The 2025 Festival of Korean Dance visits three venues outside of London: the double bill Kontemporary Korea visits Bournemouth (9 May) and Newcastle (15 May), while Ham:beth by Modern Table visits Salford (20 May). Modern Table’s programme is identical to their performance at the Place (programme details here), but the Kontemporary Korea programme is different from the London presentation in that instead of Shinsegae by Ji-hye Chung we get A Complementary Set: Disappearing with an Impact by Choi x Kang Project. Choi x Kang is LKL’s personal favourite from two previous dance festivals and we’re seriously tempted to pay a visit to Bournemouth or Newcastle to catch them again.
Here, then, are the details of the Kontemporary Korea programme in Bournemouth or Newcastle, in which we are promised a showcase of two of the freshest new voices in K-dance, each finding inspiration and play in the balance between the mundane and the virtuosic:
A Complementary Set: Disappearing with an Impact by Choi x Kang Project
Are we able to control those outside of our gaze?
Choi x Kang Project’s experimental piece uses video and performance to explore the gap between different dimensions. Choreographers Min-sun Choi and Jin-an Kang focus on connecting with the body through multidisciplinary experiments and external devices, often drawing on collaborations with artists from other fields, and finding humour in the gap between what we see and what we expect to see.
Images filmed live on stage, re-broadcast on a screen behind the performers, battle with their physical presence for our attention. Sound becomes noise as it loses its power to exist as music, and theatre’s limitations are tested and revealed.
Choi x Kang Project is a group composed of Min-sun Choi and Jin-an Kang, who look for intuitive ways to generate movement and focus on the process of connecting with the body through multidisciplinary experiments and external devices. They have been expanding their own territory through participation in multidisciplinary projects, not only in the field of dance but also through collaborations with artists from other fields such as literature, visual art and film. Through these collaborations with other genres, the group seeks to find a way out of the gap that occurs when the characteristics of each medium collide, and therefore to escape from traditional methods.
Choi x Kang won the Best Innovation in Performance Award at the 2024 Stockholm Fringe Festival and the Jury Prize at the 18th Yokahama Dance Collection, a choreography competition in Japan.
Credits
- Choreographers and Performers: Min-sun Choi and Jin-a Kang
- Filmer and Performer: Tae-kyung Kim
- Scenographer: Ro-wa Jeong
- Music Director: Yo-han Ko
- Stage Manager: Eun-jin Jo
0g (zero grams) by Melancholy Dance Company
Inspired by the repetitive and seemingly pointless actions of the mythical figure Sisyphus, 0g utilises the principle of ‘free fall movement’ to uncover the meaning of life anew within monotonous daily routines.
Melancholy Dance Company, founded by choreographer Cheol-in Jeong, plays with gravity through this principle of ‘free fall’ and applies it to various parts of the body, experimenting with extreme situations and dynamic movements, which are often dazzlingly virtuosic. The company return to the UK after their brilliantly received debut Flight in 2024.
Founded in 2016 by choreographer Cheol-in Jeong, Melancholy Dance Company sees the world we live in itself as art. Their works Flight, 0g, Overmensch, Your Sign, Mobility, and Non-Protection take human life as the theme and explore human history and phenomena through variations of speed, rhythm and weight.
Credits
- Choreographer: Cheol-in Jeong
- Performers: Ji-soo Ryu, Gyung-jae Mun, Cheol-in Jeong, Young-sang Ju and Joong-keun Jeon
- Producer: Min-young Kim
- Sound Director: Tae-kyung Choi