SERIES
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BRINGING BALLET ABROAD
PIONEERING WOMEN OF THE RAD IN CANADA
Reaching a centenary is a major milestone for any organization whether it’s in business or the arts. The now infamous 2020 was such a year for the Royal Academy of Dance. Founded as the Association of Operatic Dancing of Great Britain in London, UK, the primary goal of the Association was to improve the standard of teaching ballet, or “operatic dancing”. Some of the most respected teachers living in London in 1920 combined their international ballet backgrounds to develop a syllabus – Phyllis Bedells (British), Lucia Cormani (Italian), Edouard Espinosa (French), Adeline Genée (Danish), and Tamara Karsavina (Russian). With Philip J. S. Richardson as the secretary, the Association’s work soon spread throughout the UK. Some of the British Commonwealth countries provided a natural pipeline for further expansion and advocates of the Association’s methods reached other parts of the globe such as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and, eventually, Canada. A royal charter received in 1935 led to a name change – the Royal Academy of Dancing (later Royal Academy of Dance), known as the RAD.
CHOREOGRAPHIC DIALOGUES
The Choreographic Dialogues series ran during 2008/09. Funded by York University's Seminar for Advanced Research and by the York University Department of Dance, the series took place at York University, and at various dance venues in Toronto - Toronto Dance Theatre, School of Toronto Dance Theatre and the Coleman Lemieux & Compagnie studio.
The final phase of the project is this exhibit series, which makes accessible, as a new educational and research resource, the thoughts of a remarkable group of dance artists.
DEBORAH HAY & CHRISTOPHER HOUSE
BILL COLEMAN & LAURENCE LEMIEUX
Photo: Lola MacLaughlin / Photo by Alex Waterhouse-Hayward
ENCORE! ENCORE! WEB EXHIBITIONS
This component of the DCD web site offers an in-depth view of some of Canada's most important dance artists. Each exhibition contains a large assortment of images, biographical text, multimedia and memorabilia. All part of Dance Collection Danse's continuing effort to digitize its archives, exhibitions offer fascinating glimpses of Canadian dance history. This is an ongoing project and exhibits will continue to be added – so be sure to visit again and again.
TOURING THROUGH TIME
Born out of our Dancing Through Time exhibition in 2011, a part of which included an online walking tour of important landmarks in Toronto's dance past, Touring Through Time is a series of Google maps and encapsulated histories dedicated to the addresses that played an important role in Canada's dance past.
A new map is added each year and they all provide a glimpse into the buildings and stories that were (and in some case, still are) home to a particular city's dance history.
ARTIFACT OF THE MONTH
The Artifact of the Month series introduces our online visitors to treasured and fascinating items at Dance Collection Danse.
Focussed on Canada’s dance history, DCD’s collection dates back to the late-1800s and includes materials such as costumes, props, backdrops, choreographic notes, photographs, moving images, playbills, journals, notation scores, correspondence, business records, newspaper clippings, scrapbooks, designs, oral history recordings and books. Here, we present a featured artifact with accompanying related imagery narrated by a podcast. Welcome to Canada’s colourful dance heritage!
Photo: Conchita Triana, Toronto, c. 1938, Conchita Triana Portfolio - Early Spanish Dance In Canada
ENTER DANCING
Narratives of Migration
Enter, Dancing: Narratives of Migration, a project initiated and co-ordinated by Carol Anderson, records the stories of nine individuals who have come to Canada, brought their dancing and continued to evolve their art and practice here. It is the intention of Enter, Dancing to record their stories first-hand. These are inpiriing chronicles, full of practical wisdom and deeply considered perspectives on dance.
BaKari Ifasegun Lindsay (Trinidad/Tobago)
Sashar Zarif (Iran/Azerbaijan)
Photo: Santee Smith and Soni Moreno in Alejandro Ronceria's Bones: An Aboriginal Dance Opera, The Banff Centre, 2001 / Photo by Don Lee, courtesy of The Banff Centre
DANCE HISTORIAN OF THE MONTH
Curated by Seika Boye and Carolyne Clare Dance Historian of the Month is a series of interviews with Canadian dance writers/historians that illuminates the behind-the-scenes work of this growing field.
Photo: Selma Odom
PAGES IN HISTORY
This component of the DCD web site offers images, brief biographies and content descriptions for dance artist's portfolios within the Dance Collection Danse archives.
