Seeds of Life marked the ten-year anniversary of the National Arboretum Canberra, and 20 years since the devastating Canberra bush fires. The Djinama Yilaga choir, rising star clarinettist Oliver Shermacher performed together with local artists for a celebration of life and new growth. The event culminated with a performance of a new work by Australian Dance Party, co-commissioned by Ausdance ACT and Canberra International Music Festival.
Hillscape was a new work choreographed by Australian Dance Party’s Ashlee Bye with new composition by Dan Walker for Seeds of Life.
We enter the vastness of the landscape to celebrate the Sisyphean cycle of generation and regeneration. Expanding and connecting into strong networks to negotiate the precariousness of the ecosystem, we reach out of the earth to climb and tumble, to bustle and thrive.
Hillscape was performed by Ashlee Bye, Yolanda Lowatta and Patricia Hayes Cavanagh with the support of Australian Dance Party.
Canberra International Music Festival (cimf.org.au) was founded in 1994, and has been shaped and distinguished by the strength of its curatorial vision. The creation of new work has remained an intrinsic part of the identity of the Festival, which now has a proud track record as a leading commissioner of new Australian music, especially music by women, First Nations artists and emerging composers. CIMF commissions traverse a broad spectrum of music-making practices, traditions, and technologies, and also include significant international works, such as Arvo Pärt’s Fourth Symphony.
Ausdance ACT (ausdanceact.org.au/) is the peak body for dance in the ACT headed by Director Dr. Cathy Adamek. They are part of a member-based non-for-profit national network and advocacy body, supporting independent dance artists, dance studios, dance teachers and dance education.
They are funded through artsACT to produce a series of programs that create public engagement and raise the profile of dance in the ACT
