More than a Karen Kain bio, it's an ensemble drama built on major stakes.
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Hi, Art!

Sunday, November 19, 2023

Hi, Art!

Sunday, November 19, 2023

Hi, art lovers!

 
Photo collage. Three rows of ballet dancers in a line-up. Text reads:

CBC

 
I can tell the difference between a plié and a sauté, but that’s only because I was forced to take a single year of dance class when I was seven. A ballet expert, I am not. But you don’t need to be a lifetime subscriber to the National Ballet of Canada to appreciate a new docuseries that’s coming soon to CBC Gem. After watching just one episode, I can say this: I’m desperate to buy tickets to the next show at the Four Seasons Centre.

Swan Song, a four-part documentary from members of the creative team behind the CBC Arts series, In the Making, takes you behind the scenes at the National Ballet. In 2022, the company staged a fresh version of Swan Lake — the fourth in its history and the swan song, so to speak, of the company’s artistic director emerita, Karen Kain. A dance legend on the cusp of retirement, Kain wanted the show to be her farewell to the National Ballet. In her 50-year career, she performed Swan Lake many times — including a star-making turn at the age of 19 — but her production for the National Ballet would break new ground. For the first time, she’d be directing the show, and — one small spoiler for you — it was a sensation. In a Q interview from 2022, Toronto dance critic Martha Schabas called the ballet “quietly radical.”

But Swan Song isn’t a Karen Kain biopic. It’s a backstage story about all the dancers fighting for their moment on stage — an ensemble drama built on major stakes. Or put it this way: “It isn’t about swans and fouettés; it's about human beings,” said filmmakers Chelsea McMullan and Sean O'Neill, writing for CBC Arts.

If the title sounds familiar, yes, I’ve mentioned Swan Song in the newsletter before. In September, a feature film version of the doc appeared at TIFF. (Q interviewed one of the project’s executive producers, Neve Campbell, when it premiered at the festival.) Similar to what I was saying in last week’s email about BlackBerry, Swan Song is another example of a Canadian project that’s found funding as both a TV series and a film. (Here’s some industry context for you.) 

For more on the making of Swan Song, CBC News ran this feature about the project earlier this fall. And in the next few days, we’ll be publishing a few stories about the series. (Keep checking the site!) All four episodes arrive on CBC Gem this Wednesday, Nov. 22.
 

And because we promised you eye candy ...

 
Flat illustrative painting of two dancing figures leaping in the air. Both are blue and wear blue berets. The background is an abstracted blue forest with an orange sun.

Erin Armstrong

Swirl of Night by Toronto artist Erin Armstrong.
 
Collaged still life made of colourful paper cut-outs. A vase packed with flowers and shapes is the central dominant form. It is flanked by small pierrot clowns balancing on a fence.

Daniel Barrow

Daniel Barrow (previously seen here) has referred to works like this one as “paper doll poems.” I spy ballerinas dancing among the lily pads …
 
Photo of a white-walled gallery. In the fore is a sculptural art installation. It appears to be wooden logs arranged to suggest moving bodies.

Robin Arseneault

Dancing Men (Troupe) by Robin Arseneault. The Art Gallery of Hamilton happens to be featuring this installation in their current exhibition, Wonder: the Real, the Surreal, and the Fantastic. Find it there until January 7.
 
Painted photograph. A nighttime scene. Four women in floral dresses stand together under a painted fabric-like canopy, their backs to the viewer.

Annie Baillargeon

Baptême des postures nocturnes by Quebec City artist Annie Baillargeon.
 
Nocturnal scene. A pale pink bird, probably a pigeon, rests in leafy branches, its back to the viewer.

Laura Findlay

Catch by Laura Findlay. Laura’s nighttime paintings are always so deliciously mysterious. In her hands, even a pigeon can have major Black Swan vibes.
 
 

You've got to see this

 
 
 
Still from Who's Yer Father?. A bald man in a moutache and a woman with long blonde hair, peek out from behind a bush. They both wear perplexed expressions. the woman holds a pair of binoculars in her hands.
63 Lights/LevelFilm

In P.E.I., this movie is bigger than Taylor Swift’s

 
On its opening weekend, detective comedy Who’s Yer Father? was the top movie in Charlottetown. We spoke with its director, Jeremy Larter, about giving his home province the onscreen love it deserves.
 
Portrait of the actor Yaayaa Adams, a young Black woman with straight dark hair and heavy bangs. She wears a white turtleneck and looks over her shoulder at the viewer. Text reads: CBC Arts Rising Stars Yaayaa Adams.
Samuel Engelking/CBC Arts

Acting was never the plan

 
Meet Yaayaa Adams, whose magnetic presence in Next Stop and The Last Video Store is earning much-deserved attention.
 
Still from Here and Queer. A white man with short hair and a chin beard smiles while seated on a couch covered with colourful patterned pillows. The wall behind him is two shades of pink. A large fiddle-leaf fig plant is behind the couch.

CBC Arts

 

A century-old Virginia Woolf novel is now a trans cinema masterpiece

 
Orlando, My Political Biography is the debut feature from philosopher and theorist Paul B. Preciado. He stopped by the set of Here & Queer in advance of the movie’s upcoming Toronto screening.
 

Follow this artist

 
 
 
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Jacquie Matechuk

@jacquiematechuk
Photo of a long-haired bear perched in a tree. The animal looks toward the sky.

Jacquie Matechuk

Jacquie’s a wildlife photographer from Cochrane, Alta., and earlier this month, she claimed the title of Nature Photographer of the Year. This is the image that earned her that international prize, and she told CBC Calgary the story behind the photo. 
 

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I’m Leah Collins, senior writer at CBC Arts. Until next time!

 
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XOXO CBC Arts
 
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