The Invisible Practice: Carbon Movements

Imagine having zero experience in contemporary dance and movement, and within a year developing and performing one of the most original and innovative pieces in Canada - as a Deaf person.

This is what we aim to achieve in The Invisible Practice: Carbon Movements, and we need your help to get all the way there! We’ve already had six incredible weeks of research, development, and choreography work spread out over the past seven months since February 2022.

We planned for only two more weeks before our final tech rehearsals and performance in March 2023 at SOUND OFF, Edmonton’s Deaf Performance Festival, but we’ve been very fortunate to be accepted into a residency program at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity this coming December! This means an EXTRA two weeks of time that can be dedicated to developing my choreography on stage, rehearsing difficult movements and sequences, and workshopping the overall story. This is incredibly valuable to me as someone who is pushing every personal-physical boundary on stage. It is essential to my craft that I present a confident and layered performance that will have an impact beyond the walls of the theatre.

Why do we need so much time for a dance piece? Well, it’s not just dance. It’s also…

American Sign Language poetry, layered with;

Tactile material interaction (the stage is covered in something that constantly moves and flows, but we won’t spoil what it is), layered with;

Vibrotactile technology that converts sound to vibrations felt by the performer and audience, layered with;

A custom-built stage made of several dozen pieces!

(Not to mention everything else a show needs - lights, cues, interpreters, promotional material, program info, and so on!)

It’s a lot. And hopefully our video helps you see how all of this fits together without spoiling the final result too much! We really want to preserve the surprise for our audiences.

Why do we need funding to go to Banff? First of all, we’re very grateful for the funding we have received from all three levels of arts stewardship - Edmonton Arts Council, Alberta Foundation for the Arts, and Canada Council for the Arts. However, the budget that they are supporting didn’t account for the bonus time at Banff, which comes with associated costs of program fees, transport, materials, and - most importantly - ensuring we are paid adequately as artists making a living.

We deeply appreciate your support. And if you can’t give dollars from your pocket, that’s okay! You can share this on your platforms and tell a few friends!

And if you’re not in Edmonton, don’t worry - we have every intention of applying for a tour series, so you could still eventually see in person what your support helped create!