Episode 70 – Dancer Magic (Catching Up to the Future of Our Past)
Gabrielle Martin: Hello and welcome to Push Play, a Push Festival podcast featuring conversations with artists who are pushing boundaries and playing with form. I’m Gabrielle Martin, Push’s artistic director, and today’s episode highlights future dances, the space race, and how we imagine hope, and the materiality of midlife.
I’m speaking with Catching Up to the Future of Our Pasts creative director, co-choreographer, co-cinographer, and performer James Gnam, and co-choreographer and performer Natalie LeFebvre Gnam. Catching Up to the Future of Our Pasts is being presented at the Push Festival January 30th and 31st, 2026, and it’s a duet for Nathalie and James that traces the elastic rhythms of midlife, where memory and possibility intertwine.
Set within a Mary Quant-inspired retrofuturist astral bubble, their movements measure and unspool time, revealing the quiet space where nostalgia meets anticipation, and where every gesture carries echoes of what was and what could be. Plastic Orchid Factory, their company, is a Vancouver-based interdisciplinary organization that for over two decades has cultivated site-responsive, collaborative, and immersive experiences that bridge art and community.
James is a dancer, choreographer, and artistic director of Plastic Orchid Factory, and his work explores the tensions between embodiment, technology, and social exchange, positioning the body as both subject and analytical or analytic instrument. A graduate of Canada’s National Ballet School, he has performed internationally with companies including Ballet BC, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens, and IDAM Dance, and his choreography extends from theaters to galleries, gaming environments, and civic spaces Natalie is a dance artist, producer, and performance maker interested in shaping tactile design-led spaces where movement and objects co-compose.
Montreal trained at École Supérieure de Québec, and, uh, also trained at Arts Man- in Arts Management at Capilano. She has performed with Les Grands Ballets Canadiens, Coleman Lemieux and Company, Dancers Dancing, and Vancouver Opera. Since 2003, she has co-imagined Plastic Orchid Factory with James and led the creation of Left of Main.
Here is my conversation with James and Natalie. And so Plastic Orchid H- Factory has this, um, continuous history, this continuous history with, um, dissolving boundaries between dance, theater, installation, and digital media. Mm. And how… My question is how this interdisciplinary fluidity has shaped your understanding of choreography.
James Gnam: Wow. That’s, yeah, that’s a, that’s a lot. That’s that’s so
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: layered. How much time do we have? No, no, we have to- … keep it pitched. Yeah.
James Gnam: Um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Keep it brief.
James Gnam: Yeah. Do, do you want… I, I, I can start if you want, Nat, and… Okay. Um, well, uh, as, as dancers, um, our, our, our lineage is connected to, um, classical ballet. We’re both classically trained dancers.
Um, I went to the National Ballet School, Natalie went to L’École Supérieure de Danse de Québec, and, um, we have relationships with ballet companies, Les Grands Ballets Canadiens and Ballet BC while we were here. And so that’s really where we kinda came up and learnt what, like, a, a very specific kind of dance.
And after, you know, you know, when we started making work, we were really making work with… It’s funny ’cause, like, my last few years at Ballet BC, right, like, we were just, uh, we’d be, I’d be in the studio all day, and then Natalie and I would go and we would work, uh, on these, these projects together where we would make these choreographies.
Um, they’re very much about the things that we were doing and learning and, like, referencing and dissecting and remixing all of this stuff that, that, that we had found. But, um, a- at, at a certain point, we, we, we felt like we had hit a place where we felt like we were just kinda making the same work. You know?
Like, it, like, different themes, different, different ways in, different objectives, but the container was always the same, and somehow it always felt like the same work. And then so when I left Ballet BC and we started really thinking about, like, okay, like, what do we wanna do as artists now that we’re not working in that, that structure, uh, any longer?
And, um, and so it became really important to start having conversations with artists from other disciplines because, um, with dance especially, the dance that, that we were working in is quite insular, right? Like, it, it, it, it has a tendency to constantly be looking in on itself and referencing itself and kind of…
And it does amazing things in that, but, um, ultimately we felt like we needed to start having conversations with other artists And see where it, see where it led. And, um So this interdisciplinary practice really came about at first started working with, like, composers and, and building work between the choreography and the composition.
