3 MONTH INTENSIVE EMERGING ARTIST PROFESSIONAL PROJECT September 2023- December 2023 2023 applications open!
The Performance Research Project is a mentorship and professional development platform for early career dance professionals to focus on creative personal growth and career development, led by Lesley Telford since 2016. Conceived as a stepping stone into a career in dance or for those in transition between contracts, this professional development project provides daily training along with further experience in the creative process and exposure to new ways of working and thinking about dance . PREP provides a space for dance artists to build an intensive practise, connect, learn, question, experiment, collaborate, perform, and grow. Ultimately, the main purpose of this project is to provide dancers with the support, mentoring and focus that they need while balancing training, auditioning and independent work.
Inverso successfully took over the Performance Research Project in 2020 (previously under Arts Umbrella), leading two 10-week sessions at The Dance Centre, mentoring 16 dance artists, offering public workshops in person and digitally across the globe including a co-presentation with SFU, developing a new collaboration with the Vancouver Film School, and streamed performances at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts.
Past Seasons 2016-21 • Collaborations with Ballet BC, Chor Leoni , Bard on the Beach, Pi Theatre, Inverso Productions, Mascall Dance, Vancouver Film School • Creation processes with Serge Bennathan, Noam Gagnon, Tara Cheyenne Friedenberg, Idan Cohen, Heather Myers, Vanessa Goodman, David Raymond, Livona Ellis, Brandon Alley, Rachel Prince and Lesley Telford • Workshops and classes led by Crystal Pite, Renee Segouin and Eric Beauchesne / Kidd Pivot, Yvan Dubrueil / Nederlands Dans Theater, Clyde Archer/LEV Sharon Eyal, Khoudia Toure, Christophe Dozzi (NL), Yannick Bouquin (France), Sarah Reynolds (NL), Ayman Harper/ Forsythe repertoire, Marla Waal/ ELDOA, Béatrice Larrivée/Gaga • Improvisation events and improvisation research • Choreographic workshops with participating dancers • Repertoire by Crystal Pite, Jiri Kylian, William Forsythe, Johan Inger, Medhi Walerski, Sharon Eyal, Lesley Telford • Dancers have worked with actors, writers, musicians, opera singers and movement sensor technology
Alumni Alumni have gone on to work with local and international companies and have created their own choreographic projects with careers as independent artists. Luzerne Tanz Theater, Switzerland Mainfranken Theatre, Germany Theatre Pforzheim, Germany Theatre Augsburg, Germany Theater Nordhausen, Germany Staattheater Flensburg, Germany Compañia Contemporanea de San Martin, Argentina Les Ballets Jazz de Montreal: Ballet Edmonton Project20 / Donald Sales The Response/ Amber Funk Barton 605 Collective Inverso Productions/ Lesley Telford Action at a Distance/ Vanessa Goodman Vision Impure/ Noam Gagnon Les Productions Figlio/ Serge Bennathan Wen Wei Dance TWObigsteps collective Rachel Meyers Mascall Dance/ Jennifer Mascall The Darlings