Author: Dag Rosenqvist

Akram Khan, one of Britain’s most acclaimed choreographer and dancer, is right now hard at work with a new production for young audiences. We are proud to finally be able to share that the performance Chotto Xenos will have its Swedish premiere during Step 2020!

On March 18 and 19, the performance Chotto Xenos will be presented at Dergårdsteatern in Lerum. The award-winning choreographer Akram Khan has toured all over the world with his productions. Together with director Sue Buckmaster from London based Theatre-Rites, he has now re-imagined the piece XENOS to meet the young audiences. Lerum will be one of the first venues after the premiere and in Lerum the company will present school performances and an evening performance open to the public on March 19!

Chotto Xenos is set during World War 1, where we explore the lives and the fates of colonial soldiers. But the questions asked in the performance are just as relevant today: how does war begin? And how does it end? The answers depend on who is telling the story.

Don’t miss this unique opportunity to experience a brand new piece by one of the world’s most acknowledged and respected choreographers!

Read more about the performance here!

Book your ticket here!

Welcome to En scen kväll, focusing on dance for young audiences, March 17 2020! Come meet the city’s dance groups and enjoy dance performances for young audiences. During the evening there will also be a lecture and talks about dance for young audiences!

Step has started a collaboration with Göteborgs stad regarding the local showcase day En scen kväll, that for this occasion fittingly enough focuses on dance for young audiences. It feels great to able to present this in collaboration with Göteborgs stads Kulturförvaltning as a prestart of Step’s professionals program.

En scen kväll takes place in Gothenburg on March 17, from 15:00-19:00. The afternoon will be filled with local dance performances for young audiences, lecture, talks and presentations. This is also an opportunity to meet presenters, dancers, choreographers and invited guests of a light bite to eat!

Registration is done through Göteborgs stads Kulturförvaltning and will open shortly. For any questions, just send an email to mia.bjorklund@kultur.goteborg.se.

More info about the participating groups, location and invited guests will be announced shortly! But for now, please mark En scen kväll on March 17 in your calendars!

Welcome to the professionals program in Gothenburg on March 19-21 2020!

During three days you have the opportunity experience talks, mingling and of course – dance performances! The Step professionals program is for anyone working with dance, performing arts or culture for young audiences in general. Don’t miss this opportunity to meet other professionals and let yourself be inspired by three full days of dance.

The professionals program 2020 focuses on artistic selection – what we present and why. To shed some light on this from various perspectives, we have invited participants representing various parts of the performing arts scene for young audiences. They are producers, artistic directors, dramaturges, directors, dancers and researchers and will present perspectives regarding representation, internationalization, gender identity, target group adaptation, artistic choices and much more.

We have invited Sue Buckmaster, Artistic Director of London based company Theatre-Rites to talk about the work on adapting adapting Akram Khan’s performance Xenos into Chotto Xenos, that also has its Swedish premiere during Step 2020, for younger audiences. She will also talk about creating work on not naturally “child-friendly” subjects like the refugee crisis and the banking crisis.

From Gothenburg we welcome Sandra Grehn, Postgraduate in Literature focusing on Theatre Studies at the University of Gothenburg. Sandra will discuss representation using what discourses, narratives and bodies there are in performing arts for young audiences today as her starting point. But also how this affects children and youth’s perception of themselves and others.

From The Netherlands comes Dancer and Producer Paulien Truijen, one of the co-founders of the company Cie. Woest that visits Step with the performance Balancing Bodies. Paulien will talk about working outside the traditional venues and how they in doing so create ownership within the audience.

During the talks you will also meet our three curators. Adjjima Na Patalung, Artistic Director of BICT Fest in Bangkok, talks about producing a contemporary performing arts festival in Thailand in relation to a European context. Peter Sunesson, Producer for the Salto! festival in Skåne, talks about non-normative and queer perspectives in performing arts for young audiences. Gerhard Verfaillie, Artistic Director of the Krokus festival in Belgium, talks about internationalization and the artistic choices this could mean for a festival.

The talks are moderated by Catharina Bergil. Catharina has extensive experience in working with issues regarding performing arts connected to society at large. Today she works as head of the performing arts educations at the Academy of Music and Drama in Gothenburg.

The talks are held in English. They are free of charge, but you have to register.

Click here to register!

The talks on Thursday and Friday, March 19-20 are presented in collaboration with Folkteatern.

Read more about the professionals program here!

Hope to see you all in Gothenburg on March 19-21, 2020!

Plock!

Drip, throw, splash the paint? Why choose when you can do all of it! The performance Plock! combines dance circus and action painting into a color explosion.

Bothe children and adults put on covering overalls before the performance, because it’s going to splash and spill when the dancer takes the stage. This is an exploration of the painting style action painting, with buzzing paint tubes and where hands and feet are used as brushes. With an impressive force and body control, we follow the acrobatic dancers’ way toward the finished masterpiece.

Balancing Bodies

Do you want to experience a performance really close up? Sit among the dancers and perhaps even participate? Balancing Bodies plays with the idea of the relation between the audience and the dancers.

