Dracula's Garden Rising
Dracula’s Garden is a contemporary dance series exploring the universe of Gothic literature: its stories, creatures, and themes. We call them a series of contemporary ballet poems - brief dance works, with each dance exploring a unique theme. "Dracula's Garden Rising" is a short dance film highlighting excerpts from different ballet poems in this series. “Dracula’s Garden Rising” is an introduction of movement qualities, characters, and themes from this on-going series.
In Dracula’s Garden contemporary dance series, we are interested in how Gothic literature and its themes evoke a range of emotions, from love to horror. Curiosity, excitement, exploration of something dark or dangerous, adventure, loss, deformation, search for humanity – the themes reflected in these stories that continue to appeal to us many decades after they were written. Each dance poem addresses these themes from different stories and characters. In this series, dance artists explore the personal, cultural, and historical symbolism of pointe shoes in the context of ballet, and re-imagine and re-invent their meaning, use, and symbolism. The Gothic literature themes, stories, and personages provide a juxtaposition to the classical balletic ideology of beauty. We look for ways to un-demonize and resurrect creatures, habits, humans, and emotions that, through processes of marginalization, are banished from cultural spot light. The Dracula’s Garden series investigates social constructions of beauty; ugliness; deformity; both the sublime and the grotesque, and the line between the two.
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Alina SotskovaDirector
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Gemma CroweProducer
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Alina SotskovaKey Cast"Dancer"
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Rachel HeltenKey Cast"Dancer"
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Sophie BrassardKey Cast"Dancer"
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Samantha PresleyKey Cast"Dancer"
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Jason KirknessKey Cast"Observer"
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Gemma CroweCinematographer
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Alina SotskovaChoreographer
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Rachel HeltenChoreographer
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Alina SotskovaSound Design
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Chris GilesSound Design
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Gemma CroweCreative Video Edit
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Ian CunninghamDrone Operator
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Ivan KlyuzhinProjections Design
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Project Type:Experimental, Short
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Genres:Experimental, Gothic, Dance, Horror, fantasy, postmodern
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Runtime:9 minutes 51 seconds
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Completion Date:December 9, 2019
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Production Budget:5,000 USD
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Country of Origin:Canada
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Country of Filming:Canada
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Shooting Format:digital
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Aspect Ratio:16:9
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Film Color:Color
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First-time Filmmaker:No
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Student Project:No
Alina is a professional dancer and choreographer. A contemporary framework informs her dance practice, with a focus on integrating physical rigour, experiential approach to movement, and continued goal of finding new movement possibilities. While her initial dance training was in ballet, now she takes inspiration from Countertechnique and Gaga, and blends pointe technique with contemporary dance approaches. Alina holds a PhD in clinical psychology and is a Registered Psychologist in British Columbia who works with adults, couples, and groups. Her previous studies in existential philosophy and her career in psychology continue to create spaces for intersections between psychology, philosophy, dance, and other art forms. In 2017, Alina founded Voirelia: Dance, Psychology, and Philosophy Hub. The goal of Voirelia Hub is to be a platform that allows dance artists to collaborate and create work in an atmosphere that strongly values mental health, depth-oriented psychology and philosophy, and interdisciplinary collaboration with artists, scholars, and scientists. Under Alina’s artistic direction, Voirelia Hub creates new contemporary dance and art works and also creates and produces events that bring together the topics of psychology, philosophy, and dance in workshops, public talks, and art events.