood (right), 2015. Photos: © Justin Ridler

Mixed in with old faithfuls like Swan Lake and Coppélia, the Australian Ballet’s program for 2016 contains one or two works that we can anticipate with a bit of excitement. One of them is John Neumeier’s Nijinsky, which will be seen in Melbourne, Adelaide and Sydney, although we will have to wait until the last few months of the year.

Nijinsky was created in 2000 for Neumeier’s Hamburg Ballet and was seen recently in Australia when Hamburg Ballet performed it in Brisbane in 2012. On that occasion it received a standing ovation on its opening night—and I mean a real standing ovation where the theatre rose as one. No stragglers, no people leaving to catch the subway before the rush, no one standing up because they couldn’t see what was happening because the person in the row in front was blocking their view. A proper standing ovation. Neumeier calls Nijinsky ‘a biography of the soul, of feelings, emotions, and of states of mind’. It needs wonderful dancing, and fabulous acting. My fingers are crossed. Here is what I wrote about it from Brisbane.

Another program that fills me with anticipation is a triple bill called Vitesse presenting works by Christopher Wheeldon (DGV: Danse à grande vitesse), Jiri Kylian (Forgotten Land) and William Forsythe (In the Middle, Somewhat Elevated). It is scheduled for the early part of the year and will be seen in Melbourne and Sydney.

Forgotten Land and In the Middle are not new to the Australian Ballet repertoire having been introduced during Maina Gielgud’s artistic directorship. I remember watching people leave the auditorium after the opening sounds of Thom Willems score for In the Middle (it was 20 years ago), but it showed off certain dancers of that era absolutely brilliantly. But the Wheeldon is new to Australia. It is a work for 26 dancers with four pairs of dancers at the heart of the work. It shows in particular Wheeldon’s skill at creating pas de deux. In the Royal Ballet program notes from its showing in 2011, Roslyn Sulcas writes of Wheeldon that ‘[He]—like his ballets—is both traditional and innovative, able to inhabit an older world while moving firmly forward towards the new.’ Here is what I wrote after seeing it, on a very different mixed bill program, in London in 2011.

Then I await Stanton Welch’s Romeo and Juliet, exclusive to Melbourne in June and July, with anticipation mixed with trepidation. I was not a fan of his Bayadère, although I have loved some of his shorter works. But the word is that his R & J is ‘quite good’. Fingers crossed again.

Dancers of Houston Ballet in Stanton Welch's 'Romeo and Juliet'. Photo Amitava Sarkar — Dancers of Houston Ballet in Stanton Welch’s *Romeo and Juliet*. Photo: © Sarkar

As for the rest of the year, Brisbane will get Ratmansky’s Cinderella in February; Stephen Baynes’ Swan Lake returns with seasons in Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne; a program called Symphony in C will run concurrently in Sydney with the Vitesse program, although it is not exactly clear as yet of what the Symphony in C program will consist; and Coppélia will be in Sydney and Melbourne towards the end of the year. I think this is the Peggy van Praagh/George Ogilvie production from 1979, but the media release is a little confusing. ‘Having first revisited Coppélia in 1979, the great choreographer re-invigorated it thirty years later with this joyful and sumptuous production.’ Who is that great choreographer? Not PVP who was not really the choreographer and who died anyway in 1990.

And for my Canberra readers, we won’t be seeing the Australian Ballet in 2016 in the national capital where we too pay taxes.

Michelle Potter, 23 September 2015

Featured image: Dancer of the Australian Ballet in costume for Coppélia, 2015 (detail). Photo: © Justin Ridler

Full details of the 2016 season are on the Australian Ballet’s website.

Waangenga Blanco in 'Patyegarang', Bangarra Dance Theatre, 2014. Photo: Greg Barrett

Australian Dance Awards 2015

12 September 2015, Her Majesty’s Theatre, Adelaide

For the first time in its history, the Australian Dance Awards ceremony was held in Adelaide, a fitting location given that 2015 marks the 50th anniversary of the Adelaide-based Australian Dance Theatre. The recipients of awards this year represented a cross-section of Australian dance styles and performers, as did the program of entertainment that accompanied the awards.

The much-anticipated awards for Outstanding Achievement by a Female Dancer and Outstanding Achievement by a Male Dancer were won by Lucinda Dunn, just recently retired from the Australian Ballet, for her performance in Manon, and Bangarra Dance Theatre’s Waangenga Blanco for his role in Stephen Page’s Patygerang.

