On a hunt for dance through Montreal’s annual Nuit Blanche, it was an unplanned incident that ended up making my night.
8:30 p.m. My Nuit Blanche begins early at Tangente where the second instalment of the Biennale de gigue contemporaine is well underway. Unfortunately, I must admit that none of the five works presented this week ever reached the heights of the previous week.
10:30 p.m. At Studio 303 in the Belgo building, dance videos are being shown on a loop. I’ve already seen the first one last year, but I decide to stay anyway because it is simply brilliant. It’s Johnny Ranger’s Haikuedde, in which one of my favourite choreographers, Vancouver-raised Montreal resident Chanti Wadge, presents us with a delightfully tongue-in-cheek “hyper-Asian” version of herself. Dressed up in traditional attire, her martial-arts inspired movement is speeded up to transform her from dancer to simplistic video game character.
This video is followed by Luc Boisclair’s short, but sweet Po