And then when we started including media or any sort of, like, really specific scenography, like having conversations with textile artists and with media designers and, like… And so there, there, there became this, like, collaborative fluidity that was really, um, generative for us in that we were able to break out of these frames and ways of thinking and seeing what we were doing, ’cause oftentimes we’d be like, “Well, this is what we’re thinking of doing,” and then we’d be working with, like, our, our dis- uh, uh, James Proudfoot, a lighting designer that we’ve worked with forever, and he, he would just, you know, he would mention, “Well, yeah, okay, I hear what you’re saying, but if we frame it this way, then we can get what you’re doing, but you don’t necessarily have to…”
And then, you know, the sound designer would pipe in and be like, “Well, yeah,” you know. So it was just like we were able to develop this, this way of working across disciplines where it’s, it’s always starting from the dance, from the body, from, from the… This is always the center point, but from there it would, it branches out and intersects with other disciplines.
Or I, I wanna say it’s less about disciplines. It’s more about specific artists that we have histories and relationships with, and we’re able, and we have so much trust and patience with each other that it’s like it, it moves through, these conversations move through other people and then back into what we’re trying to build together.
But then as far as choreography, I always felt a certain kind of responsibility to, to, to s- to save work, um, like, by being awesome dancers, uh, because there’s not a lot of time, right, in, in, in those- Yeah … in those, in those places, right?
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Dance more awesome equals better piece.
James Gnam: It’s really like the dancers have to take a lot of the responsibility on to make it work.
And we joke. We joke, right? Like, you know, we call it dancer magic, where it’s just like, “All right, well let’s just dancer magic this shit.” And then all of a sudden this thing becomes something because the dancers are so invested, and they have so much training and so much skill and virtuosity that they can make it happen.
And for me, my departure from that, that world, it became really important that, like, how can we build choreographies that aren’t dependent on the dancers being, like, so amazing that that becomes the thing? Like, how can we make it about all of the other things? And then, like, all of these things that dancers do, like how we embody time, how we work with, um, uh, uh, uh, activity, how, how we work through, like, memory, and how we see the space in each other, and it’s like, so we use all of these, like, really important soft…
not soft skills. Well, they are soft skills- Soft skills … but they’re, like, skills that, like, you know, um- that support what we do, but how do we make those like the thing that like how do we build virtuosity around that? And that’s been the thing choreographically that I’ve been interested in doing And trying to, and, and, and in doing that, like, how, how do we, how do we put, like, the body and, um, the individual, the individual’s limitations and, um, exceptionalist qualities and, um, capacities and interests, how, how do we, how do we have those things, how does the choreography or the proposition move through those things and so that, like, the choreography is really supporting their humanity, their history, their them?
Um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Yeah, it’s like the choreography is in service of the idea or the concept-
James Gnam: Yeah, yeah …
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: not the other way around, whereas that- Mm-hmm … that’s where we started, and we did a 180.
Gabrielle Martin: You know, when I was looking over the description of this work, I identify so much with the concept that you’re talking about, and so I’m- Midlife,
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: are you familiar with midlife work yet?
Gabrielle Martin: Yes. Thinking about past and future and- Yeah … potentiality and memory and possibility and all these things. I wanna ask you a bit more about the, about catching up to the future of our past, where you invite audiences into the train of midlife, a space between nostalgia and anticipation where time folds back on itself.
Mm-hmm. What drew you to this theme, and how do you begin to embody the future of your past?
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: I’m laughing because it, there is a practice inside of the creation of this work where we are trying to do just that, and it’s the hardest fucking thing I’ve ever done in my life. Trying to imagine future dances.
Yeah.
James Gnam: Yeah, there’s a-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: And, and, and manifest them in, in present time …
James Gnam: you know, being, being almost 50, you know, um, raising, raising children, you know, you, you’re, you’re very much aware of your, your, the time that you’re holding. And y- I feel like you’re also made aware of the things that you inherit because they’re the things that you share and transform with your children, and then you imagine that they’re going to share and transform.
And it’s interesting because it’s like there’s this place in our lives that I feel like we’re at right now, but I feel like as dance artists, we’re specifically tuned to that as, as, as artists that work in an oral tradition that’s passed down from generation to generation, um, where these ideas and concepts are, are passed from one generation to another, and that generation takes it and transforms it so it makes sense for them, and then they pass it on to the next.
