Find your way to the Melbourne Fringe experience through colourfully immersive dance piece, Wayfinder.
Listening to three-time GRAMMY Award-nominated Australian music act, Hiatus Kaiyote is a full-body experience that starts at your ears, swirling up to the top of your temporal lobe, tapping into your cerebellum and involuntarily choreographing its way down through your body. It’s a formula that vocalist/guitarist Nai Palm, bassist Paul Bender, keyboardist Simon Mavin, and drummer Perrin Moss have finessed across four albums including this year’s revolutionary release of Love Heart Cheat Code. Their eclectic explosion of sound strikes, attacking every limb in erratic eurhythmics.
The Hiatus Kaiyote wave has weaved its way into the form of Townsville/Gurambilbarra-based dance company, Dancenorth Australia for their immersive contemporary dance experience, Wayfinder.
Wayfinder
- When: Friday 25 Oct 2024, 7:30pm | Saturday 26 Oct 2024, 7:30pm
- Where: The Story House, Geelong Arts Centre, 50 Little Malop Street Geelong
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A presentation under the Melbourne Fringe Festival program, as supported by Queensland Government, Brisbane Festival, North Australia Festival of the Arts, Creative Australia and the Australian Government RISE Fund, Wayfinder joins the Geelong Arts Centre 2024 Season for two electrifying evenings of music and movement. Presented at The Story House on Friday 25 October and Saturday 26 October, Wayfinder is hailed a favourite of this years exciting Fringe Festival offering one of the few performances touring to regional audiences.
Tagged as “Physical exuberance, sonic resonance, and collective exhilaration exploding onto stage in a kaleidoscopic fusion of dance, music, and visual art”, Wayfinder is the outpouring of artistic expression under the distinctive direction of Amber Haines and Kyle Page. Set to a pleasure and possibility-evoking composition crafted by Hiatus Kaiyote in conjunction with sound artist Byron J Scullin, Wayfinder is a marvel of movement that indulges in intricate and intense choreography, elevated by soaring sonic highs, abrupt pauses and a temperamental tempo. An undulating sound sculpture condenses and expands this scintillating score, immersing audiences in a new sonic dimension; one that is dynamic, daring and directional.
As a stage spectacular, Wayfinder is performed by Marlo Benjamin, Sabine Crompton-Ward, Tiana Lung, Damian Meredith, Darci O’Rourke, Tara Jade Samaya, Felix Sampson, Michael Smith, crayoned by a singular colour costume to together form a rainbow of vibrance on stage. The concept is derived from the expansive vision of Japanese-Australian visual artist Hiromi Tango, who offers her joyful, heart expanding artwork to both the stage design and costumes. Partnered with dramatic and alluring lighting design by Niklas Pajanti, Wayfinder transports you into the stage, into the motion and into the sonic exploration. It is the culmination of these elements that makes Wayfinder an immersive experience aimed at reminding us of a state of being that transcends the words that have come to define us, recognising connection as the central axis of the universe.
Contributing to the visual and conceptual outlay of Wayfinder is a team of creative masterminds including Robert Larsen and Nicholas Roux for sound sculpture design, construction and implementation, Chloe Greaves as Design Associate, Jeanette Hutchinson as Design Assistant, Naomi Jean as Polyrhythm Consultant, Liam Kennedy as the Production Manager, Pip Loth as Company Stage Manager, Yoshie Kenny as Production Technician of sound and technical operations and Suzy Brooks as a Production Technician for lighting.
This ambitious and adventurous new work for Dancenorth continues their streak of delivering excellence to the stage. Dancenorth has presented work in over 45 International Arts Festivals and venues around Australia and the world. With a national reputation for producing works of the highest quality, Dancenorth has received two Helpmann Awards, two Australian Dance Awards, two Green Room Awards, the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Group Award, and the PAC Australia Impact Award.
Wayfinder is also being presented at Monash University Performing Arts Centres (MPAC) the week prior to its appearance in Geelong on Friday 18 and Saturday 19 October, 2024
Be prepared to feel the power of connection of body, mind, heart and spirit as Wayfinder pours onto the Geelong Arts Centre Stage. To purchase tickets to see Wayfinder, head here.
To discover more exciting events under the Melbourne Fringe Festival season, head here.