The audience is seated in an ordinary room. Spread out on rolling office chairs, it soon turns out that the audience is in fact both scenography and extras of the performance. Using humor and charm, we are invited into a world full of surprises where we as audience are very much a part of it. We will see duets and beautiful formations, only to the next minute being thrown into new situations where fun and exciting meetings occur.

On Tuesday March 3 we open Step in Vänersborg!

Vänersborg is bubbling with dance. With drive, clear goals and determined work we see how dance grows and develop throughout the municipality. We are so happy that the first edition of Step opens right here!

On Tuesday March 3 we open the Step festival at Folkets hus in Vänersborg. Starting outside of the building, at Plantaget, we will be greeted by dance at dusk. We are then lead into the elegant Festsalen at Folkets hus, where we among mingling people, balloons and bubbles get to listen to some opening speeches, but also experience dance. The winners of VBG Dance Festival – Go To Crew – and students from Music School Vänersborg’s dance education will perform.

Finally, we enter theater auditorium to see the performance 3rd by Danish company Freestyle Phanatix. A quietly poetic yet explosively forceful streetdance performance about what happens when the choices of our ancestors and our own generation catches up with us.

Pre-program and mingle: 17:45
Doors open: 18:45
Performance: 19:00

Tickets will be available at the beginning of the new year. But make a note of the date already now so you don’t miss this amazing opening!

Natten

Imagine being allowed to touch all those pretty things? To crawl around, listen, smell and experience without boundaries. In the performance Natten, you and your baby go on a discovery in a safe room filled with moon whiz and star melodies.

Natten is an iridescent nightly adventure for the very young. In a magical nightly universe we experience dancing moonlight and glittering stars that evoke your senses through scent, dance, sounds and music. In a safe room, the babies and adults can together move freely in the room, investigate, experience or lie down and just be.

Copenhagen based choreographer My Grönholdt has toured her work to venues and festivals all around the Nordics. It is with great joy that we welcome My and the dance company MYKA to Step. And we look forward to many nightly adventuers!

Förvandling

It’s shimmering, it’s growing, spinning and floating. In an enchanted world of movement there are no boundaries, and what I see perhaps you experience as something else entirely.

Using humor and ingenuity, dancer Johanna Ehn transform into various fanciful and dancing figures. One has large eyes, another too long arms. But what is it that we see? And what did it turn into now? Förvandling is a dance performance that brings out laughter, raises thoughts and creates curiosity. It’s beautiful when the imagination takes over and we as audiences can just go along for the ride.

We’re so proud to present local company Big Wind! With a long experience in scenic works for young audiences, they create colorful performances full of warmth and humor.

Now and again we come across performances that fit in any environment. Where the actual space becomes unimportant and where the encounter is at the center. Then it doesn’t matter if we’re seated in a theatre, in a cafeteria or out on the street.

The performance An Encounter is all about that encounter and how we connect with other human beings. With its two dancers and in its intimate scale, we’re drawn into a performance that is bubbling with smiles, surprises and emotions. It’s a mixture of floor acrobatics, dance and physical theatre in a tender and adventurous interplay.

Choreographer Jordi Vidal has toured all over the world with his productions, presenting over 600 performances. We are both happy and proud to finally be able to share his work and to see An Encounter presented at Step!

What do we dare create and what do we present on stage? – Soon we will announce the professionals program for Step 2020!

On March 19-21 2020 we’re presenting the professionals program for Step in Gothenburg. The days will be filled with talks, mingling and of course – dance performances! If you’re working with dance, performing arts or culture for young audiences in general, this is for you.

During the talks we will amongst others discuss selection – what do we dare create, what do we present on stage and why? As an artist and as a presenter we are constantly making choices. These choices are reflected in the performances that young audiences see today. Are we free, and bold enough? To we dare to challenge the audiences, or are we inhibited by fear, norms and structures that affect our choices?

We invite international and Swedish guests active in the field to get inspired by good examples, and to listen to both facts and opinions. Together we will twist and turn the perspectives, and hopefully we will gain some new insights and ideas. Don’t miss this opportunity to meet other professionals and let yourself be inspired!

More information about the program will be presented shortly, but until then – save the dates in your calendars and we hope to see you in Gothenburg March 19-21 2020!

Masculinity norms using the locker room as a backdrop and street dance about what happens when forces clash. It’s finally time to present the first performances of the first edition of Step!

Un Poyo Rojo

With a large portion of humor, an ounce of provocation and with acrobatics in breakneck speed, Argentinian company Un Poyo Rojo explore the masculinity norms using the locker room as a backdrop. Although at the core, it’s something as simple and lovely as a love story. The performance Un Poyo Rojo, which has the same name as the company, was created in Buenos Aires in 2008 and has since been performed across the world and now it’s finally Sweden’s turn. The performance will, amongst others, be presented at Stora Teatern in Gothenburg as part of their circus program.

3rd

The street dance performance 3rd is the third and closing part of a trilogy by Danish company Freestyle Phanatix, revolving around man’s evolution, identity and future. Using Newton’s third law, stating that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, 3rd is a reflection on the consequences our actions as individuals, society and culture have on a global scale. About what happens when the choices of our ancestors and our own generation catches up with us. With an incredibly tight interaction, and a presence and sensitivity in every movement, this is a performance that is both quietly poetic yet explosively forceful.

We’ll be back shortly with more performances and dates!