And so we have this, like, history of, of… We’re, we’re part of this continuum of, uh, of, of information moving through time or an idea or a practice moving through time. And so it was those two things that kind of felt like, well, you know, like, we’re in this place, you know? We’re at th- Our, our, our midlife, and we’ve been, we’ve been working on for the last few pieces, right, Natalie, like working with like the materiality of our lives.
You know, like with Entre Chien et Loup, we were working with like the materiality of, uh, of our experience during the pandemic where, you know, it was about how time expanded and collapsed and the way like our relationship to activity and space and our perception of what was fearful or not. And, and so instead of making a piece about the pandemic, I used that materiality to create a dance piece that embodied those, those things.
Um, and so it felt like an interesting way to continue that conversation where it’s like, “Well, what’s the material- materiality of our lives right now?” And, um, and it really is about like thinking about the things that we carry and the things that we’ll leave behind and how will we want to leave behind, or that we’re hopeful we’ll leave behind, and how does that impact the present?
And then there’s this really interesting sort of, um, it’s almost nonlinear cycle between those three points in time where they’re always informing and changing and adapting around one another, how our past changes based on how we want our future to be, and our present is shifted based on our perception of past things happening.
And so it’s a really dynamic place to be, and I feel like as dance artists, we have- A really specific tool set where we can embody the present in a really specific way, um, and we can reach back to past dances and past places and be there. And what Nathalie was talking about, ’cause we spent a lot of time with Digital Folk, was a piece what was really built around, like, memory, how we hold on, like the, the…
Yeah, well, how the physiology of memory- Mm-hmm … can be used as a choreographic tool, how it’s, like, nonlinear and it’s fragmented, and how can we, like, find things. We spent a lot of time working with, like, the texture and the physiology and the rhythm of memory. And, and so we have this practice of moving back.
And so part of what we’ve been trying to do choreographically from the inside is, like, how do we… And it, it sounds really abstract, so bear with me, but- … how do we embody future, uh, future dances? So dances that haven’t even happened yet, how do we remember them and embody them? And, and, and part of it is, like, everything is connected from the past to the present to the future, so those future dances are gonna be the result of things that have come before.
But, like, work, like, and it, and it became this really very difficult proposition to, to work with, and it felt like, you know, like you’re holding this thing that doesn’t quite make sense. And it, it spent a lot of… We spent a lot of time in the studio that Nathalie’s in right now, um, just
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: working on- Nice.
Angus is making an appearance. Sorry. Spent
James Gnam: a lot of time, um- Who can do a proper
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Zoom call without some sort of, like, cat or dog, like?
James Gnam: Yeah. Working, working on this, like, how do we embody future ideas? And I think part of it, too, is, like, also this, like, what do we want the future to be? And I feel like that’s part of the conversation as well, but then also, like, surrendering to the rhythm of memory and imagination and letting the past and the present, like, where you are in the present inform what’s happening there.
So it’s this, like, really nuanced thing that takes a lot of time to, like, crack open and be with and be patient with. And it’s one thing to do it just Nathalie and I in the studio together, but it’s in another thing entirely to, to, to go through that, that process, that proposition, um, with, like, integrity when you’re, like, in a room with other people on a moving stage with lights flashing at you.
So it’s been, it’s been, it’s been really great. It’s been, it’s been a lovely challenge to, um, to dive, to dive into. Can
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: I add something to the embodiment piece, James? Yeah. It’s maybe more practical, but that’s just-
James Gnam: Mm …
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: that’s my role in our relationship, I feel like. I mean, a lot of midlife is not sexy.
You’re in this constant, like, flow state of just like, “I gotta go get this dinner piece, and I’ve gotta pick up this grocery, and that bill needs to be paid,” and you’re just in this kind of, like, constant flow of if you have children, you’re like, “Oh, I gotta get, you know, so and so from this practice to that practice.”
And so there’s this kind of like, um, uh, like, uh, continuous tending to small things- Yeah … uh, that is, that is very much present I, I feel in my midlife and, and that is, I would say, is also very present in the work. But there’s also this, um, there’s a kind of, like you said, James, there’s a, there’s a t- a kind of integrity, like a, um, like a, a, a purposefulness and also like a, like a, like a quiet, um, calm maybe.
