monumental

The Holy Body Tattoo / Godspeed You! Black Emperor (Canada)

For one night only, Vancouver’s The Holy Body Tattoo dance company unites with post-rock giants Godspeed You! Black Emperor live on stage in a performance that will leave you reeling.

How do you express the madness of urban life—the repetition, the confinement, the alienation? Here, the artists do it by turning movement into metaphor, dance into poetry and sound into substance. The show begins with nine human figures, mounted on pedestals. The eight-member band draws us into a trance as the dancers’ movements—equal measure of balletic grace and brutal athleticism—shifts from gestures of our everyday lives to acts of abandon. The result is unlike anything you’ve seen—as violent, beautiful and cathartic as art can get.

Godspeed You! Black Emperor is one of Canada’s great musical acts, and this is a rare opportunity to see them live, at the peak of their powers. Whether you’re a fan of the band, a lover of contemporary dance, or just someone open to the most radical possibilities of human creativity, this is one show you won’t want to miss.

The Holy Body Tattoo is a Vancouver-based dance company, founded in 1993 by Noam Gagnon and Dana Gingras. After a 10-year hiatus, the company returns to the world tour circuit, kick started by this hometown performance at the PuSh Festival.

Altogether, [monumental’s] nerve-racking vision speaks to a vast audience because it encompasses almost every common contemporary angst, from office power struggles to sexual insecurity to apocalyptic, post-9/11 fears. And that is definitely a monumental achievement.

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