Motionhouse
2013 - 2016
BROKEN
EARTH-SHATTERING PERFORMANCE IN A SHIFTING WORLD
Broken erupts onto the stage in an adrenaline filled multi-media spectacle.
Athletic contact work, spectacular acrobatics and a gripping narrative combine with a revolutionary set design, an amazing musical soundtrack and digital imagery that melds with the performers as they move.
Broken examines our precarious relationship with the earth. Hanging in suspense and scrambling to safety, the dancers negotiate the cracks and craters of this world of illusions where nothing is quite as it seems. Fast-paced, gripping, moving and exhilarating, Brokentakes audiences on a journey into the earth, as they have never seen it before…
captive
DANCING FOR SURVIVAL
Four performers use an exciting blend of dance, acrobatics and aerial work inside a large cage. Disorientated and shaken, they use their skill and instinct to survive in this emotionally charged and athletic piece.
Inspired by Rainer Maria Rilke’s poem The Panther, this powerfully emotional outdoor show explores notions of captivity. Extremely physical, Captive is a thrilling blend of dance and acrobatics with a dynamic narrative exploring human relationships in captivity.
tigress
A WARRIOR QUEEN AT TAMWORTH CASTLE
Tigress was developed as one of the highlights of the ‘I Am Tamworth’ initiative which aimed to encourage people in Tamworth to engage with or become involved in the arts.
Combining breath-taking dance and acrobatics with a searing original score, this outdoor large-scale performance took place against the dramatic backdrop of Tamworth Castle. Tigress told the story of Saxon Queen, Æthelflæda, who founded the castle and the town in Saxon times and led the Mercians to victory against the Vikings.
Motionhouse dancers worked with more than 200 participants from Tamworth, supported by local drumming groups and choirs. Featuring Tamworth Dance Company, Belgrave Taiko Drumming, the Amington Band, the Male Voice choir, Tamworth Voices and the Ladies Voice Choir, this unique event captured the warrior Queen’s electrifying spirit.
fragile
Fragile was a specially-commissioned large-scale outdoor show created in 2015.
Fragile built on our previous work with dancers and JCB diggers, with the addition of cube-shaped metal structures alongside the JCBs to provide additional spaces to house the acrobatic movement that is synonymous with our work. Our professional performers were joined by a cast of young emergent artists.
scattered
SPELLBINDING PERFORMANCE IN AN EXTRAORDINARY WORLD
Performed on a vertiginous sloping wall, inspired by a quarter pipe, seven performers slide, climb and dive through a magical world where dancers and images interact seamlessly – plunging into an ocean, tumbling down a waterfall and sliding on a frozen landscape of arctic beauty – a remarkable interaction between film and live performance.
lost
RAW AND PURE PASSION
Lost explores what it is to be both physically and emotionally lost. The visceral and thought-provoking choreography of this 9-minute male-female duet combines our characteristic contact work, complex lifts and athletic precision with emotionally charged fluidity. Sensual connection between the two dancers is fused with raw emotion as one desperately tries to pull the other back from the precipice, catching them just before they fall. Lost is an intimate, dramatic and passionate work.
BLOCK
A COLLABORATION WITH NOFIT STATE CIRCUS
BLOCK is a collaboration with NoFit State Circus; a powerful fusion of dance and circus that pushes the limits of both art forms. With its daring physicality, split-second timing and thrilling feats, BLOCK leaves audiences gasping.
What happens when dance and circus collide? When they converge, rub against each other, blend into one another?
Twenty oversized blocks are deconstructed and reformed into an infinite variety of shapes for the performers to play on, move with and explore. BLOCK is about life in the city; its contradictions and challenges.
underground
Performed by four dancers in a rocking tubular structure, Underground uses stunningly physical dance, poignant imagery and surprising aerial encounters, exploring the intimacy of a crowded carriage, the crush of personal space, the studied ignoring of our fellow humans and the fear of a dangerous stranger. Travellers are thrown together in an unlikely alliance as graffiti artists paint their love in motion. Suspended at odd angles and riding the rhythm of the train, four characters are constantly drawn together then torn apart.
Energetic and thought-provoking Underground is attention-grabbing, edge of your seat dancing. Winner of the Audience Prize at Miramiro Festival, Ghent, 2009.