Calm is not the right word, but there’s a kind of, uh, easefulness that we’re also trying to work with because we want that In our lives, like a kind of, a kind of grace where we can just still enjoy the things even though we don’t maybe feel like there’s, um, like, I don’t know. There’s this… It’s like, um, yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s not virtuosic in the same ways anymore.
Um, and that, I think that’s very present in the, what we’re working on in, in, in the embodiment, but also then what you’re observing and, and being in the room with
James Gnam: Space. Yeah, the choreography of midlife, yeah.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Yeah.
James Gnam: Mm-hmm.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Like, there, it’s, it’s, it’s dynamic in a different kind of way.
James Gnam: And, you know, it’s interesting because it’s like I’m not s- uh, I’m not sure how it is with you and your partner, but with, with Natalie and I, it’s very much like we are constantly aware of each other and where we’re at and what we’re doing, and we’re always, like, working in concert.
But it’s not, i- it’s almost never in this, like, romantic, like, l- staring into each other’s eyes, you know? Like well, you know? While the world moves around us. It’s just like the world’s moving around us, and we’re just like, you know. So that’s part of, like, the choreography as well is, like, how can we be together and tend the space and work the little things, but we’re always, like, aware of and responding to one another?
But not in a way that it’s here. It’s always in this space, and it, it requires a certain kind of, like, you know, life partner magic to be able to achieve that. Depending on where people are coming from, people, you know, they’re like, “Wow, that’s, I just, you know, that doesn’t, doesn’t feel like my midlife.” But, like, every, every, every couple, every person from a couple or parent that come, has come and interacted with the work, they’re like, “Yeah, that’s the thing.
There it is. You’re doing the stuff. You’re doing it together. You’re just, like, you’re moving through. It is, like, beautiful and graceful and, like…” You know? I mean, oftentimes it’s just, you know, like, uh, you know, younger, single people.
Gabrielle Martin: How do you know that you’re doing it right? Like…
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: That’s a really good question.
I think you know you’re doing it right when you don’t think about it too much. Like, it has to be, um- For me anyways, there has to be almost like, um, a moment where, uh, I drop out of my analytical brain
James Gnam: Mm. Mm-hmm …
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: and I’m not, I’m not, um, you know that beautiful quote that John Cage says, right, where you can’t create and analyze at the same time, you have to, you have to do them as separate activity?
Yeah. And I think it’s when I can drop out, and it usually, the dropout usually happens when I’ve like, “Oh, yeah, I gotta pick up that thing from the grocery store.” Like, I, I think about something that isn’t the work, and then it brings me into a state where I can start working in that other way. So there’s something about where the imagination is and is going and is, and what it’s working on that is really helpful to doing it right.
I’m putting that in little quotations ’cause I, ag- ag- again, like, I, I, I don’t know, but it creates a kind of state and, like James was talking about, the, at that, uh, the, the, uh, conscious/unconscious awareness of one another and our s- and the space that we’re in is really heightened. I mean, who needs drugs, man?
Just do this practice. It’s great.
Gabrielle Martin: On a revolving stage. On a revolving stage. Which I wanna talk about. So yeah, the work has this r- uh, retrofuturist aesthetic, which I’ve just spoken about, a Mary Quant- Mm … inspired astral bubble. Yeah. And, uh, this suggests both optimism and absurdity in our relationship with time.
Mm-hmm. How did design and scenography help you explore that tension between memory, desire, and the fantasy of progress?
James Gnam: It became really apparent that we needed to be working with, um, objects and things that could shift through time. It, it came from then, but could be now, and should also be in the future.
Um, so this sort of retrofuturist, mid-century modern, teak uh, artificial aesthetic, you know, [00:20:00] from like the, from the AstroTurf, you know? This idea of like artificiality being like, like, like the superior thing in the ’60s, and it’s like somehow, like, and we got rid of it, but now you walk through Yaletown, it’s like all of- It’s very present
in front of all of the condos, it’s all like As- AstroTurf’s back, you know, for some reason. So it’s like it’s then, but it’s also now. Um, but then they’re also, they also had to have like really clear, like signifiers, you know, nostalgic signifiers, you know, like these like, uh, like lawn chairs from, from like the, the ’60s that we all remember sitting in and that have come back in fashion in various cycles over the last, you know, 60 years.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: We sort of realized in rehearsal one day, and I think it speaks to what we’re talking about here in this question is- Hmm … we’ve situated ourselves in a time where our grandparents would have been our, our age. Like- Mm-hmm … we’ve put ourselves in a place where we are, we are a future of, of a lineage, but we’ve put ourselves back in time in a different generation.
