Vancouver choreographer Shay Kuebler brings his signature physicality to Ballet BC for the first time
Artist stages a 20-dancer work about society and surveillance, all set to God Speed You! Black Emperor
Shay Kuebler works in the studio with Ballet BC. Photo by Michael Slobodian
Ballet BC presents HORIZON/S from March 16 to 18 at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre
SHAY KUEBLER’S DANCE and martial arts career has taken him to an almost unbelievable variety of places.
To mention only a tiny sampling: he’s studied kung fu at China’s Shaolin Temple, tap-danced in Lebanon in Debra Brown's Flying Flames, and toured with both Kidd Pivot’s Polaris and the Holy Body Tattoo’s Monumental.
The Edmonton-born artist’s work for his own company Radical System Art has shown the same kind of versatility since its founding in 2014: there was the explosive and darkly funny solo Karoshi, a riff on Japan’s anger booths; Telemetry’s skittering tap dance with Danny Nielsen; and the tension and explosive rebound of Glory’s stunt harnesses. Elsewhere, he’s choreographed water drummers, aerial dancers, and divers.
But there is one place this dance mixmaster has not gone yet, and it’s right here in Vancouver, BC: choreographing for the city’s biggest ballet company. Until now, that is. On its upcoming HORIZON/S program, Ballet BC will debut Kuebler’s FIRST/LAST (on a mixed program that includes another world premiere by Czech sensation Jiří Pokorný).
“I did ballet when I was younger, but my strengths were really hip-hop, street-dance styles, tap dancing,” he tells Stir before rehearsals. “I was more in that movement modality. But it's interesting: I've always wanted to try to do as many different things as possible. And I think working with the ballet companies has gained more interest in me as well, because I've seen how companies are shifting and doing more contemporary works and hiring artists that come from different backgrounds.”
Kuebler says the invitation to create his first piece for Ballet BC came after artistic director Medhi Walerski saw the choreographer’s 2021 MOI – Momentum of Isolation—a group piece about loneliness that showcased Kuebler’s signature fusion of hip-hop, street dance, and physically pummelling contemporary styles.
Kuebler is making the most of his opportunity at Ballet BC. He’s creating a large-scale piece for the full company of 20 dancers—most of whom, he reveals, will be performing onstage for the entire work. He’s also secured the sweeping, symphonic sounds of Canadian post-rock titans Godspeed You! Black Emperor for the soundtrack. (The Montreal alt-icons had played live in the now-legendary Monumental show mentioned above.)
The themes and inspiration of FIRST/LAST weave in the threads of a lot of the urban-charged works he’s choreographed for both RSA and Vancouver’s acclaimed Company 605 (which he helped cofound as the 605 Collective). He’s exploring the dynamics between the individual and the group. And he’s drawing on ideas of surveillance and data and information collection—hinting at a big production-design element around that theme that he wants to keep a surprise for audiences.
Shay Kuebler. Photo by Michael Slobodian
“We're kind of trying to make the group look like one entity, if you will, like one connective organism,” he allows. “At the same time, we're kind of revealing the sense of individuality underneath this top layer….The more the group constricts and holds, the more the individuals need to break out from it.
“And I think that speaks to a lot of different aspects of different societies that have very intensive control over their people or have very controlling laws or restrictions or surveillance,” he adds.
Kuebler admits he’s pushing Ballet BC’s famously versatile dancers a bit out of their comfort zones. He relates that he’s working with them toward a new kind of speed and looseness—that he’s asking them to draw power from their centre in a different way.
But funny enough, working with the honed dancers of Ballet BC has also brought Kuebler full circle, reminding him about how connected dance is with martial arts—both fields that he started studying at just five years old. There’s a rigour and discipline he sees in the ballet studio that feels extremely familiar to his kung fu side.
“To get to the level that they're at as performers and artists it takes immense discipline and dedication—and that transcends all art, and that transcends really life in a lot of ways,” he remarks. “I was talking to a martial artist about this: I feel like ballet technique is so honed and it's so refined, and it’s like in martial arts, where there's this philosophy that perfection is like when you sharpen the sword. The sharp part of the sword is so sharp that as you try to reach that point, you fall off to the other side. And perfection is like this constant trying to sharpen the blade. There's no middle. There's no perfect. And I think that that's kind of a beautiful ethos for both dance and martial arts. I really do see ballet performers as finessing the blade as just an ongoing process.”
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