Photo: Hylda Davies
COMMUNITY EXHIBITS
Now that we're on Carlton St., DCD prepares exhibits for other locations and loans artifacts to various institutions. In recent years, we have installed exhibits at Toronto’s Market Gallery, Confederation Centre Art Gallery, the Canadian Lesbian and Gay Archives and at the Macdonald Heaslip Walkway of Theatre History for Theatre Museum Canada. Recent loans include St. James Cathedral Archives & Museum, danceImmersion and the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21.
DCD also creates exhibit panels and other forms of animation for dance performances, such as our digital exhibit A Visual History of Canadian Dance for the inaugural Fall for Dance North festival, writings for the Ontario Dances Network, and the publishing of Carol’s Dance Notes for DanceWorks. If you are interested in a collaboration with Dance Collection Danse, contact us at talk@dcd.ca.
Photo: Visitors enjoy DCD's exhibition,Canada's Pre-eminent Showman: The Artistry of Alan Lund. Confederation Centre of the Arts, Charlottetown, November 2014 / Photo courtesy of Confederation Centre Art Gallery
TORONTO STAGES:
DANCING THROUGH TIME
DCD co-presented the virtual exhibit Toronto Stages: Dancing Through Time with Fall for Dance North as part of its 6th edition festival, The Flip Side, from Sept. 29-Oct. 25, 2020. The exhibit tells Toronto’s dance story through some of its most iconic venues for dance and includes 360° photography for some venues.
This interactive exhibition has been extended and is available for the foreseeable future on the Fall for Dance North website at: https://toronto-stages.ffdnorth.com/
Photo: Alison Sutcliffe’s dancers on a Toronto rooftop, c.1935
(Alison Sutcliffe Portfolio)
BRINGING BALLET ABROAD
PIONEERING WOMEN OF THE RAD IN CANADA
Reaching a centenary is a major milestone for any organization whether it’s in business or the arts. The now infamous 2020 was such a year for the Royal Academy of Dance. Founded as the Association of Operatic Dancing of Great Britain in London, UK, the primary goal of the Association was to improve the standard of teaching ballet, or “operatic dancing”. Some of the most respected teachers living in London in 1920 combined their international ballet backgrounds to develop a syllabus – Phyllis Bedells (British), Lucia Cormani (Italian), Edouard Espinosa (French), Adeline Genée (Danish), and Tamara Karsavina (Russian). With Philip J. S. Richardson as the secretary, the Association’s work soon spread throughout the UK. Some of the British Commonwealth countries provided a natural pipeline for further expansion and advocates of the Association’s methods reached other parts of the globe such as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and, eventually, Canada. A royal charter received in 1935 led to a name change – the Royal Academy of Dancing (later Royal Academy of Dance), known as the RAD.
IN MEMORIAM
As caretakers of the Canadian dance story DCD sometimes gives context to the lives lost within the community - both online and in DCD Magazine. Here are two examples. The first was written after the passing of Brian Macdonald, the second in the wake of losing Grant Strate. (READ MORE)
PAST EXHIBITIONS
After a 5-year collaboration with Ryerson Theatre School to hang and photograph these exceptional hand-painted backdrops, DCD Gallery presented a new exhibit revealing photography and designs of the few remaining ballet backdrops in Canada from the 1940s and 1950s. (READ MORE)
SPECIAL EXHIBITS
Running in the summer of 2011, Dancing Through Time: Toronto's Dance History 1900-1980 explored the development of the city's dance scene from influential touring artists to vaudevillians to the ballet and modern dance booms to the diversity of dance forms present in the city. (READ MORE)
CONTACT
1303 - 2 Carlton St.
Toronto, ON
M5B 1J3
Canada
Phone: 416-365-3233
Fax: 416-365-3169
info@dcd.ca
Research Centre
Mon. - Fri. 9:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
Appointment Required
Contact Amy Bowring by email or call one of the numbers above
PERSONNEL
Miriam Adams, C.M.
Co-founder/Advisor
Amy Bowring
Executive and Curatorial Director
Jay Rankin
Administrative Director
Vickie Fagan
Director of Development and Producer/Hall of Fame
Michael Ripley
Marketing & Sales Coordinator
Beth Dobson
Archiving and Programming Assistant
SEARCH
SOCIAL MEDIA
Dance Collection Danse would like to acknowledge that the land on which we work is the traditional territory of the Huron-Wendat, the Anishnaabeg, Haudenosaunee, Métis, and the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation. It has been a site of human activity, including dance, for at least 15,000 years and we are grateful to all the caretakers, both recorded and unrecorded, of this land and of Turtle Island. Today, the meeting place of Toronto is still the home to many Indigenous people from across Turtle Island and we are grateful to have the opportunity to work and dance in the community, on this territory.