Lucinda Dunn & Adam Bull in 'Manon', the Australian Ballet 2014. — Lucinda Dunn & Adam Bull in *Manon*, the Australian Ballet 2014.

Queensland Ballet walked away with outstanding performance by a company for its production of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet.

Marilyn Jones and Dr Elizabeth Cameron Dalman were formally inducted into the Hall of Fame for their distinguished contributions to dance in Australia and internationally, and Marilyn Rowe was the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award. The Ausdance Peggy van Praagh Choreographic Fellowship, a bequest from the first director of the Australian Ballet, Dame Peggy van Praagh, was made to Lina Limosani.

From a very personal point of view I was thrilled to see photographer Jeff Busby take out the award for Services to Dance. I have used so many Jeff Busby photographs throughout my career as a dance writer for a wide variety of outlets in Australia and overseas, and he has always been incredibly generous with his permissions. A well-deserved award.

The full list of winners is available on the Australian Dance Awards website.

The awards night always includes a series of short performances and snatches of film. The 2015 ceremony was distinguished, I thought, by a brief excerpt from Garry Stewart’s Birdbrain, the first full-length work Stewart made as artistic director of Australian Dance Theatre. While we are now somewhat used to the extreme physicality that characterises much contemporary dance in 2015, and Stewart’s vocabulary in particular, looking at the vocabulary of Birdbrain I was stunned that Stewart had made such a work 15 years ago. There is a whisper that it may be revived next year.

In something of a jaw-dropping juxtaposition, current ADT dancers Kimball Wong and Lonii Garnons-Williams performed ‘Moon Woman’ from Creation, Elizabeth Dalman’s 1970 work for ADT. What a difference 45 years of choreographic development makes, although Dalman’s slow, controlled movement language, redolent of American dance of the 1960s, was carefully realised by Wong and Garnons-Williams.

I also enjoyed the extract from Leigh Warren’s Mayakovsky performed by students of the BA dance program at the Adelaide College of the Arts. Danced to Luciano Berio’s Sinfonia of 1968, it was reflective and soul-searching dancing.

Michelle Potter, 16 September 2015

Twyla Tharp

A new interview with Twyla Tharp, by New York-based dance writer Gia Kourlas, is now available online on the website of Dance Magazine. It’s well worth a read. Here is the link.

Reading the article so soon after seeing In the Upper Room in Melbourne, I was inspired to search through my bookshelf for Tharp’s autobiography, Push comes to shove, published in 1992. There I read a little about the genesis of and inspiration for In the Upper Room. In particular, I was fascinated by Tharp’s account of the role of the two women who open and close the work. Tharp writes:

In picturing the great ferocious and brave porcelain dragon dogs that guard Zen temples, I was also seeing a family of small black-and-white china bulldogs that were kept in the front parlor of my Gram Bertha’s farmhouse. These had been passed down from Sarah Margaret Cherry Confer, my small Quaker great-grandmother who held the world together through all adversity. As I cast Shelley [Washington] and Chris [Uchida] in this role, to guard and organize the stage, I realized we had been building the strength for them to take on this work for more than a decade. These two women had become the ultimate in what I think of as my power women.*

She then goes on to talk, in a wonderfully analytical manner, about the structure of the work and where and how these two women (whom she called the Bomb Squad) fit into the whole. Now I look forward even more to seeing In the Upper Room again when the Australian Ballet’s 20:21 program goes to Sydney.

Michelle Potter, 2 September 2015

* Twyla Tharp, Push comes to shove: an autobiography (New York: Bantam Books, 1992), pp. 305–306.

Dance diary. August 2015

New Breed: Sydney Dance Company

Early in August Sydney Dance Company announced the four recipients of commissions to create works for the company’s New Breed initiative. Kristina Chan, Fiona Jopp, Bernhard Knauer and Daniel Riley will present their dances at Carriageworks in a season running from 8 to 13 December. Commissions have also gone to independent designers Matt Marshall and Aleisa Jelbart, and musician/composers Nick Thayer, James Brown, Jürgen Knauer, Toby Merz and Alicia Merz, who will contribute to the creation of the works, which will be performed by artists from Sydney Dance Company.

