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Massey University academic Greg Clydesdale has copped a huge amount of flak since he published a report in May claiming Pacific Island immigrants were a drain on the economy. It has been widely scorned, and this week Race Relations Commissioner Joris de Bres published his own report, saying Clydesdale's work was misleading and based on out-of-date data.
Black Grace choreographer Neil Ieremia isn't happy about Clydesdale's paper, either. He's responding with a major new work, Gathering Clouds, which will be "beautiful in its fury" when it is staged at AK09 next March. Gathering Clouds was announced as part of an early sneak preview by festival director David Malacari on Thursday night of what's in store at AK09, which runs from March 5-22.
Malacari revealed details of four other major works planned for the festival. The Auckland Philharmonia will perform a programme called American Songs, which will include The Wound Dresser by John Adams, an adaptation of Walt Whitman's Civil War poems; Duke Ellington's Harlem, which Malacari believes has never been played live in Auckland before; Knoxville: Summer of 1915, an ode to childhood by Samuel Barber; and Old American Songs by Aaron Copland.
Osaka troupe Ishinha will bring 35 performers to the Aotea Centre to stage Nostalgia, set in 1908 and based around the story of the first Japanese immigrants to Brazil. Ishinha, founded in 1970 by Matsumoto Yukichi, performed outside Japan for the first time in 2000 at the Adelaide Festival. Malacari describes their work as "a kind of chanting choreography with no natural dialogue ... very much a visual movement piece", adding that "the thrill of seeing large numbers of people on stage in tightly choreographed work is quite something".
British sound artist Ray Lee will occupy a "gallery or shed" at Motat to perform his work Siren, a surprise sellout at last year's Edinburgh Festival.
Comprising 29 large metal tripods with rotating arms with loudspeakers at each end, Siren builds a sonic texture with lights that Malacari says makes for a hypnotic experience. It was first performed in a hangar at an Oxfordshire airbase, in 2004.
The fifth act revealed in the preview was The Andersen Project, created by Canadian Robert Lepage's company Ex Machina. Lepage, considered one of the most dynamic theatre producers in the world, has previously presented three works at Wellington's International Festival of the Arts.
Malacari, who saw the French-language Andersen Project in Montreal, says he didn't understand a word but was enchanted by the one-man tale with "big, big sets and beautiful theatrical tricks".
The tale of a Quebecois who goes to Paris to write a libretto for a children's opera based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairy story, the production will be staged in the Aotea Centre, which will be the hub for the entire festival, complete with Red Square and Spiegeltent.
