What would it be like to create a dance in one day?
New Melbourne-based youth dance organisation Yellow Wheel is giving young dancers the chance to find out with a special one-day workshop on Sunday 16 September 2012. Entitled “It’s a Dance Project”, the workshop will see participants make a short contemporary dance work and perform it that night. The brains behind the workshop is Adam Wheeler, Yellow Wheel’s Artistic Director. Dance Australia spoke to Wheeler to find out more about Yellow Wheel.
“Jessie Oldfield and I began Yellow Wheel in April this year with an audition to find our first ever ensemble,” explains Wheeler. “We had 80 young people in total come on the day and over the past six months have been working with twenty of Victorians finest young dancers.”
Wheeler hopes that Yellow Wheel will provide young Victorian dancers with the same opportunities that those in many other states are offered. “I have had the privilege to make a bunch of works with the some of the country’s great youth companies, including Stompin, STEPS, QL2 and fLing,” sys Wheeler. “I was surprised we didn't have a company of our own in Victoria. So with all the experiences and skills I have gathered, Yellow Wheel was born.”
Yellow Wheel’s structure is similar to that of Canberra’s QL2, says Wheeler. “Under the Yellow Wheel umbrella we run a number of programs including our next generation youth dance company PUSH. We also run contemporary technique classes for young people called WORKSHOP and term 4 this year we will run our first ever choreographic program SHOWROOM.”
Those who come to view the outcome of “It’s a Dance Project”, which will be appropriately entitled Eight Hours Later, will also get a sneak preview of Dance Robot Dance, PUSH’s first major work. “Dance Robot Dance is the first instalment of a number of works exploring our love/hate relationship with dance,” says Wheeler. “This particular project examines the relationship between dance and our PUSH ensemble. What does it really mean to dedicate your entire life to dance at such a young age? What are ups and downs of a life in dance and how do our imperfections and individualities make us unique, important and the next generation of exciting artists? This is a work about human verse dance and premieres in October this year.”