So there was this kind of- Hmm … interesting realization around that. I don’t know. I think it was, um Maybe an instinctual thing, but it was interesting to make that connection and go, “Oh, yeah,” like, wow.
Gabrielle Martin: Mm-hmm.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: And also the space race, James, you’ve talked a lot about… I mean, I think you have a personal, like, fascination with it.
Certainly, I do as well, but you’ve talked a lot about how that whole time was, like, there was just so much optimism and hope and, like, a trust in the future and in technology and in, like, where we were going, and we were going to the moon. Like, we were g- anything was possible. Mm. And it was, like, this, like, um…
I don’t know that it was blind optimism, but there was a kind of a, a real, like, sense of possibility. And I think- I think that’s exactly right … we wanted that in there. We wanted that sense of, like, hope and possibility and, like, oh, where can we grow and expand? Like, what can we mushroom into from this moment?
Gabrielle Martin: And you speak about this relational hope. So this piece started as a solo for James and then evolved into this duet with the two of you- Mm … shifting the work’s gravitational field from introspection to relation or introspection and relation. So how did this transformation change the piece’s emotional and choreographic landscape, and what emerged when the singular became shared?
James Gnam: It really… It, it… And it, and it did start that way ’cause I, I, I, I, I spent a few months in the studio by myself, right, Nathalie? Where it was, where it was just me. And, um, I needed to figure out what it was that I was working on. I had some ideas, and it really just needed to start with, like, what are these dances that I’m find finding?
What am I interested in, in embodying? And taking the time to really, like, delineate that for myself, um, to spend time in the studio, and to spend time reflecting afterwards. And it was, it was, it was in that, once I, once I really got a sense of, like, well, what I’m really interested in is, like, how I’m preoccupying time, how I’m, how I’m thinking of what came before and what I’m going to leave and, and, and, and really, like…
And then, again, coming out of the, the Chez Luciana was, it was about the materiality of my life, which is, like, you know, the, the choreography of midlife seemed like, like, a rich terrain. And I was like, “Well, I, I can’t do this by myself.” And, uh, and then so, yeah, over dinner, Nathalie and I, um, decided we were gonna, we were gonna hop into the studio just the two of us together, which we haven’t done in, in, since Jem was born.
So, um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Yeah, since a long time ago.
James Gnam: Mm-hmm. So, so I, I was able to, like, do a bunch of research and figure out, like, what, where the drive is from the inside. Um- By myself, and then, yeah, and then when I really understood what the work wanted to be and who needed to be involved, then, um… And it, yeah, I mean, it, and it, and it really, it did change because it was, it wasn’t just about, like, what I’m feeling and what I wanna do, but, like, how are we, how can we…
You know, I mean, it was interesting because it’s like we don’t, we don’t wanna make the work about us, but it’s made of us, you know? Like, it’s, it’s, like, we couldn’t have done this with anyone else other than, like, somebody that I’ve known and been with for most of my life. Um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: It’s
James Gnam: so weird we can say that now, right?
I, you know, it is, it’s kinda weird to say that, but we’re at midlife and we met when we were very young, so, you know, it’s like for, we’ve been together for most of our lives. Um, s- and, you know, I mean, and, and our way of being in this work and building this work together, and it’s like this trust in being in this, like, really unknown space, uh, and just, like, trusting that we could do the work, and we can be patient, and we can find it, and we can surrender to the score and the proposition.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: But interestingly enough, the evolution of it becoming a duet took a little longer. The evolution of it needing a revolving stage was pretty instant.
James Gnam: Yeah, yeah. As soon as we realized that-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: It took us, like, two days and we were like, “Oh, what?” Yeah. You know, this needs… And then it was just like it, it sort of ar- arrived as a, as a very clear, like, idea.
Like, this is how this thing needs to be held. Yeah. In this Astro bubble, right? This, like-
James Gnam: Oh, yeah …
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: like, this kind of transposed into this little, like, space that feels like it’s- Pocket
James Gnam: of time.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Yeah, like it’s from The Jetsons almost. You know, it’s like this contained little… So.
