Hagley Dance Project 2022 had their very first outdoor Dance showings of “Insitu” on the last week of Term 1, on Wednesday 13th April.

“The Insitu showing was a really fun way for me to have performance experience. It challenged me to work creatively with the concepts we had been learning in class, as well as adapting to unexpected changes due to Covid. I loved the audience/performer interaction, as often I would be in audience position and then jump into performing again. I was so inspired seeing it all come together and what we created as individual dancers and as a group.” Adult Student, HDP member Rawhiti Welch

Due to the Covid “Red Light” setting, this became an “in-house” showing to students and staff who were part of the Hagley “bubble”. The showings had originally been scheduled for Wednesday 30th March 1:30pm and 6pm (before daylight savings) and had to be postponed by two weeks due to Covid (after daylight savings).

Hagley After 3pm Dance were also featured special guest performers. Tutor Fleur de Thier directed a structured improvisation at the main entrance to Hagley College. Unfortunately, due to Covid, Fleur was unable to attend the showing, but the show must go on!

Term 1 was full of many obstacles, with students and staff isolating at different times. All involved had to be adaptable to the changes, often affecting progress for group works. However, the students demonstrated fantastic resilience and determination to reach their goals and celebrate the term's successes. Adept problem solving, collaboration, communication, and support for one another was demonstrated.

On the day of the showings, we were sadly down four dancers due to Covid and illness. However, the team pulled together with teacher Naressa Gamble stepping in to learn Shannon Gilmore’s choreography and performing the quirky and light-hearted Dance with Fah Poompusk. Kirley Meneses and Earl Jr Segua were finally reunited and presented a tender and mesmerising piece full of percussive patting on their bodies, table, rails, on and around the site between O block and the School of Fashion. Muika Dodd stepped in for Jenna Wardworth and performed an engaging structured improvisation with Rawhiti Welch behind the Food/Hospitality building. Next the audience were summoned towards Hagley Park where Naressa had directed a kind of “walking” dance in collaboration with HDP. Body parts were revealed and concealed from behind or out of trees. The audience walking alongside the action, bodies rolling down mounds to culminate at a grove of trees near the netball courts and stream. Navigating pedestrians, cyclists and Lime scooters was a fun task on spatial awareness.

Douglas Royds, who performed with the After 3 Dancers and watched the 6pm showing commented that….

“I really enjoyed the informal nature of the show, the sense that the audience and the dancers were all in it together, no separation. We walked as one group from site to site, and in one case, we even walked as the piece progressed (from tree to tree)!”

Finally, a lone body lay emersed in water, under a bridge, moving as one with the earth, flowing, building, growing, to a point of frenzy, water and limbs flying. Muika Dodd closed the show with a solo full of suspense and surprises.

Congratulations to all involved: Thank you to past Hagley Dance Company and Project students Georgia Laugesen and Phoebe Hazard for helping with sound, and crowd ushering. Isaac Bennet, Fiona Brownlie, and Naomi Milner's student for filming. Cameron McKenzie with lights, Year 13 Dance student Aleisha Bouma for photography, Fleur and After 3 Dancers for your awesome contributions and to all the staff and students who came along to watch. Our new Principal Rowan Milburn came along and said…

“In Situ the dance performance was just awesome. The last dance performed in a creek (yes, she was almost submerged in a creek) by Muika Dodd was really quite something. Just reminded me how great our students are and what incredible kaiako we have supporting and extending our students to achieve well beyond what we think of as normal curriculum stuff.”

"I have performed in many shows before, but Insitu was different. I got to experience dancing outside on the grass, in the trees and in a river. I learnt how to do a structured improvisation and how to choreograph a dance in unusual areas. Insitu was a great show and I'm glad I was a part of it." Muika Dodd

"The way the dancers used the space was interesting, and their own strength reflected the strength of the metal struts. The overall imagery was intriguing. The walk through the park was also enticing. The dancers were so spread out along the path in the dark that it was impossible to see them all at the same time. The use of the follow spots and follow speakers caused the dancers to appear and disappear intermittently as they moved across the park, and for me the journey was reminiscent of superheroes heading out in secret to save the day. The dancer in the water under the bridge was disturbing and fascinating at the same time, evoking the semblance of a fairy creature, poised (or caught?) between this world and the otherworld." Emily Napolitano