Presented with community partner Canada Ice Dance Theatre
Kerrisdale Cyclone Taylor Arena (5670 East Boulevard)
Running time: 65 minutes (no intermission)
Disco Skating Party following Sunday’s performance (3:30-4:30pm)
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Unbounded by the terrestrial, thousands of birds move in synchronous patterns across the sky, like one enormous organism. The word murmuration is derived from the sound of hundreds of wings in flight, a thrumming rush that also curiously recalls the scrape and glide of ice-skates.
Founded by competitive skaters, Le Patin Libre upended the conventional idea of ice shows to create a radical new form of movement, infused with speed, power, and a dizzying momentum that goes beyond the virtuosic into a new place of unfettered freedom.
Inspired by the aerial choreography of birds, Le Patin Libre’s Murmuration transposes the swoops, swirls and configurations of mass flight to the ice. To fully embody this phenomenon, Le Patin Libre sought out the world’s most highly skilled skaters through a series of international auditions. Complex algorithms, infused and emboldened with meticulous choreography, become an aeriform ballet, embedded with risk, but mesmerizing in its beauty and razored precision.
As the performers mimic the movements of creatures fully in sync, the line between individuals and the collective blurs, then disappears. This group of virtuoso performers becomes a living plurality, moving together with instinctual ease – the very incarnation of grouped flight and epic grace.
Introducing new family & youth (under 18) pricing for matinee performances. Learn more at dancehouse.ca/tickets
Co-produced by: Fonds national de création du Centre national des arts (Ottawa, Canada), Fonds de création CanDanse (Canada) / Danse Danse (Montréal), Centre national des Arts (Ottawa), DanceHouse (Vancouver), Fall for Dance North and TO Live (Toronto), La Rotonde (Québec), Théâtre de la Ville de Paris (France)
Anndraya Luui
Sonya Wall
"A new masterpiece, epic and fascinating”- Toute la culture
“We are not only inspired by murmurations, we are one.”- Alexandre Hamel, Artistic Director, Le Patin Libre
“There is something marvelous going on.”- Prof. Adrian Vetta, Algorithm Consultant
Founded in 2005, in Montreal, by a group of rebellious high-level figure skaters who wanted to get away from sparkles and stereotypes, Le Patin Libre proposes a contemporary reinvention of the ice show, using their athletic virtuosity to create something legitimately artistic and truly cool.
Since 2014, the company tours the international contemporary performing arts network with pieces described as contemporary skating by dance critics. Speed, virtuosity and fluid choreography characterize their sophisticated yet accessible style that charms as much as it questions and inspires.
The company turns ice arenas into pop-up theatres, inviting everybody in public infrastructures normally reserved to exclusive sport clubs. Le Patin Libre constantly invests itself in efforts to make both skating and performing arts accessible to more people.
Top image: Le Patin Libre, murmuration © Rolline Laporte