James Gnam: Yeah. Yeah. It came-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: That came very quickly.
James Gnam: Well, yeah, from a choreographic standpoint as well. Yeah. ‘Cause we were like, “Okay,” you know? It’s just like, like, we, we, we, we, we, we thought about being in constant motion. We were like, “Okay, well, that’s, that’s a thing,” and, you know, we can stay in that for so long. But it’s like we are in time, we are being moved by time, so it felt really important that the space was moving us and that we are m- moving in relation to being moved in, in a very- Mm-hmm
similar way to, like, just how we, how we, how we live our, our, our lives. Um, but yeah, then just the, the logistics, it was like, okay, is this what we wanna do? But, you know, we were like a small, you know, um, production-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Let me, let me take my dancer collaborator hat off and put my producer hat on and check the budget.
James Gnam: Yeah. Yeah. So there, there was that, and, um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: But
James Gnam: you
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: figured out We figured it out
James Gnam: We did. I mean, fortunately we worked with amazing people that were able- Yeah … to adapt these industrial designs that were, like, built for showroom cars or, like, operas that were, like, in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to manufacture, and then figure out a way to, um-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Bring it down to our
James Gnam: scale Bring it down.
The, the… yeah, the, the, the fun note is that Jack Chipman, the, the, the, the, the fellow that built this, designed it, or helped, or didn’t design but built the stage, um, is best friends with the folks at Castortown. Um, so- Now. … it was a, it was a store in Vancouver that only sells casters. And, uh-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Does… how many casters are on the bottom of that stage?
Like- 700
James Gnam: casters
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: 700? So they were like, “Jack, you’re back.” It was like walking into Cheers
James Gnam: for him. “Jack, you’re back.” Yeah. He’s like their best customer.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Oh.
Gabrielle Martin: I feel like you’ve just, um, spoken really beautifully to how the work holds this intensely personal element or, you know, it’s, it’s grown… There’s this, um, intensely relational aspect on the stage, right? Yeah. That’s not necessarily about you, but of you- Yeah … um, with the architecturally scaled, and so the human body and the technological interface.[00:28:00]
Mm-hmm. And so looking ahead, what kinds of new spaces, digital, social, or imaginative, are you hoping, uh, Plastic Orchid Factory might move through next?
James Gnam: You know, Natalie’s working on a solo that, that may or may not-
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Be
James Gnam: a solo … or not a solo, but, like, yeah, it may seem that it might not be a solo. It might be a performance.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: It definitely will be a very collaboratively devised work. There is-
James Gnam: Mm-hmm …
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: not just me in performance. It’ll be very similar, I think, to Door Project, where there is a dance element, which is probably embodied by myself and, but maybe others. Right. But the rest of the, um, mediums come in and, and are very live with- Right
with me. That’s something. But, I mean, that’s just, that’s just a little… Is that what we’re talking about? Do
James Gnam: we- It, it may, it may or may not exist in, like, a pop-up… Hey, hey, buddy. Sorry. Finn, Finn just got home. Um, like, we’re just doing a, a pod- podcast interview. Podcast. Um, yeah, and the performance, right, Na- it, it may or may not take place in, like, a pop-up tent trailer that moves around
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Well, I mean, if we want to talk about it in a little bit, I wouldn’t maybe start, like, there with how we started.
But for sure, um, no, this is a, this is a project that we’ll develop over many years, most likely, like, minimum of two, probably closer to three, um, that will be, um, in close connection to, uh, the lands of my ancestors at Slave Lake. Um, it may or may not end up living, yeah, outside of a traditional performance space, or it may have, um…
I think, actually, right now, in the perfect imagined version of it, there’s, like, a land-based version of it, and there is a, uh, a more, um, traditional performance venue space- Mm-hmm, right … version of it. But it hasn’t started yet. It’s in the very beginnings, and there is a whole, um- wonderful exercise of building very, um, meaningful relationships with many wonderful people, uh, whom I probably haven’t met yet to bring this work to life.
