#dancecafe

By Kaia Shukin

It’s funny how we self-segregate: there are theatre people who seem to be separate from spoken work people, who are different from opera people, who don’t think they’ll ever like improv.

The dance community in Vancouver is a small, tight one. We all know one another. We go to one another’s shows.

Maybe this is why dance rarely attracts other audiences outside the usual suspects. Many people who don’t usually go to dance shows or who imagine they won’t like it, find buying a ticket too risky.

So they don’t.

Broadening the scope, bringing this art form to those outside the world of dance, is always a challenge.

So the Dance Cafe is a welcome experiment.  With rather exciting results.

We offered our first one on June 3rd at the Gold Saucer (an artists’ co-op that rents space for performances at reasonable rates).

 Our goal was to offer a short, performance-based show. Followed by a party and an opportunity to meet the artists, ask about our process, the choices we made. That sort of thing. The objective of Dance Cafe was to create a very welcoming, casual environment for people to see what dance is about. To ask questions. Break down some barriers.

And it worked!

Maybe it was the free booze. Maybe it was the welcoming, unpretentious vibe (that just seemed to happen organically). But as a dancer, I’ve never felt so comfortable just putting myself out there to try something I’d be too scared to attempt in a more formal setting.

And I had some wonderful conversations with people who’d never seen a dance performance before.

Let us know if this is something you’d like to see more of!

So excited for our inaugural Dance Cafe!  Come check out some sweet moves by an exciting group of Vancouver choreographers and then hang out with us after!