Canada Dance Festival 2010

Tuesday 25th May 2010

sampad is collaborating with a Canadian dance company to produce a new South Asian dance piece for the prestigious Canada Dance Festival.

Talented UK dancers Subhash Viman and Mithun Gill left for Toronto last week to work with Canadian dancers from Sampradaya.

The group is developing a new piece, ‘Stealth’, with Indian choreographer Santosh Nair.

Inspired by Chhau, a tribal Indian martial art form, it promises to be a highly energetic, integrated display of controlled strength and riveting speed.

It will be performed at the Festival in Ottowa on 8 June and will come to Birmingham in the autumn.

Brian Webb, Artistic Director of the Canada Dance Festival said: “As a celebration of global potential, this program excites me to no end.”

This new commission is a continued collaboration between the two South Asian dance companies, following last year’s DanceIntense programme. Piali Ray, director of sampad and Lata Pada, artistic director of Sampradaya led intensive workshops in contemporary dance from the point of view of the South Asian diaspora at the York University in Toronto.

Piali Ray said: “We are delighted to be working with Sampradaya again. This is a fantastic opportunity for Subhash and Mithun to meet their peers in the field of dance and develop their understanding of the South Asian dance environment in another diaspora country.

“Canada Dance Festival is also a brilliant chance for sampad to show the high quality that Birmingham and the UK have to offer on an international stage.

“Our international partnerships are an important part of sampad’s work to increase opportunities for our artists to produce and perform new work.”