In Spring 2018 the Vancouver Park Board, in collaboration with Made in BC, launched a call for proposals for a two-year Community Dance Residency at the Roundhouse. The residency called upon professional dancers and choreographers with community-engaged practices to work together with non-professional dancers of varying experience and ability to create and produce new works.
The Roundhouse is now delighted to announce Heather Lamoureux and Kelly McInnes as its new Roundhouse Dance Artists-in-Residence. The two artists will work formally with the Roundhouse Ageless Dancers and Roundhouse Community Dancers, while working informally with the larger community activating spaces both inside and outside of the Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre.
Lamoureux and McInnes approach this residency with the intention of combining their experiences and practices with those of their participants, to create new and enriching works. With a shared interest in site-specific, transformational work and performance as a ritual, the two artists hope to create work that is conceptual, imaginative, multi-disciplinary and personal, while reimagining spaces in and around the Roundhouse that are not normally used for performance.
Heather Lamoureux’s work stems from her relationship with the earth and a determination to walk with generosity. She is the Artistic Director of Vines Art Festival, Community Outreach Co-Coordinator at Raven Spirit Dance and works for other performing arts organization including the PuSh International Arts Festival and Dancing on the Edge. She applies her training in Expressive Movement Therapy to work with youth in foster care as well as running various youth programs throughout the Lower Mainland. Currently being mentored by Cease Wyss at Harmony Gardens on community engagement in Sḵwú7mesh, she also volunteers at BC Crisis and Suicide Prevention Centre and at Kwekwecnewtxw: traditional Coast Salish Watch House.
Kelly McInnes dances with the intention of healing and through this works as a choreographer, performer and facilitator; community engagement is an important part of her practice. A graduate of Modus Operandi, Kelly has trained extensively in contact improvisation at EDAM Dance and in somatic practices with Helen Walkley. Often multi-disciplinary and site specific, her work explores the socio-political and invites an attention to sensation. She is a member of the collective Pressed Paradise, which focuses on activating public and unconventional spaces with performance, and of Mutual Futures collective, which focuses on the practice and performance of improvisation.
Registration for the fall session of Community Dance is now open, offering free sessions and an opportunity to work with Heather Lamoureux and Kelly McInnes as part of the Roundhouse Ageless Dancers or Roundhouse Community Dancers.
Roundhouse Community Dancers are an ever-changing group of adult participants that use dance to learn about their bodies and how they move.
Roundhouse Ageless Dancers are an inclusive community of older adults who create, practice and perform in ways that honour the aging body, affirming and celebrating the unique experiences of later life. In a series of weekly workshops, adults 55+ explore the creative and interactive potential of their physical, mental and emotional selves through movement.