Montreal Choreographer Dances Into Vancouver

The Georgia Straight

Publish Date: 23-Sep-2004

By Gail Johnson, Brian Lynch, and Colin Thomas

Arts Notes

Montreal Choreographer Dances Into Vancouver

Following the success of her multimedia, hip-hop influenced Interactive Digital Urban Ballet this past spring, Martha Carter is, for the upcoming dance season at least, calling Vancouver home. And she's got plenty marked in her DayTimer to keep her out of the rain.

The choreographer, who spent years in Montreal heading a collective of drag queens known as Marta Marta House of Pride, is now the dance artist in residence at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts. There, she's working on a new piece for six performers that will premiere next January. With Carter's characteristic fusion, the work combines ballet, modern, and street dance. She's also creating a duet for the next Dances for a Small Stage, which runs October 20 and 21 at Crush Champagne Lounge. And with a music degree from Stanford University behind her, Carter is teaching a class in composition for dancers at Simon Fraser University.

"The overriding feeling is that I'm getting the opportunity to continue to collaborate with the people I've met here and to develop relationships with them," Carter says on the line from home. "It's paradise here, and it's inspiring. There's plenty of activity going on, and even though I have nostalgia for Montreal--especially in the fall--things were always swirling so fast there. I have the luxury of calmness here. I can focus on my work."

Besides developing the aforementioned productions, Carter is busy promoting iDUB--which she pitched at the Vienna Dance Festival this summer and at Portland's recent Time-Based Art Festival--in the hope of touring it across Canada and internationally. She has also recently completed "Figment", a short dance-video installation that centres on a descending staircase as a metaphor for the unknown. The film, a site-specific piece for the Scotiabank Dance Centre--where it's playing on a continuous loop in the lobby until Tuesday (September 28)--features special effects by experimental visual artist Jamie Griffiths. Furthermore, Carter is choreographing John Korsrud's interdisciplinary Enter/Exit, which debuts next March at the Vancouver East Cultural Centre and won the most recent Alcan Performing Arts Award.

"I'm trying to make my voice heard," Carter says. "I'm very happy here."