|
|
April 26, 2013
Highgate dances at Cultch
A visit to the historic English cemetery inspires choreographer.
CYNTHIA RAMSAY
Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg has a penchant for the quirky, and a talent for using humor to communicate serious and thought-provoking themes. Prime example: her latest work, Highgate, described as “a morbid romp through Victorian funerary culture,” quite literally explores issues of life and death.
“I got the idea for the piece after visiting Highgate Cemetery in 2008,” Friedenberg told the Independent in an e-mail interview. “I had been there before, during university, to visit the grave of Karl Marx (of course) but, in 2008, I took a tour of the western section of the cemetery where some of the most impressive tombs are, the best examples of the Victorians’ obsession with death and mourning. I couldn’t get over the unbelievable amounts of money they spent on their funerals, graves, mourning clothes, etc. It got me thinking about how contemporary society hides from death, denies it, sweeps it under the rug so to speak.”
Friedenberg visited the English cemetery again in 2010 – “the place just sticks with you,” she said.
According to the cemetery’s website, London was facing a crisis in the early part of the 19th century, with not enough space to bury the many dead, the result of both a rising population and a high mortality rate: “Graveyards and burial grounds were crammed in between shops, houses and taverns.... In really bad situations, undertakers, dressed as clergy, performed unauthorized and illegal burials. Bodies were wrapped in cheap material and buried amongst other human remains in graves just a few feet deep. Quicklime was often thrown over the body to help speed decomposition, so that within a few months the grave could be used again. The smell from these disease-ridden burial places was terrible. They were overcrowded, uncared for and neglected.”
By the 1830s, the website notes, “the authorities were stating that for public health reasons something had to be done. Parliament passed a statute to the effect that seven new private cemeteries should be opened in the countryside around the capital for the burial of London’s dead,” one of which was Highgate.
In 1836, an act of Parliament was passed, creating the London Cemetery Co.: “Stephen Geary, an architect and the company’s founder, appointed James Bunstone Bunning as surveyor and David Ramsey, renowned garden designer, as the landscape architect.... Over the next three years, the cemetery was landscaped to brilliant effect by Ramsey, with exotic formal planting complemented by the stunning and unique architecture of both Geary and Bunning. It was this combination that was to secure Highgate [17 acres large] as the capital’s principal cemetery.”
“I found the place fascinating and a great jumping off place to examine our relationship with death,” explained Friedenberg. “The Victorians were obsessed with death, it was a lot more a part of every day; people were dying of things they don’t die of now. The palette of this era and place is also very rich and beautifully haunting.”
Highgate features performances by Friedenberg, Justine A. Chambers, Alison Denham, Susan Elliott and Bevin Poole. Friedenberg said that it “does tell a story of sorts but not in a traditional linear, narrative way. There is lots of text and lots of dance. The journey is explored on many levels.”
Artistic director of Vancouver-based Tara Cheyenne Performance, Friedenberg has created and performed three solo shows – bANGER, Nick & Juanita and Goggles – all of which have received numerous accolades. Both bANGER and Nick & Juanita, for example, have won People’s Choice honors at the Dancing on the Edge Festival (in 2005 and 2007, respectively) and Friedenberg herself has been nominated for several awards for her choreography in theatre.
About her creative process, with reference to Highgate, Friedenberg said, “I work improvisationally at first, exploring the images and characters that might be rattling around in my mind. I do this when I work on solos and group work. My cast is super important because they need to be able to really ‘play’ inside the ideas, images and concepts. There is a lot of laughter in the studio, it’s a great testing ground for the comic elements of the piece, which are so important, especially with this subject matter. A good friend who is a great comic once told me ‘tragedy plus time equals comedy,’ so any real honest look at the human condition and what we endure will produce pathos and laughs, poignancy and the ridiculous.”
Tara Cheyenne Performance includes director and dramaturge Sophie Yendole, lighting designer James Proudfoot and composer and sound designer Marc Stewart, who also happens to be Friedenberg’s husband. Joining the team on Highgate is Friedenberg’s mother, Alice Mansell, who created the costumes and the lobby design.
“I’m lucky to have these incredibly talented people around me. I would work with them even if they weren’t my family!” said Friedenberg. “Alice is a visual artist who has always done really strange, captivating work, often with a creepy edge, so she was perfect for this piece. Marc and I always work together, but he always surprises me. It is nice to work with people who really know you and care about you and the work. It’s hard to leave work at the ‘office’ though, we are all always talking about the work.”
Another special aspect of Highgate is that it is being staged at the Cultch, which has a youth mentorship program, a highlight of which is the Ignite! Youth-Driven Arts Festival (which takes place May 6-11 this year). As such, added Friedenberg, “An exciting element is that we are involving some of the youth from the Cultch’s Ignite! program in the lobby design with Alice and as characters animating the entrance and lobby space. It’s great to have these enthusiastic young people on board!”
Highgate previews April 30 and runs May 1-4, 8 p.m., at the Cultch, 1895 Venables St., with a post-show Q&A with the artists on May 2. Tickets (from $17) can be purchased from the box office, 604-251-1363, and tickets.thecultch.com.
^TOP
|
|
