Montréal’s Compagnie Virginie Brunelle headlines just-announced 2024 Vancouver International Dance Festival

Running February 25 to March 9, Kokoro Dance event also features FakeKnot’s whip, Ferenc Fehér’s Disco Boys, Tony Chong’s Invisible, and more

Compagnie Virginie Brunelle’s *Les corps avalés*.

Ralph Escamillan in FakeKnot’s *whip*. Photo by Marchel B. Eang

THE 2024 VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL DANCE FESTIVAL has just announced its 24th annual programming for the event from February 25 to March 9.

Amid the offerings at the Kokoro Dance-produced fest is Montréal’s Compagnie Virginie Brunelle, whose Les corps avalés (Swallowed Bodies) explores power relations and social disorder with live classical music accompaniment performed live by the Molinari Quartet, February 28 to March 2 at the Vancouver Playhouse.

VIDF had announced Spain’s Israel Galván Company as the second headliner, but it has now had to cancel the scheduled performance at the Vancouver Playhouse due to logistics issues. The festival team says it is actively exploring options to reschedule the performance for 2025.

Elsewhere, Montréal’s Catherine Gaudet is at the Annex with Se dissoudre, a riff on solitude and slow-dissolving. The same venue hosts Japan’s Conan Amok with the solo butoh piece The Folds.

Both Hungary’s Ferenc Fehér with Disco Boys and Vancouver’s Jennifer McLeish-Lewis with New Skin hit the stage at the Roundhouse Exhibition Hall.

Vancouver’s FakeKnot presents whip, a duet performed entirely in leather hoods, at the Roundhouse Performance Centre, while Montréal’s Tony Chong brings the meditative, multidisciplinary Invisible无形 to the same venue. Additionally, Vancouver’s Modus Operandi will perform at Woodwards Atrium.

The VIDF will also host dance workshops, free life-drawing classes, and an Art and Photography Exhibition by Vancouver’s Ken Clark and Vincent Wong. New this year is the VIDF Jazz Club, open at 9:30 pm after performance days, where VIDF patrons can join in dancing to local jazz musicians at KW Studios.

The full program and tickets are available now here. In a new effort, VIDF will also subsidize tickets at a special rate of $25 for those who face financial constraints (exclusively available online). Learn more

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Janet Smith

Janet Smith is founding partner and editorial director of Stir. She is an award-winning arts journalist who has spent more than two decades immersed in Vancouver’s dance, screen, design, theatre, music, opera, and gallery scenes. She sits on the Vancouver Film Critics’ Circle.

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