And yeah, there may or may not be a pop-up tent trailer as part of it. That was just something that I was like, “Oh, could be interesting.” Um, that, yeah, so that’s, like, more– that’s more distant future, I would say, right, for the company. That’s something- Yeah … that’s even, I would say, even more, like, uh, relational and maybe, uh, scaled in a different way.
James Gnam: I’m in the process of, uh, like, like a few things. Um, a good friend of mine, uh, and mentor, Ted Robinson, passed away, um, a few years ago. And, um, yeah, he, he invited me to be a part of this process way back in 2014 called Facets, where it was really about, like, sharing, um, his, his legacy, ’cause he wanted to destroy all of his archives.
And he’s like, “No, no, no, no, no,” ’cause he, he didn’t want for his legacy to live in these, like, flat things. And so he brought five choreographers from across Canada and shared his archives with us each individually. So we each spent two weeks with him, and we, we each built a solo. And then out of all of these solos, he built a piece called Facets that premiered at the National Arts Centre, um, that was a collage of how we were interpreting his, his, his history.
Um, and then after that, like, we just became very good friends. And I, I spent a lot of time with him, um, and my friend Angie Chang, whenever I was on tour. In any part of that side of the country, we’d always make sure we swung by and visited him, um- He was a big part of Entre chien et loup as well, uh, as an outside eye.
Anyways, so part of, um, part of, uh, my time, my two weeks together with him in Quillon in this, like, in his farm in the middle of the winter, he’s showing me all of his archives. And he had quit dance for a really long time and, um, lived in a monastery as a monk. And, and then when he decided to start dancing again, um, he, he, he moved to Prague for a year.
And for six months, every day he would go to the studio, and he would improvise to The Goldberg Variations. And he was always really, like, self-conscious ’cause he didn’t have any formal training. He was more of like, like, like, like a performance artist. He wanted to be a rock star, but he was making all of this installation work, and then he was also dancing.
And so it was the first time in his life that he was able to, like, focus on his dance practice, and he developed this really deep score out of just being with that same music every day, and then at the end of the week, he would film it, and he would take some notes, and he would come back, and he did this for six months.
And so, um, I’m in the process of doing that myself in, in honor of Ted, where I go into the studio, and I dance to The Goldbergs. ‘Cause for me, you know, he was like, “This is the f- this is the first and only time that I felt like a real dancer.” Like, he felt like a dancer ’cause he always felt like he was like, um
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Some imposter syndrome maybe
James Gnam: Yeah, absolutely.
Like he knew he could make work, but when he was talking about dance and the body, he, he just always felt like he was missing something. And so that was something very personal that he shared with me about what he was carrying. And so, um, I’m gonna make– I’m, I’m, I’m in the process of just going through that practice and seeing, seeing where it ends up.
Um, there was, uh, um… When he, when he passed away, his, uh, a lot of his objects were sort of gifted to different, um, collaborators that he’d worked with over time. And, uh, I have like a sheet of sparkle fabr-fabric that he had used for facets that, uh, I, I’m not sure what I… I think I’m gonna build some sort of costume piece out of to perform in.
And then sitting alongside that, um, my friend Sylvie Bouchard’s, um, performed, uh, perfor- was commissioned him to make a duet, um, called Bob’s Last Request, which was about a funeral. So he made a piece about his death three days before he died. He had finished this piece with Sylvie. And, um, and it’s this amazing piece where it’s just like, it’s a band…
It’s a narrative piece, which he never makes. And so it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s three people who are in an experimental band who, you know, Bob’s parents never really like supported, and they made really weird music, and nobody really understood it, and so they disbanded. And then, and then when Bob passed away, h- in his will, he asked the, the, the, the last two band members to come together and like reunite and play at his funeral.
And so the piece is really just all about them getting back together and like, you know, figuring out how they’re gonna do this experimental music together and, and so he had actually made this piece, um, yeah, like I said, three days before he passed away. And, um, and so yeah, we’re gonna perform that, and I’m gonna perform The Goldbergs.
We’re gonna put those two things together. So that’s just sort of this… It, it’s taken a while for me to figure out how I want to, you know, um create anything, or even if I wanted to, you know? ‘Cause it’s been like, it’s been like four years since he passed away. Um- Mm. Yeah … but it feels like there’s been, there’s been time and I’m, I’m, yeah, you know, he was such a, such an important, um, person at a really crucial point in my development as a, as a, as a maker.
