Thank you to The Straits Times and Lee Mun Wai for this glowing review of She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching into Space in the life section today!
“She Ain’t Heavy, She Reaching into Space, provided a much needed counterpoint to the recents currents in Singapore contemporary dance as well as society in general”.
– Lee Mun Wai
Thank you to everyone who came to watch this performance! We have started tickets sale for our next production, ‘GALA’ in October. Get your tickets from SISTIC!
Our associate artist, Eng Kai Er in collaboration with Faye Lim, have been working hard the past weeks on their performance She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching into Space.
Today, they were featured in LianHe Zaobao. Initially starting off as a piece of contact improvisation, their performance has evolved, moving away from just Contact Improvisation, into what Kai hopes to be a new type of art form -a blend of improvisation, rehearsal and dance.
“As the subjects of the performance as performers, we are trying to also objectively judge our work from another viewpoint,” Kai said. “Therefore, we always feel that as performers, it is inherent that we have a blind spot, no matter how we view our performance. For this performance, we want to emphasize the attitude of exploration. While incorporating improvisation and rehearsal in our production, we want to discover, observe and experience the ways of art.”
Article Summary
Independent Dancer Eng Kai Er and TheatreWorks are working together to present her latest work, She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching into Space. Just like her previous works, Eng Kai Er’s latest presentation cannot be classified under the genre of dance theatre, but one thing is for sure– it is filled with experimentation and unconventionality. When Kai spoke of where the idea for this production stemmed from, she attributed a large part of it to her prolonged interest in contact improvisation, but the lack of opportunity to bring it into her performance. She hopes that this performance will serve as platform to blend improvisation and rehearsal, and hopefully, to emerge as a new type of art form.
But exactly how real do the discussions get? We hope you’ll come down and see it for yourself. Happening at 8pm, on 28-29 July 2016 at 72-13! Do email us at sheaintheavy@theatreworks.org.sg or call us at 6737-7213 to get tickets today!
“It’s a desire to show something we’ve rehearsed but also our true selves.”– Eng Kai Er
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She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching into Space was featured in the Straits Times Life section, on page D2 today!
Find out more about how they met, what the work entails and the meaning behind the title of their piece!
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We still have tickets for both nights, email us at sheaintheavy2016@theatreworks.org.sg or call 6737-7213 to book your tickets today!
Faye, Kai and Tze Toh posing for a casual selfie after working on Sound Design
With an intuition in music and sound design, the award-winning composer-pianist Tze Toh is working hand in hand with Faye and Kai to highlight the emotional genuineness within their performance. Having a passion and strong drive to continually improve his work, Tze Toh has made an impact in the Singapore arts community with his authentic arrangements and compositions.
Most recently in 2015, Tze Toh created and presented his own music, sound design and story in the LAND with NO SUN : Promemoria in Esplanade. We are thrilled to have him as part of the production team. In She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching into Space, Tze Toh will be looking to project the emotional subtleties and conveying strong messages through his composition as Kai and Faye work their magic on the dance floor. As Tze Toh continues to strive for originality in his music, we thought it would be a good idea to chat with him about his work.
Eng Kai Er during the Open Rehearsals back in April
Despite being an Associate Artist with TheatreWorks for only a year, Eng Kai Er is no stranger to the realm of unconventional performance. Picking up dance as a CCA at the tender age of 9 years old, Kai’s bold character and passion for dance took her on a path of discovery, in which she experimented with different dance forms and performance styles. Most recently in 2015, Kai had collaborated with Bernice Lee and Jereh Leong to present Indulgence, where the title alone speaks volumes on what the performance is about. This year, together with Faye Lim, their collaboration explores their interpretation of a dance form called Contact Improvisation, a contemporary dance form that is intimate, resulting in a different outcome every time.
We’re less than three weeks away from the opening of She Ain’t Heavy, She’s Reaching Into Space, and we spoke to Kai about her anticipation and feelings about the upcoming production. We also reminisced about Indulgence, and found out a few quirky things about Kai too!
She Ain't Heavy, She's Reaching into Space 