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Internationally acclaimed solo dance artist and choreographer Margie Gillis has toured in Canada and internationally for some twenty years. As well as her solo work, by turns witty and rhapsodic, anguished and ecstatic, she has performed duets with guest artists including Christopher Gillis and Paola Styron, and has appeared as a guest with such major companies as Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal and The National Ballet of Canada. She has been featured in many television specials and won a Gemini Award for the 1998 CBC documentary, Wild Hearts in Strange Times. She was the first performer to take modern dance to China in 1979, and has toured India, Europe, the Middle East and North and South America. Both Canada and Quebec have named her a cultural ambassador. Critics refer to the charismatic soloist as "a living legend," and unanimously applaud, as do her audiences, her passionate presence. |
Photo CreditsMargie Gillis, Voyages to Interior Landscapes, Margie Gillis Dance Foundation; photo: Michael Slobodian Photo of Margie Gillis: Annie Leibovitz |
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Photo of Margie Gillis: Annie Leibovitz |
Artistic Director
Margie Gillis, who in 1988 became the first recipient of the Order of Canada for modern dance, studied under May O’Donnell, Linda Rabin, Lynda Raino and Allan Wayne. She has developed an idiosyncratic, naturalistic style: she says she dances "from the inside out" as she interprets universal themes of human emotion. She has choreographed and performed more than seventy solo dance works and has developed a unique teaching method. In 2000, she began to choreograph for other artists.
On Tour
VOYAGES TO INTERIOR LANDSCAPES
July/2005/Vancouver/Canada
70 minutes
1 interpreter
Margie Gillis, Choreographer
Gilles Vigneault/Gaetan Leboeuf, G.F. Handel, Suzie Leblanc, Jennifer Warnes/Léonard Cohen, Music
Denis Gagnon and Margie Gillis, Costumes
Voyages to Interior Landscapes (2005), resulting from five years of research, takes us on a journey through landscapes which spring from and resonate with the depths of inner life. As well as Voyage, a 25-minute solo created in 1997, four other works from Margie Gillis' repertoire are integrated into the program : Bloom, Loon, Blue and The Complex Simplicity of Love. Voyages to Interior Landscapes speaks of the risk that is love, the devastation that is loss, the mystery that are life and death. From abandonment to hope, from anger to forgiveness, this show is an unforgettable exploration of the adventures of the soul. With all her wisdom and knowledge, Ms Gillis invites us on a journey, creating a unique physical transparency and vocabulary where time is shifted and where body and soul amalgamate in a theatrical ritual.
CELEBRATION
December/2003/Montreal/Canada
70 minutes
1 interpreter
Margie Gillis & Irène Dowd, Choreography
Gaetan Leboeuf, G.F. Handel, Suzie Leblanc, Daniel Taylor, Jennifer Warnes/Léonard Cohen, Doreen Bray, J.S. Bach, Rosalyn Tureck, Johannes Brahms, Jessye Norman, Tom Waits, Music Composers, Arrangers and Recording Artists
Denis Gagnon, Sylvain Labelle, Denis Lavoie, Anne Dixon & Margie Gillis, Costumes
Celebration (2003) - Created for the thirtieth anniversary of Margie Gillis’ career, Celebration offers seven solo pieces which cristallize her exceptional path as an artist. The program designed by Margie Gillis is inspired by both desire and pleasure: her profound desire to perform and to create, and the pleasure with which she revisits, with her audiences, solo works which resonate as strongly as ever.
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