Newsletter – Tanja Liedtke Foundation
January 2017

London choreographer Botis Seva brings streetwise hip-hop vibe to Australian Dance Theatre

STREETWISE hip-hop has been infused with Australian Dance Theatre’s own
high-velocity brand of movement as part of a three-week residency by awardwinning
young London choreographer Botis Seva.

Seva, 25, won both first prize and the audience award for his work 60 sec earlier this year
at the 30th annual International Choreographic Competition in Hanover, Germany, where ADT artistic director Garry Stewart was one of the jury members.

“Botis’s work really stood out … he was the person that I wanted to choose to come here,’’
Stewart said.

“It was executed beautifully with a really unique vocabulary, because he is a street dancer
but it didn’t look like street dance — it was his own style within that, set to classical
music.’’

The scholarship was awarded by the Tanja Liedtke Foundation, established in memory of
the German-born former ADT dancer and choreographer who had just been appointed
artistic director of Sydney Dance Company in 2007 when she died after being hit by a
garbage truck.

Seva was born to African migrant parents in London, where his company Far From The
Norm is based.

“Our foundation is hip-hop and street dance but we literally take that and rip it apart, to
make it a bit more experimental — it’s very earthy,’’ Seva said.

“Garry’s work is like abstract and narrative put together. He uses a lot of visual images to
draw upon his conceptual research, which I am going to take a lot from.’’

As well as immersing himself in ADT’s past repertoire, self-taught Seva has observed
Stewart’s process of choreographing his latest work, Doppelganger, in which the
ensemble are dressed as replicas of dancer Matt Roffe.

“It’s quite different from my other work … very suggestive and moody with an air of the
uncanny about it,’’ Stewart said.

Stewart said he had also benefited from the exchange with Seva. “It’s really interesting to
see someone at the beginning of their career and be reminded how much the impulse
toward choreography is rooted in my own body,’’ he said.

Originally published as Dancers get hip to streetwise vibe

Tanz - Medial (Mediated Dance) Forum in Berlin

In December 2016, the second in a series of three Tanz medial forums took place in Berlin thanks to a collaborative partnership between Dachverband Tanz Deutschland, the Fraunhofer Institut and Tanja Liedtke Foundation. 

Artists and arts workers came together in a dialogue about the capacity for dance and film (dance on film) to generate new dance works and create a platform that enables broader audience reach for dance, more diversity of practice and how dance/film is important in documenting the history and development of dance.   

The first Tanz medial forum was in Hamburg, and the third and final forum will be in Leipzig in April 2017.  

Mr. Michael Freundt from Dachverband Tanz Deutschland expressed his sincere gratitude to the Tanja Liedtke Foundation for their commitment to the initiative and for providing critical financial support for the three forums. 

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