Carol Brown Dances was in residence in Athens for three weeks developing a site-specific event, an interactive dance journey through the historic site of the Duncan Dance Research Centre. Dancers from the UK and local professional contemporary Greek dancers and peformers together with artists from the fields of dance, architecture, video and mu lt i-media design formed a large team for this event which used the surrounding rooftops and acqueduct as well the interior spaces of the building for a dynamic homage to the utopic vision on which was based the conception, design and construction of the building.
The project begined with the question of Isadora Duncan's legacy and relevance for contemporary dance and asked what does it mean to dance the freedom of women in the 21st century ? This was not a tribute dance but a radical refit of the question itself. Performance designer, Dorita Hannah worked with Carol on the design of the project which included large-scale video projections and intimate installations of bodylandscapes.
The project, a co-production of Municipality of Byron, British Council (UK/Greece), the Duncan Dance Research Centre (Greece) and Carol Brown Dances (UK) offered a critical opportunity for innovation and enquiry through cross-disciplinary practice, for cultural exchange and creative dialogue between British and Greek professional dance and media artists, between the past and the presence, the local and the global.
Experimentation with innovative technology heightened the sensory impact of the work.
The wide public of dance, architecture and media art as well as local members of the community were invited to witness the event-in-making and participate as audience.
Potentially, given the innovation of the project, it is already planned to form a model of practice capable of being installed in other sites and locations as well as countries.
Carol Brown is a dancer and choreographer. Her work is renowned for its conversations with artists in other art forms. The dances she makes arise from an ongoing investigation into bodies, their histories and inventions, and the mediation of these through writings, film, digitization, buildings and sounds. Carol has received numerous awards including, a Jerwood Award for Choreography (1999), a Lisa Ullman Travel Scholarship (1998), a University of Otago William Evans Scholarship (2001) an AHRB Research Fellowship in the Creative and Performing Arts (2002-04), and a Nesta Dream Time (2004-05). Carol Brown Dances receives regular support from the Arts Council England and tours with the British Council.
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