The Man Within
The Man Within
1989
About
The Man Within premiered May 1989 at the Canadian Festival of Modern Dance in Winnipeg. The work investigates the weight of the body as a metaphor for the spirit. It has been hailed by critics as a “brave and unforgettable dance, danced with total commitment” (Winnipeg Free Press).
I was interested in the fact that one person carrying another has great emotional resonance. I wondered what would happen if a woman carried a man, what would the resonance and impact be? I discovered that it was a huge impact and resonated in a way that was different from anything I had done before or seen before. I was startled by this work.
This is a dancer’s piece. It is an interpretive vehicle. The first research process and inspiration was with Byron Chief-Moon and Hiromoto Ida. I saw Byron carrying something in his physical demeanor. After the initial research period, Byron left the company to pursue a movie career. Catherine Lubinsky and Hiromoto brought the work to completion with me and it premiered at the Vancouver Playhouse in 1991. Through the work with these dancers the piece grew to become a work of great power and toured extensively. Re-created in 2004 for the students of School for Toronto Dance Theatre, I was unprepared for the power of the work, and again astonished by how deeply felt it was for these student dancers and how well it served as a vehicle for the development of dancers as interpretive artists.
February 1 & 2, 1990 production at the Playhouse theatre in Vancouver as part of the Dance Centre’s Discover Dance Series included: Man Within. The performance publicity photo of the work caused an uproar amongst a group called Media Watch – National Watch on Images of Women in the Media Inc. – who viewed the photo as a menacing power of men over women.
The People
Choreography: Karen Jamieson
Performance: Catherine Lubinsky and Hiromoto Ida
Music composition: Jeff Corness
Costumes: Catherine Lubinsky
Sampled Voice: Lani Snipper
REVIEWS
“In The Man Within, bent by her human burden, determined not to buckle, a woman carries the full weight of a man on her back. Even when she is able to offload him, her freedom is constrained and doesn’t last long.
As idea made visible, the feminist-humanist message doesn’t come much clearer than that, and the intense commitment and sheer physical resilience of Catherine Lubinksy as she struggled under the weight and control of Hiromoto Ida was easily the evening’s most moving and most enduring image.”
- Max Wyman
"Reducing movement to its essence”
The Province, February 4, 1990
“Wild applause and a chorus of Bravos met the first work on Karen Jamieson’s portion of the festival’s opening night, her totemic duet, The Man Within. Hiromoto Ida and Catherine Lubinsky’s reprise of their Playhouse performance in February was a hit with the Ottawa audience.
The duet, which deals with the symbiotic bond between two creatures inhabiting the same space – a notion dear to the Native storytellers of the Pacific coast – seemed even more potent on the stage of the National Arts Centre than it does back home on the edge of the rain forest.”
- Michael Scott
”Dances in need of pruning”
The Vancouver Sun, June 26, 1990
Since that time the roles have been realized by Kathleen McDonough and Yannick Matthon, Monica Strehlke and Yannick Matthon, Byron Chief Moon and Brian Solomon and most recently Caroline Farquhar and Brian Solomon. Each of these casts has created vastly different interpretations evoking completely different resonance and emotional impact. Yet the piece has not changed in its choreographic vocabulary or structure.
1995
About
In 1995, the piece was performed as part of 5 Dances by Karen Jamieson, an evening of innovative dance and music collaborations featuring 2 premieres and a repertoire of original works. Emotionally intense, the performers pushed beyond boundaries of any single dance technique and explored notions of gender, conflict, spirituality and compassion.
At this performance, The Man Within was performed by Byron Chief-Moon and Hiromoto Ida, with music by Jeff Corness, and costumes by Susan Berganzi based on original designs by Catherine Lubinsky.
“Originally created for a woman and a man, this duet is Karen Jamieson’s signature work, conceived through the archetypal image of one person carrying another. The two exist in a state of symbiosis: each of them asserting individual traits, yet neither quite whole without the other. Performed to the metallic music of Jeff Corness, this work is about the experience of loving another person and about the images we carry within us that others fulfill.”
- Media Release, 5 Dances, 1995
The People
Choreography: Karen Jamieson
Performance: Byron Chief-Moon and Hiromoto Ida
Music composition: Jeff Corness
Costumes: Susan Berganzi
2005
Kathleen McDonough and Yannick Matthon performed Man Within at a Simon Fraser University Noon Dance Event in 2005.
2006
Yannick Matthon and Monica Strehlke performed at the Canada Dance Festival in June, and again at the Dancing on the Edge Festival in July of 2006.
2007
Byron Chief Moon and Brian Solomon performed at Vancouver International Dance Festival in 2007.
2008
Caroline Farquhar and Brian Solomon performed Man Within as part of the Sisyphus Project performance at the Kay Meek Centre in 2008.
Please note that populating the Karen Jamieson Dance website with new information and images from the archives is an ongoing process that we are undertaking as fast as we can. Karen Jamieson Dance welcomes any corrections or missing information to the description and acknowledgments listed above. These can be forwarded to admin@kjdance.ca