Tara Brandel / Croí Glan

Production Residency: Croí Glan In Place (Dance)
Dance Studio/Gallery
1 February to 30 April

In Place is an hour long show in 2 sections, In Place One and In Place Two, investigating the architecture of 4 distinct art spaces around Ireland, in Dublin (IMMA), Belfast (The Mac), Cork (Uillinn West Cork Arts Centre) and Limerick (Limerick City Gallery).

In Place One: is a solo choreographed and performed by Tara Brandel, made in response to the architecture of each space. As someone with dyslexia, Tara experiences her neurodiversity through a heightened sense of spatial awareness. In Place One will draw upon and embody this distinct experience and reflect on the relationship between the fragility and durability of the soft human form and the spatial harmony of architectural space. Drawing on images by De Chirico, In Place One reflects on isolation and our place in the world.

In Place Two: is an intimate duet for Croi Glan Co-Artistic Director and dancer with a disability, Linda Fearon, and male dancer Lee Clayden. The duet provides complementary insight and experience to In Place One, reflecting on our relationship with others and how our environment shapes our trust, attachments and closeness, through touch, balance and exquisite movement. In Place Two explores longing, connection and intimacy within the limitations of place.

In Place will be created in collaboration with a stellar team of creatives: haunting music composed by Ray Harman; beautiful costume design by designer Angharad Matthews, and simple site-relevant lighting design by Sarah Jane Sheils.

Tilt

Tilt is an Aerial Dance Theatre show centred around a very versatile pole that flies, falls and circles, as a metaphor for instability

An outdoor performance for Culture Night on Friday 18 September, 6pm (55mins duration) at Fairfield Carpark (adjacent Abbeystrewry Hall), Skibbereen.

When everything is off kilter, what remains? Tender and triumphant, Tilt spans the fragility of the human body and the endurance of the human spirit. Conceived as an idea in 2019, and made even more relevant by our current situation, Tilt is an Aerial Dance Theatre show centred around a very versatile pole that flies, falls and circles, as a metaphor for instability and change in an unstable world.

Including live music, Irish dance, twerking, street dance, aerial, contemporary dance and song in an insightful and surprising show that offers both humour and pathos with a multi-talented, international cast of five diverse performers.

Tilt is a Croi Glan production.

Directed by Tara Brandel

Music composition by Niall O’Carroll

Cast: Oran Leong, Tanya Turner, Nicholas Nwosu, Niall O’Carroll and Tara Brandel

Rigging design by Barnaby Munn

Booking: free, eventbrite – booking is essential to ensure public safety

Please be prepared to wear face masks where physical distancing may be difficult

This is an outdoor event so please dress accordingly

Croí Glan is Ireland’s leading Integrated Dance Company and was fo-founded in December 2006 by Rhona Coughlan and Tara Brandel. The company is based in West Cork and produces innovative, engaging, high calibre productions and delivers associated participatory activities with both disabled/non-disabled dancers to highlight the value of diverse bodies in creating performance. Croi Glan was nominated Best Performance Ensemble Dublin Fringe 2012 and 2016. The company has toured throughout Ireland, and internationally including to the UK, Egypt and the USA.

Croi Glan
Production Residency ‘Too’ from 24 to 26 March and 26 August to 3 September

Croí Glan will be working on a new duet choreographed by Tara Brandel, to premier at Firkin Crane October 2018. Too is a duet for Croí Glan’s Aristic co-Directors Linda Fearon and Tara Brandel, exploring the Me Too phenomena from a dancer’s perspective, drawing on the dancers’ personal experiences and interviews with other female dancers. How are we treated as female dancers? What are our experiences? How is difference navigated?
With this new work, Croí Glan wishes to tackle these meaty topic of gender experience, with the ambition to delve into deeper and more complex subjects as a maturing company. West Cork native Tara Brandel has been choreographing extensively since 1990. Veteran dance artist with a disability Linda Fearon from Armagh has been dancing with Croí Glan since 2015 (as well as CanDoCo, Jerome Bel and Claire Cunningham) and has been Artistic co-Director since 2018.

Dance Artist in Residence 2015 and 2016
Tara Brandel
January 2015 to November 2016
Dance Studio
Bridge: Croi Glan and West Cork Inclusive Dance Group
Funded by the Arts Council Artist in the Community Scheme

West Cork Arts Centre in partnership with Cork County Council has received an Arts Council Award for their second dance residency for Uillinn with dance artist Tara Brandel. This second residency is about Consolidation and Completion inviting peers and public to experience aspects of her creative process through a community-based dance programme, studio sharings and performance.

The focus of Tara’s studio practice will be on developing a solo dance theatre performance Cappaghglass. The idea for this piece was borne out of a series of interactions and improvisations in her first year at Uillinn. Throughout the development of this work, Tara will engage in an online and studio based mentorship with Berlin / San Francisco based choreographer Jess Curtis. The public will be invited to see the work on two occasions during the year to witness and collaborate in the process.

