Tell Everyone
Performed at Older & Reckless #40
November 10 & 11, 2017
Harbourfront Centre Theatre
Created by Peter Chin, this work embodies and honours the words uttered by Taliesin Myrddin Namkai Meche, a young man of 23 years. In May 2017, Taliesin, along with two other men, had been defending two Muslim girls against the racist aggression of a white supremacist on public transit in Portland, Oregon. The aggressor turned on the three men, attacking them with a knife. As Taliesin lay bleeding to death in the arms of a woman, a stranger who comforted him, he told her, “Tell everyone on this train I love them.” They were his last words before he died.
View performance excerpts here
Here I Stand in Time
March 11 - 12, 207
Phnom Penh, Cambodia
Here I Stand in Time, Phnom Penh is a contemporary sacred dance performed in three public sites on the streets of Phnom Penh including the infamous Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. This healing series of dances by Peter Chin in collaboration with thirty-five dancers and musicians of Amrita Performing Arts Phnom Penh, will be enacted on March 11 and 12, 2017.
View photos of the process here
View video of the rehearsal process here
Where? With All
January 14, 2017
Mandala Agung Venue, Ubud Bali, Indonesia
Peter Chin performed his solo work, Where? With All as part of the All about Dance series, described as "A special day honouring the power of dance to heal, move energy, create joy, bridge communities and cultures, share wisdom and celebrate life."
"What an honour to breathe with this masterful creative piece - more openings fertile to soul - ripples remain creating space for what is possible - truth in creative craft vibrates to the bone - thank you Peter Chin" - Susan Allan
"What a remarkable blending of creativity and humour, intelligence and mystery, history and eternity. Thank you for gracing us with your dance, Peter." - Avara Yaron
"Peter's performance at the Mandala Agung was flawless as always, rich and soulful...I just hope that Ubud will be blessed to see his return in the future." Savitri Devi
Woven
Premiere: September 24 - 26, 2015 at Harbourfront Centre Theatre, Toronto
Presented by DanceWorks
Tour: October 3, 2015
Alcalá Theatre, Oaxaca Mexico
Presented by Fundación Alfredo Harp Helú Oaxaca and the Textile Museum of Oaxaca
Choreography, music, text: Peter Chin
Performers: Kathia Wittenborn (Toronto), Kassi Scott (Toronto), Chy Ratana (Cambodia), Marina Acevedo (Mexico) and Boby Ari Setiawan (Indonesia); Debashis Sinha (percussion), Caleb Bean (backstrap weaver)
Inspired by the intertwined threads of woven art in Cambodia, Indonesia, Mexico and Canada, renaissance man Peter Chin and his international cast of dancers reflect the spirit of traditional weaving communities in Woven.
"There is only one word to describe Woven, and that word is stunning." - Paula Citron, Dance Critic
Returning Empathis
A new work for Toronto Dance Theatre
April 9 - 11 and 15 - 18, 2015
Nominated for a Dora Mavor Moore Award for Outstanding Choreography
“Your work was brilliant, Peter, created & performed with exhilarating artistry and deeply moving as a reflection of a humanity without borders.” - Claudia Moore
Ningali
A new work for the Gotrasawala Festival
December 5, 2014
Radiant Art Centre, Cirebon West Java, Indonesia
Peter Chin's Ningali premiered at the West Javanese cultural festival, Gotrasawala on December 5, 2014. This is an expansion of a dance piece originally presented in Bandung West Java in November 2013 to much acclaim. Dancers and musicians who have graduated from the esteemed arts college STSI Bandung, interpreted Chin's work about the many meanings of "seeing", which is the meaning of "Ningali" in the Sundanese language.
Read about the Gotrasawala Festival in the Jakarta Post.
Ferocious Compassion
Presented at the Our Roots Right Now Festival in Bangkok, Thailand, January 24 - 26, 2013; Tari Dance Festival Kuala Lumpur, July 3 - 7, 2013; the Department of Performing Arts in Phnom Penh on November 2, 2013; and at the World Dance Alliance Asia Pacific in Taipei November 29 – December 2, 2013.
