Press Release: Another Kind of Blue presents UK premiere of Flirt with Reality at The Peacock

[Jan McNulty]

Another Kind of Blue
Flirt with Reality
The Peacock, WC2A                                                
Tuesday 9 - Sunday 14 July 2019
Tickets: £18 - £40
Performances: Tues - Sat 7.30pm, Sat 2:30pm, & Sun 4pm
Ticket Office: 020 7863 8222 or www.peacocktheatre.com

 

 

Dance meets cutting-edge drone technology in an inspiring new work by Britain’s Got Talent semi-finalists, Another Kind of Blue, presenting the UK premiere of Flirt with Reality at Sadler’s Wells’ West End venue The Peacock from Tuesday 9 - Sunday 14 July 2019.

 

 

 

 
Flirt with Reality explores the very nature and extent of reality and how borders have become blurred in our increasingly virtual world. Dancers collide with digital matter and drones in an imaginative, gravity-defying dreamscape of fantasy and rhythm.

Founded by choreographer David Middendorp, Netherlands-based Another Kind of Blue found fame on Britain’s Got Talent in 2016, when the company wowed the judges and audience with a floor-based routine that Simon Cowell called “stunning”. The company was also a finalist on America’s Got Talent.

Flirt with Reality features dancers Demi Carlin-Aarts, Jeroen van Acker, Corinne Cilia, Aya Degadi, Klevis Elmazaj, Faizah Grootens, Antonino Milazzo and Elie Nassar.

Inspired by his enduring fascination with technology, David Middendorp synthesises dance and technology to create a brave and compelling new world. His high quality contemporary dance performances bring together strong choreography with cutting-edge drone technology, robots, animation, digital imagery and original music to create stunning spectacles. Flirt with Reality received its world premiere in The Hague in October 2018.

Flirt with Reality consists of five choreographies: Airman is a duet between man and machine, imagining human consciousness as it would be if it were represented by a group of intricately choreographed drones. Flyland In A Room is a duet about a love story that is coming to an end. It explores the emotional thin line between fantasy and reality, where two people ending a relationship are surrounded by animated clouds of memories. Blue Journey earned the company a place in the 2014 finals of America's Got Talent. It reveals the struggles of a girl and her search for identity within herself and the world around her. In As It Appears, old and modern methods of storing moments collide, starting with a man in a room with a painting. Game Engine is inspired by the rise of the digital age and the seemingly faster and faster pace with which it is moving.

David Middendorp said: “Dance and technology come from the same source: man's desire to create a different reality. Flirt with Reality shows how boundaries are blurring in our increasingly virtual world and how this creates new opportunities. Flirt with Reality is a show which plays with reality. I believe that augmenting reality puts things in sharper perspective, and that playing is nature’s wonderful mechanism to learn. I am learning about the warm and cold sides of technology and I want to use them to pull the audience into this dance and technology duet. Dancers literally collide with digital bits and drones; they are free from time and gravity and are propelled by their own feelings, imagination and rhythm. As one of the great technological and dance hubs of the world, we are thrilled to be premiering our new show in London in July.”

David Middendorp began his professional career at Dutch company Introdans. He went on to dance with the Saarländische Staats Ballet and the Ballet Theater Munich, before returning to The Hague, where he founded Another Kind of Blue in 2008. His choreographies include Bread-peace, Dreamsketch, As it Fades, Kruimeldief (Dust Buster), Murph! and 15 Minute Universe.

 

 

NOTES TO EDITORS

 

Listing information

Another Kind of Blue
Flirt with Reality
The Peacock, WC2A                                                                              
Tuesday 9 - Sunday 14 July 2019
Tickets: £18 - £40
Performances: Tues - Sat 7.30pm, Sat 2:30pm, & Sun 4pm
Ticket Office: 020 7863 8222 or www.peacocktheatre.com

 

About Sadler’s Wells

Sadler’s Wells is a world-leading creative organisation dedicated to dance in all its forms. With over three centuries of theatrical heritage and a year-round programme of performances and learning activities, it is the place where artists come together to create dance, and where people of all backgrounds come to experience it – to take part, learn, experiment and be inspired. 

 

Its vision is to reflect and respond to the world through dance: enabling artists of all backgrounds to create dance that moves us and opens our minds, and sharing those experiences with the widest possible audiences – to enrich their lives and deepen their understanding of what it means to be human.

 

Audiences of over half a million come to Sadler’s Wells’ three London theatres each year, with many more enjoying its touring productions at venues across the UK and around the world, and accessing its content through digital channels. Sadler's Wells commissions, produces and presents more dance than any other theatre in the world, embracing the popular and the unknown. Since 2005, it has helped to bring over 170 new dance works to the stage, many of them involving its 16 Associate Artists, three Resident Companies and four Associate Companies – the most exciting talents working in dance today. 

 

Sadler’s Wells nurtures the next generation of talent through a number of artist development initiatives and reaches over 30,000 annually through its learning and engagement programmes.

 

Located in Islington, north London, Sadler’s Wells’ current building is the sixth to have stood on site since entrepreneur Richard Sadler first established the theatre in 1683. The venue has played an illustrious role in the history of theatre ever since, with The Royal Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet and English National Opera having all started at Sadler's Wells.

Sadler’s Wells is to open an additional mid-scale venue in east London in 2022. The new space will be at the heart of the East Bank project, a new cultural and education district in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in Stratford, which will also include BBC, UAL’s London College of Fashion, UCL and the V&A in partnership with the Smithsonian Institution. As well as a 550-seat auditorium, Sadler’s Wells’ new venue will include a choreographic centre and a hip hop theatre academy, the first of their kind in the world to be run by a theatre.

www.sadlerswells.com