Performance is central to the residency and Tara will perform work from her own company Croí Glan who celebrate their 10th Anniversary with a double bill of new works; Fancy Dress with Ireland’s leading choreographer David Bolger and Remote, directed by Jess Curtis. The residency also hosts a dance platform for other dance performers in Ireland to come and share their work. This year we welcome Luke Murphy to come and perform On Triumph and Trauma and Phillipa Donollan from the CoisCéim Broadreach programme

Tara has also initiated a number of improvised site specific performances inviting guest artists to perform in and around Uillinn and the locality, interacting with the building and the environment and wearing Lime Green. This vivid colour provides a striking contrast to the rusty orange exterior of the building, drawing the eye to these compelling site specific dance pieces, making contemporary dance more visible, by bringing it into spaces where it is not usually seen.

Tara will take this concept further by an interaction with a familiar everyday object, the car, a complex machine that travels at high velocity. Invited guest artists will perform with her on series dance pieces, in and around a car in unusual and highly physical ways. This consolidates her aim of making contemporary dance more visible, by dancing in a playful and irreverent way in non-dance places and spaces.

Tara’s community-based dance programme is all about engaging the public in her work processes and widening the appeal of contemporary dance. She will deliver regular classes in Contemporary Dance and Aerial for teens and adults.

A new feature of this year’s residency is Listening to Art, an experimental kinaesthetic experience which invites members of the public to join Tara in her Lime Green performances to improvise and interact with the artwork in the gallery. These workshops will lead participants through a process of experiencing and responding to visual art through the senses of smell, touch, and hearing, and most importantly through movement and body sensation.

Tara will also continue her work in developing West Cork Inclusive Dance, a programme that was initiated in partnership with West Cork Arts Centre in 2012. Her role this year will be to mentor facilitators Josephine McCarthy and Patricia O’Sullivan in delivering the weekly sessions and choreographing their first site specific show for Clonakilty Wellness Week in May 2016.

Tara trained at the Laban Centre, London and with Steve Paxton, Nigel Charnick and Lloyd Newsom. She studied Integrated Dance with Axis Dance Company and Alito Alessi. She was a Co-Director of 848 Community Space, San Francisco from 2002-2004 and is currently Director of Croí Glan Dance Company, based in Ballydehob.

Dance Production Residency – Gawky and Awkward
Tara Brandel
18 June to 21 June

Tara Brandel was award studio time to prepare for a performance of ‘Gawky and Awkward’ at Cork Mid Summer Festival. Gawky and Awkward is a 20 minute solo which looks at one dancer’s struggle with dyslexia, and how its affected her as a professional dancer. Performed and Choreographed by Tara Brandel. Directed by Caroline Bowditch. Soundscape by Colm Rooney. Original composition by Charlotte White. As part of her preperation process, Tara presented the work to the public as a full dress reheasal in the studio on Tuesday 13 June.

Dance Production Residency Cappaghglass
Tara Brandel
25 May to 15 June

Tara Brandel was award studio time to prepare for an international tour of ‘Cappaghglass’. Cappaghglass was devised and developed over two years during Tara Brandels residency at Uillinn 2015 – 2016. This support is an important part of Uillinns commitment to artists career development. As promised the artists secured a tour and funding of the work to 6 venues nationally and internationally
DCAF Cairo March 31st
Cork Midsummer Festival June 17th
EchoEcho Derry June 24th
Ballina Arts Centre June 28th
Ponderosa, Germany July 8th
FRESH Festival San Francisco Jan 5th-6th, 2018

Dance Research Residency
with Tara Brandel and Kathleen Hermesdorf
10 May to 13 May 2017

Two contemporary dancers from the USA and Ireland working together investigating contact improvisation. Contact improvisation is a strongly recurring theme in both dancers work.

An Improvised Performance by Kathleen Hermesdorf and Tara Brandel Part of Tara Brandel’s Dance Residency at Uillinn: West Cork Arts Centre.
Recorded music is by Kathleen’s longtime collaborator Albert Matthias.
Live improvised music is by local cellist Lea Miklodi.
‘Kathleen Hermesdorf and I have been working together for 2 weeks. Although I took many classes and workshops with her when I lived in San Francisco, this is our first time collaborating together. We have spent our time listening to what brings our dancer selves delight, and trusting in the serendipity that the performance would emerge from following our creative bliss. What you see here is a culmination of 2 weeks of contact improvisation, body work, sharing our favourite dance moves, talking about being dancers in our late 40’s, doing lime green improvs in the supermarket, the car park and by the river, spending time by the sea, and interacting with the art in the galleries.’

Dance Research Residency at Uillinn
Tuesday 10 to Saturday 14 January
with Tara Brandel, SarahLaura Dowell and Siobhán Ni Dhuinnin.

Three contemporary dancers from West Cork, Cork and Dublin who each use contact improvisation as a strong theme in their work will take part in this five day Dance Research Residency, exploring Contact improvisation as a choreographic tool. They will present a sharing of work in progress as part of their artistic development on Saturday 14 January at 12 noon.

WCAC acknowledges the financial support of the Arts Council and Cork County Council in making these residencies possible.