Just like a prayer, Co.ERASGA’s Offering comes at a time when the arts has never needed it more
Filipino-Canadian dancer-choreographer Alvin Erasga Tolentino’s collection of six solos marks his company’s 20th anniversary
Dancers (clockwise from top left) Joshua Ongcol, Olivia Shaffer, Marissa Wong, Marc Arboleda, Molly McDermott, Antonio Somera appear in Alvin Erasga Tolentino’s Offering. Photos by Yasuhiro Okada
Co.ERAGSA’s Offering livestreams from the Anvil Centre on November 28 and 29 at 3 pm by donation.
VANCOUVER DANCER AND choreographer Alvin Erasga Tolentino started planning his company’s 20th-anniversary performance last year, when “contact tracing” was an unknown concept and ensemble pieces were an everyday approach to dance, not a choreographic pipe dream. Co.ERASGA’s COVID-19 pivot has been like a pirouette, having taken a few turns.
With 2020 marking two decades of dancemaking for the Filipino-Canadian artist, Tolentino initially envisioned a large-scale immersive production with numerous artists to celebrate. After the pandemic hit and people became accustomed to masking up and keeping their distance, he asked six local dancers if they would be comfortable rehearsing a show of solos that would be presented to a small live audience as well as via livestream. For various reasons, the venue shifted from the Roundhouse to the Anvil Centre in New Westminster. Then B.C. announced even stricter public-health measures on November 19. Now, Offering will take place solely via livestream. It’s not quite the grand affair Tolentino dreamed of, but the work feels even more significant and vital at a time when the arts are getting hammered by the effects of COVID-19.
“It’s been quite heartbreaking,” Tolentino tells Stir of the way the pandemic has put a pause to so many live performances even as movie theatres and bars stay open. “I began asking the dancers: what do we do in this kind of crisis for the arts? How do our bodies relate to the pandemic? How can we continue to be artists in this time when everything is so difficult and keep art alive?
“I started to think about prayer and how dance can be a sense of prayer,” he says. “How can we be an offering for the world, a kind of prayer for what’s going on for ourselves and for humanity? I’ve always been interested in the concept of dance as a spiritual entity. It’s important to be thankful, and I’m thankful for the existence of the company during the pandemic and see dance as a kind of a gratitude. I want to bring that positive energy to whoever might be able to see it.
Co.ERASGA, which is titled after his mother’s maiden name, has a lot to celebrate. Born in Manila, Tolentino moved to Canada in 1983 and has trained with the Royal Winnipeg Ballet in Winnipeg, the University of Fine Arts in Toronto, State University of New York, and Limon Institute. During its two decades, the company has travelled to more than 60 cities in Canada, Asia, Europe, and South America. Tolentino has explored themes of identity, sexuality, gender and the immigrant experience to name but a few, all while seamlessly fusing the East and West, classical and contemporary. He’s known for cross-cultural exploration, delving into everything from bharata natyam to taiko to flamenco. He received the Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award for Dance in 2010 and in 2018 won the ExploreAsian-Pan Asian Award for his contribution to the arts and multiculturalism.
Dance as spiritual practice has been just one constant in Tolentino’s work; another is the mandate to shine a light on underrepresented artists, specifically Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour. While amplifying the presence and voices of BIPOC individuals across the board has come into greater focus in recent months, following the senseless murder of George Floyd, as an Asian-Canadian artist, Tolentino has been doing this since day one.
“This cultural shift we’re seeing really affirms to me my sense of relationship to the community and my ways of working, providing a context of diversity, and how important that is for the ecology of our art practice,” Tolentino says. “From the very beginning I’ve wanted to work with artists of Colour and be a voice of Asian artists in the presence of contemporary dance not only here at home but across Canada and worldwide. It’s been a core value of the company from the beginning, and now more than ever I think, to me that’s really exciting we’re about to open a new way of relating and understanding the context of art.”
Marc Arboleda. Photo by Jasuhiro Okada
Offering is inherently diverse given the makeup of its cast. Each of the six dancers—Joshua Ongcol, Olivia Shaffer, Marc Arboleda, Antonio Somera, Molly McDermott, and Marissa Wong—brings something different to the stage, with their distinct influences, ages, perspectives, and styles. Born in Dubai, Ongcol, for example, has a background in street and contemporary dance; Shaffer dances with EDAM and specializes in contact improvisation. Three are Filipino-Canadian (Ongcol, Arboleda, and Somera.) Prayer means different things to every one, and each expresses their unique experiences related to the pandemic in their own way.
“You can see the diversity in terms of how they move their body during this time of isolation and confinement,” Tolentino says. “I also want them to be free; I’m there as a guided eye and consultant for what they want to say. If this is your prayer, how would you move and keep it alive during this time?”
Creating the score is French composer Emmanuel Mailly, a long-time collaborator. The two have been communicating mainly via Zoom, just one more way the pandemic has made the creative process all the more challenging.
What matters is that the show will go on. Tolentino didn’t want to cancel altogether; so long in the making, Offering has momentum behind it. The dancers have pushed through the difficulties of rehearsing in masks (which make it difficult to breathe during physical exertion) and socks (as opposed to bare feet, which is prohibited in the pandemic era, and is a preferred approach by many modern dancers). There has been lots of discussion among cast and crew about self-care and how to cope amid these most dreadful days.
“I’m getting through by taking it day by day,” Tolentino says. “We have to take care of ourselves and be calm. I feel Co.ERASGA has weathered all of the storms over the years. After 20 years, I know how it is with the arts; it’s so volatile.
“I’m really grateful for the resilience, for the partnerships we’ve developed over the years at home and internationally,” he says. “The dancers are still willing, and that’s an act of resilience. We’re on the frontlines of culture and we need to stay as strong as we can.”
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