Everyone is sitting around, tugging at their clothes. Or jumping around as if to get the circulation going. Then one stands. Then another, completely upright. Eventually, all of them. In anticipation. In readiness. That is the beginning of the show. Now, the dancers do as they are told. In the three-part 6.58 MANIFESTO by Canadian choreographer Andrea Peña, the dancers submit to different announcements, voices or moods. Anyone who has ever attended a dance class knows the “five, six, seven, eight!” command. Numbers, or sometimes tones, beats or the waltz tradition, do the deciding for the nine people on stage. In the process, repetitions, sequences and pairings emerge. No stories. Only the bodies become exhausted. But already they are stretching their arms again, strutting, bending, kneeling.
Andrea Peña, born in Colombia, has worked in Canada as a dancer with Ballet BC, Les Ballets Jazz de Montréal and others. She studied industrial design and founded her own company, Andrea Peña & Artists, in Montreal in 2014. As someone who lives in two cultures, she is interested in the in-between areas. She wants to dig into them “and show the relationship between the known and the unknown on stage.”
Artistic direction: Andrea Peña
Choreography: Andrea Peña in collaboration with the artists
Performers: Erin O’Loughlin, Francois Richard, Laura Toma, Veronique Giasson, Gabby Giasson, Gabby Kachan, Benjamin Landsberg, Jontae Landsberg, Jontae McCrory
Soprano: Rebecca Gray
Sound designer: Marc Bartissol, aka dull
Stage design: Andrea Peña & Alexis Gosselin
Dramaturgy: Mathieu Leroux
Artistic advisor: Hélène Simard
Lighting designer: Hugo Dalphond, Roxanne Bédard (director)
Technical direction: Hugo Dalphond
Costumes: Polina Boltova, Rodolfo Moraga
Visual design: Bobby León