Gabrielle Martin: Seems like very much in conversation with catching up to the future of our past, like catching up to the past of our future, or-
James Gnam: Absolutely. You know?
Gabrielle Martin: Deep and diffracted time is a theme for this 2026 Push Festival.
James Gnam: Nice.
Gabrielle Martin: Many of the projects are interrogating, questioning in relation to the layered, yeah, [00:36:00] depth- Mm
the layers of time, how, yeah. Oh,
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: I can’t wait to take all, in all this other programming. It’s gonna be awesome.
Gabrielle Martin: Yeah, you’re definitely in the pocket. You’re definitely in the pocket of the theme this year.
James Gnam: Oh, that’s
Gabrielle Martin: great. Which came first? I don’t know. Yeah. Catching up to the future
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: of- Yeah …
Gabrielle Martin: to the future of our past or-
the theme for 2026.
James Gnam: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Gabrielle Martin: Um, and I actually haven’t seen the, the finished… I mean, this is the premiere, so I am- Yeah … so excited to experience it in its full-
James Gnam: Oh,
Gabrielle Martin: yeah. For sure … realization. Yeah. Um, so yeah, thank you so much for bringing us into your thoughts and your process a bit more, and, uh-
James Gnam: Oh, I think it made sense.
Gabrielle Martin: Yeah, it did. It did. It makes sense though.
James Gnam: Well, you know.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Yeah, yeah. You tend to ramble a little. It’s okay. Yeah. We like you still.
James Gnam: Mm-hmm.
Gabrielle Martin: I mean, it’s great because then we have the words, and then we can experience the work, and then we can put the two together. Yeah. Yeah.
James Gnam: Yeah.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: Should we mention about the slow social?
There’s a, there’s a, uh- A, a complimentary event to this show, um, Barbara Adler from The Only Animal will host one of her amazing slow socials, which is an opportunity to gather around the work, conversations around a work, but in a tactile practice. So it feels, to me, they feel like very casual and comfortable post-show talks where you’re busy with your hands and you’re talking to your neighbor and to the room about your experience, and it’s after the fact.
Mm-hmm. So this will occur, uh, the days following the, the premiere. Having been to slow socials, I was like, “Wow, this is such a powerful way to get people thinking about what they’ve seen,” and also involving the artist in that conversation where it doesn’t feel, um, too, um, like… I, I, I’m gonna use the word dangerous, but I think y- you know what I mean.
Like, you’ve just performed, and then you’re doing this post-show talk, and you’re like, “Oh, God, I’m, like, cracked wide open and I’m super vulnerable, and I don’t know if I can answer these questions without, like, breaking my heart.” Um- Yeah … so it felt like a way that we could be in community and in conversation with people about this work, but in, in a, in a way where we are, uh-
James Gnam: It’s really…
It really is. Yeah Like, we’re all sitting in a room together, and it’s not that supercharged, like, post-show place. Yeah. Sometimes it can feel a bit performative in another way, which is not, not a bad thing, but it just is a thing, and we just wanted to, like, take something that we’ve, like, cared for in a really specific way and, and continue caring for it in how, like, we’re going to- Yeah
how, how we’d love to have, like, another series of conversations with, with, with people. Yeah. Yeah.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam: And Barbara’s a bit of a magic performa- magic maker in those, in those spaces- Yeah … so it’s like we’re so grateful for her interest in the collaboration and the, [00:39:00] and, and, yeah, it should be really interesting.
But she calls it the detritus that will be in the room, like, the, the, the sort of the rem- the remnants of the work sh- that she’ll curate for this for us- Mm … to be busy with is, uh,
James Gnam: yeah. It’ll be
Gabrielle Martin: interesting.
Natalie LeFebvre Gnam : Really
Gabrielle Martin: exciting. Yeah. Yeah.
James Gnam: Cool.
Gabrielle Martin: Yeah. We, uh, hosted a slow social with Only Animal and Music on Main, uh, for- Oh, yes
Gabriel Daramu’s piece this past year. Yes. Right. So it’ll be great- That’s awesome … to, um, be able to welcome people into that as well.
James Gnam: Yeah.
Gabrielle Martin: Um, thank you so much. Thank you. So looking forward to- Yeah … both the performance and then being able to, like, process it collectively through this, this guided process of the slow social