Choreographer: Peter Chin
Performer: Chy Ratana
30 minutes
Ferocious Compassion continues from the work that was established with Inside the Mask with Chy Ratana, exploring the virtuosic solo Khmer traditional/contemporary dancer. In this work, a series of transformations are ritualized: a dancer speaks about wearing a Lakhoan mask, a boy emerges from innocence when he is filled with compassion for a dead animal by the side of the road on his way to see his teachers, and a boy discovers an inner strength and ferocious discipline through his identification with a wild animal.
A collaboration with Amrita Performing Arts, Phnom Penh.
Everyday Marvels
October 5 - 6, 2013
Gardiner Museum, Toronto, as part of Nuit Blanche
Everyday Marvels, is a new episodic performance installation based on Saskatchewan poet Lorna Crozier’s new volume of poetry called The Book of Marvels – A Compendium of Everyday Things. Directed by Shannon Litzenberger Dance Company in collaboration with Susie Burpee and Marie-Josée Chartier, Everyday Marvels features 16 miniature vignettes (or 'marvels') created by eight local choreographers. Peter created two of these vignettes for artists Chy Ratana (Cambodia), and Toronto artists Linnea Swan, Daniel McArthur, Kassi Scott, and Kathia Wittenborn.
Realms Revisited
Premiered November 26 - 27, 2012 at Teatro Carmarin Del Carman as part of the Festival Danza en la Ciudad, Bogota, Colombia.
Choreographer and Composer: Peter Chin
Performers: Chy Ratana, Phon Sopheap, Chumvan Sodhachivy and Peter Chin
Realms Revisited investigates our connection to the past, and realms that have faded into history, both imagined and real. In this fluid world between fantasy and fact, through evocative solos, duets and ensembles, the four dancers enact a kind of ritual that delves into a state of mind that takes one back and forward into realms beyond the here and now.
Olden New Golden Blue
A collaboration with Amrita Performing Arts, Phnom Penh
Premiere: February 24 and 26, 2011 at the Fleck Dance Theatre, Toronto presented and commissioned by CanAsian Dance Festival
Touring: April 18 - 19, 2013 at Abron Arts Centre, New York, presented in partnership with Amrita Performing Arts
Choreographer and composer: Peter Chin
Performers: Chey Chankethya, Chy Ratana, Chumvan Sodhachivy, Phon Sopheap and Noun Sovitou
In a new ceremony, five young Cambodians of a pivotal generation embody and synthesize contradictory ways of being in a contemporary Cambodian society of opposing currents. Tradition/experimentation, preservation/evolution, nostalgia/future-focus, spirituality/materialism, and public exhibition/private introspection collide and merge briefly in this riveting work.
PRESS
"The dancers spoke, sang, acted, and danced the repertory as “total theater” that felt like watching a Cambodian “sit-com” – if there is such a thing...As I watched these exquisite performers, I thought again about “what the body remembers...” I don’t think I have ever seen such physical and emotional intensity and core power in a group of dancers – something about that monkey role! No matter how far the choreography veered away from the traditional repertory, “what the body remembers” has created a performing instrument in these Amrita dancers that truly reminds one of their past. - Karen Greenspan, Ballet Review
Fluency
Premiered November 3 - 5, 2011 at the Enwave Theatre, Toronto, presented by DanceWorks
Choreographer/Direction: Peter Chin
Performers: Peter Chin, Alison Denham, Billy Marchenski and María Constanza Guzmán
In Fluency, Peter Chin asks the question, Can one become Nicaraguan? He attempts to answer that question through this multidisciplinary piece imbued with finesse and humour that he developed during a lengthy stay in Latin America. Over a two-year period Peter, accompanied by videographer Jeremy Mimnagh, documented his efforts to learn Spanish and his attempts to integrate into a new culture, an undertaking that involved more than a few comical situations. It all led to this very playful piece, an atypical progress report that lies somewhere between dance, theatre, video and a talk show.
PRESS
Tusaaj (online translation journal)
Watch the Fluency trailer here
Behind the Mask
October 19, 2012
Institute for Contemporary Culture, Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada
Choreographer and Artistic Director of Tribal Crackling Wind, Peter Chin, joined with celebrated dancer Leak (Chy Ratana) from Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to present a dance work exploring the multiple layers that both hide and reveal the soul - whether a traditional dance mask, or the glass between a viewer and the photo of the portrayed. This performance was part of the Institute for Contemporary Culture’s exhibit Observance and Memorial: Photographs from S-21, Cambodia.
