A Burnaby dancer and choreographer is hoping her latest body of work inspires people to speak up about social, political and environmental issues.
Via a collage of dance, poetry, photography, video, music, light and textiles, UMBRAL There is a Way explores the meaning of life and death, while providing commentary on the reality of war and destruction in a world fuelled by greed, according to Salome Nieto.
The production is the brainchild of Nieto and Eduardo Meneses-Olivar, co-founders of the pataSola dance company. The idea for UMBRAL evolved from a previous piece they created two years ago when they were commissioned to come up with a dance for Mexico’s Day of the Dead holiday.
“When we were working on this 10-minute segment vignette, we realized how can we take this further and really create some responsibility,” said Nieto. “We started to explore the meaning of life and death, the values we place on life and death. We went beyond the cultural and placed it in the context of the now.
“Death is beautiful but not when somebody imposes it on you. We started to explore what’s happening right now and then thinking, well it’s not just about what’s happening, but also we hope that we can turn the wheel around,” she explained.
For Nieto, who also works at the Shadbolt Centre as an arts programmer, it’s the little things that can turn that wheel.
“I buy local. I’m conscious of not purchasing bottled water and very over packaged things. The things I buy are impacting someone’s life in another part of the world,” she said. “We live in a system that’s very hard to escape from. If we could all (do) a little bit.”
Nieto added it’s hard to read the day’s news sometimes and keep a positive attitude.
“There is horror happening every day everywhere in the world and we don’t pay attention. We don’t acknowledge it because we’re used to it. Part of my intention is that we can’t desensitize ourselves. We need to just be aware.”
But UMBRAL, which means “threshold,” won’t leave the crowd feeling down, according to Nieto. She noted the piece is reflective and gets people thinking about coming together as a human race.
“We can find a way. We are capable of wonderful things. If we could just stop and rethink, we could turn things around,” she said.
The show runs nightly from July 27 to 29 at 8 p.m. at Vancouver’s Roundhouse centre. There is a free performance Wednesday (today) at 4:30 p.m. Otherwise, tickets are $25. Visit umbral.brownpapertickets.com.
