ALICE HEYWARD
Before the act
Before the act
Concept/choreography: Alice Heyward
Performer: Alice Heyward
Illustrator: Ilya Milstein
Composer: Gregor Kompar
Set and Lighting Design: Matthew Adey
Alice Heyward locates her choreography at the nexus of language and movement. Before The Fact is a piece that has arisen 'from page to stage', taking its cues from imagined dance notation drawings by Melbourne illustrator Ilya Milstein. Alice's work represents choreography performed in the future tense, -a future perfect – involving dances which re-enact Ilya's fictitious notations. Inverting the relationship between the work and its trace, Alice re-frames history, creating an archive of fragmentary movements, from a dance which is mercurial and forever unfinished. With costumes by Sarah CrowEST and songwriting by Gregor Kompar, Alice's work expands the boundaries of choreography, delving into visual, aural and textual forms.
ALICE HEYWARD is a dancer, choreographer and writer. She graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts with a Bachelor of Dance in 2013. Alice has performed in Europe and Australia in works choreographed by Xavier Le Roy & Scarlet Yu, Alexandra Pirici, Mia Lawrence, Maria Hassabi, Simone Forti, Trisha Brown, Stefan Dreher, Hana Erdman, Becky Hilton, Geoffrey Watson, Timothy Walsh and Chloe Chignell, among others, at Centre Pompidou (Paris), The Venice Biennale (College Danza) '15, Carriageworks (Sydney), Berlin Art Week '15, Meinblau Gallery (Berlin), Index Gallery (Stockholm), 'Think Big’ festival (Munich), 'DANCE 2015’ festival (Munich), Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (Melb), ‘Le Mouvement – Performing the City’ (Biel), Pieces for Small Spaces at Lucy Guerin Inc. (Melb) and more. Alice’s choreographies have been presented at Dancehouse (Keir Choreographic Award 2016), Murray White Room (Melb), ada studio (Berlin), Sketch Gallery (London), and Melbourne Recital Centre. In 2016, Alice was commissioned to create ‘Before The Fact’ for 2016 Keir Choreographic Award, and was selected for the danceWEB Scholarship Programme 2016 in the frame of ImPulsTanz–Vienna International Dance Festival. She has been supported by the Australia Council for the Arts with an Artstart grant (2014), and by the Ian Potter Cultural Trust (2015) to expand her practice internationally. She received the 2014 VCA Graduate Mentorship Scholarship to produce ‘Now Is Not The Place’ at Murray White Room in February 2016, with Sandra Parker’s mentorship. Her writing has appeared in a range of publications.
Dancehouse, Melbourne - March 2016 - all rights reserved
Documentation by Cobie Orger.