The four New Breed 2015 choreographers . Photo: Peter Greig — The four ‘New Breed’ choreographers for 2015 (l-r: Fiona Jopp, Kristina Chan, Daniel Riley and Bernhard Knauer). Photo: Peter Greig

Don Quixote: the film

During my recent foray into the career of Lucette Aldous, as a result of Sue Healey’s short film on Aldous, I came across the photograph below.

Lucette Aldous and Robert Helpmann in rehearsal for the film, 'Don Quixote', the Australian Ballet 1972. Photo: Don Edwards — Lucette Aldous and Robert Helpmann in rehearsal for the film, *Don Quixote*. The Australian Ballet 1972. Photo: Don Edwards. Courtesy National Library of Australia

I had always understood that it was very hot in those Essendon hangars where the Don Quixote production was filmed. From this image it appears that perhaps it was quite cold at times!

Harry Haythorne choreographic awards

The Royal New Zealand Ballet and the Ballet Foundation of New Zealand have announced two new choreographic awards to honour Harry Haythorne, artistic director of Royal New Zealand Ballet from 1981 to 1992. There will be two studio showings of new works choreographed by company dancers who will be in the running for two awards, one to be decided by a panel headed by present artistic director Francesco Ventriglia, and the other a People’s Choice award funded by money raised at the memorial event for Haythorne held in January. Dates for the showings are 12 and 13 September in the Royal New Zealand ballet studios, Wellington.

Press for August

‘Moving tribute to those who served.’ Review of Reckless Valour, QL2 Dance, The Canberra Times, 1 August 2015, p. 16. Online version.

‘Dalman and Jones going into dance Hall of Fame.’ Feature on the 2015 Australian Dance awards, The Canberra Times, 27 August 2015, ‘Times 2’, p. 6. Online version.

Michelle Potter, 31 August 2015

Hall of Fame. Australian Dance Awards 2015

The 2015 Australian Dance Awards ceremony will take place on 12 September in Adelaide. Following usual practice, the recipients of the Hall of Fame award have been announced in advance. The 2015 inductees into this prestigious group of Australian dancers and dance makers are Elizabeth Dalman and Marilyn Jones.

Dalman has been in the news recently as founding director (initially with Royal Ballet dancer Leslie White) of Australian Dance Theatre, which this year celebrates its 50th birthday. Audiences in Canberra and Queanbeyan have been treated to several performances that have looked back to Dalman’s early Adelaide Dance Theatre works in two programs, Fortuity and L, with L also being shown in Adelaide.

Elizabeth Dalman (centre front) in 'Moon Lake Walking'. Weereewa Festival Lake George. 2010. Photo: Barbie Robinson — Elizabeth Dalman (centre front) in *Moon Lake Walking*, Weereewa Festival Lake George. Photo: © Barbie Robinson

During her Adelaide years Dalman was described in the press as the ‘rebel of the dance’ but her more recent work has also been ground-breaking. In particular she has worked in diverse inter-cultural situations, including with Taiwanese and Indigenous dancers, and has frequently celebrated in dance the unique landscape of Lake George, near Bungendore, New South Wales, where she now lives and works.

Marilyn Jones is passionate about classical ballet and, while she has made excursions into contemporary dance, including with Sydney Dance Company, her career has been dedicated to the growth and development of ballet in Australia. She was a principal dancer with the Australian Ballet from its inaugural season in 1962 until the 1970s, and with the company danced leading roles in all the great classics. She was the company’s artistic director from 1979 until 1982 and during that period established the Dancers Company, which offered touring experience to senior students of the Australian Ballet School and opportunities to younger members of the Australian Ballet.

Marilyn Jones in 'The Merry Widow', the Australian Ballet, 1975. Photo: Walter Stringer — Marilyn Jones in the Australian Ballet production of *The Merry Widow*, 1975. Photo: Walter Stringer. National Library of Australia

One of Jones’ most significant achievements has been the establishment of the Australian Institute of Classical Dance, following the award of an Australian Creative Arts Fellowship in 1990. AICD continues its work today, teaching and examining, offering scholarships to dancers, and organising a choreographic competition, Dance Creation, to encourage emerging choreographers.

For a longer article on Dalman and Jones and their induction into the Hall of Fame, and more images, see this link.

Michelle Potter, 27 August 2015