Seeking meaning in a techno world

SHIMMER: Dancers perform a work by one of three choreographers involved in Footnote Dance Company’s most recent production Search Engine. Picture supplied

Audiences for Footnote Dance Company’s most recent production Search Engine can expect something physical, exciting and intense, says dancer Georgia Beechey-Gradwell.

Within the shimmering, luminous world of the work, three choreographers explore their experiences of what it means to seek meaning in our technologically-driven society.

“There’s something for everyone, I think,” says Beechey-Gradwell.

“At Footnote we work collaboratively with the choreographers and the composers.”

Often a work will start with some movement which prompts the music. The composer will go away and work on it and come back with something and it goes from there, she says.

Performed by Georgia Beechey-Gradwell and Adam Naughton, Search Engine begins with a duo by choreographer Rose Philpott.

“It is abstract — interesting and strange,” says Beechey-Gradwell.

Music for the piece is varied and begins with electronica.

“There’s a groovy section in the middle which is about the blending of future and past and there’s ambient music at the end.”

The second piece is performed by Tyler Carney, Joshua Faleatua and Anu Khapung and choreographed by Tupua Tigafua.

“Tupua focused on the word ‘search’ — searching for acceptance, searching for ecstasy, searching for a home.”

The final piece is by Australian choreographer Lauren Langlois who came to New Zealand to work with the company.

“I want to draw the audience into another world and state of altered reality,” Langlois says of her dance, Dys-connect.

“Hopefully they can come away with a sense of optimism in humanity and a visceral desire to connect to their instincts.”

Audiences can also look forward to exciting AV projection by lighting designer Charley Draper who has created a striking, playful projected world that punctuates the physicality of the dancers.

“There are some incredible projected images that work well with the movement,” says Beechey-Gradwell.

Described by reviewers as “electrifying to watch”, Footnote’s five young professionals will perform the newly choreographed works to music by sound designers Jesse Austin-Stewart, Harry Benson-Rae and Jimi Wilson.

The Footnote Dance Company presents Search Engine War Memorial Theatre, tomorrow at 7pm.