Anya Saugstad wins Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award, while Raven Spirit Dance receives Isadora Award for choreography
Saugstad will work on her paper-airplane-filled piece Paper Mountains, while Michelle Olson and Star Muranko’s company gets nod for its Confluence
Anya Saugstad. Photo by Micah Henry
Raven Spirit Dance’s Confluence. Photo by Erik Zennström
ANYA SAUGSTAD is this year’s recipient of the biennial Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award, and Raven Spirit Dance has received the Isadora Award for Excellence in Choreography, The Dance Centre has just announced.
Saugstad’s Iris Garland Emerging Choreographer Award provides $5,000 to an emerging artist between 19 and 35 years of age who demonstrates exceptional choreographic potential. The prize allows them to produce their work at Scotiabank Dance Centre. Through the Award, Saugstad plans to present the premiere of her first full-length work, Paper Mountains. Initiated during the early stages of the pandemic, the work explores loneliness, using choreography created during many months in solitude, and integrating an ensemble of dancers, live sound, and 600 paper airplanes.
Saugstad trained at Arts Umbrella, and holds a BFA with honours in Dance from SFU. She has danced for Vanessa Goodman, Lesley Telford, and Rob Kitsos, among others. The choreographer focuses on creating live and digital performance works that foster space for women to tell their stories through movement, with her works showing everywhere from SFU to Vines Art Festival, F-O-R-M, Lamondance, Arts Umbrella, Dancing on the Edge, and The Dance Centre’s Open Stage program.
The Iris Garland Award was established in memory of the pioneering educator who developed SFU’s dance program, with previous winners including Amber Funk Barton, Vanessa Goodman, Deanna Peters, Julianne Chapple, and Shion Skye Carter.
The annual Isadora award, meanwhile, honours Raven Spirit Dance’s full-length choreographic work Confluence. The piece was co-created by Raven Spirit’s co-artistic directors Michelle Olson and Starr Muranko with artistic associate Jeanette Kotowich, collaborating with performers Tasha Faye Evans and Emily Solstice. Premiering at last year’s Dancing on the Edge fest at the Firehall Arts Centre, it interweaves perspectives, histories, and bodies to create a somatic tapestry that speaks to the resilience of Indigenous women.
With the prize, the company receives $2,500, access to studio time at Scotiabank Dance Centre towards the creation of a new work, and a specially-designed award created by renowned glass sculptor Mary Filer. Previous recipients have included Peter Bingham, Crystal Pite, Wen Wei Wang, Jennifer Mascall, Helen Walkley, Julia Taffe, and Gabrielle Martin and Jeremiah Hughes of Corporeal Imago.
Raven Spirit Dance blends contemporary dance with other forms such as traditional dance, theatre, puppetry, and multimedia. Based in Vancouver, it’s tied to the Yukon through its projects and inspirations, with Olson hailing from that province’s Tr’ondek Hwech’in First Nation.
The Isadora Award was named after late international dance pioneer Isadora Duncan. An independent jury of professionals selects recipients based on specific criteria.
“We are very pleased to have the opportunity both to support the work of younger artists whose careers are just starting to take flight, and to acknowledge the achievements of more established artists,” The Dance Centre’s executive director Mirna Zagar said today. “These awards illustrate the depth of artistry in British Columbia’s dance community.”
Anya Saugstad’s Paper Mountains. Photo by Bray Jorstad
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