Dynamic loud show from Hofesh Shechter Dancers

Arts Week with Judy Murphy

Political Mother, with its ear-shattering drumming and its depiction of war, resistance and ritual, took the Galway Arts Festival by storm when it was staged at the Black Box in 2010.

Now Hofesh Shechter Company, the outfit which presented that memorable dance show, has returned to the Festival with a new piece, deGeneration. It’s a very different work according to the company’s Associate Artistic Director Bruno Guillore.

“We will never do the same show twice,” explains Bruno who dances with the London-based Hofesh Shechter Company as well as being one of its choreographers. “Audiences see a show and like it and maybe want the same, but we hopefully will never do that. Political Mother had a lot of musicians on stage and had a rock feel to it. This is something new and different.”

It is indeed new and different, as deGeneration will be performed by the Hofesh Shechter Junior Company at the Black Box Theatre. It is made up of three works – Cult, Fragments, and Disappearing Acts.

The eight-strong Hofesh Shechter Junior Company came into existence last year after London-based choreographer Shechter and several of his contemporaries stated that UK ballet schools were not producing sufficiently strong performers.

So the Hofesh Shechter Company decided to cast its net and find young dancers to nurture.

A scheme was set up and eight dancers from all over the world, aged between 18 and 25, were chosen from over 1,000 applicants.

“It was to bridge the gap between dance school and the professional world,” says Bruno of the Junior Company. “Some have potential but are not ready for the main company. Hopefully 100 per cent of them will find work after a year with us.”

The eight members of the Junior group receive training and mentoring from Bruno and other dancers. They have also danced alongside the 14-strong main troupe and this September they will perform in a new version of Orphée et Eurydice on the main stage of the Royal Ballet in Covent Garden, which is being co-presented by the Hofesh Shechter company.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.