News

Tuesday 7 February at 10:31 am

Welcome to 2023

Welcome to 2023. It has been an extraordinary start to the year for our team based in Tāmaki Makaurau and we send our aroha to everyone who has suffered loss and damage during the recent flooding events across the upper North Island.

As we look ahead to drier and sunnier times, we are excited about what 2023 holds for NZDC. The team is working hard on our forthcoming double bill season set to premiere in April. Choreographers Tupua Tigafua, Xiao Chao Wen and Xin Ji present two new works which promise to uplift, challenge and excite. We’ll be sharing more about this season soon.

The start of a new calendar year signals new beginnings and it is with sadness that we farewell our wonderful Artistic Director Tor Colombus. Tor has been with NZDC since 2019 and she has shared her vision, passion and energy for the company through the difficult covid period of the past three years. Her work The Fibonacci received critical acclaim during NZDC’s season of Night Light in 2022 which was richly deserved. Tor has been an unfailing champion of the company and of growing dance experiences for young people. We will greatly miss her generosity of spirit and the deep kindness with which she approaches everything she does. The NZDC Board and staff wish Tor every success as she embarks upon her next chapter.

Late last year long time NZDC dance artists, Carl Tolentino and Chrissy Kokiri welcomed their first child together and they are now on sabbatical and maternity leave respectively. We congratulate them and wish them all the best as they take some time to enjoy choreography of an entirely different nature – the dance of parenthood.

We are pleased to welcome back into the rōpū three dancers who worked with us across different projects in 2022.

After making her NZDC debut in 2022, Brydie Colquhoun returns to NZDC after performing credits that included Black Grace’s successful tour of North America and season at the prestigious Joyce Theater in New York.

Chris Mills, fresh from working on a number of Sydney Dance Company shows returns home to Aotearoa to again work with NZDC along with ‘Isope ‘Akau’ola who was with the Company for last year’s premiere season of What They Said.

The Company are delighted to have these three talented performers with us for projects in 2023 as we begin a very full year of performance.