Street Performances
Expect the unexpected as over 30 performance groups and artists transform the Junction streetscape into a carnival of sounds and sights. Live music, Comedy, Dance, Bookthug Nation readings, Theatre and more will be performed all day. Follow them on a journey or watch from a safe distance. Whatever your taste, you will be marvelled as these artists animate the inanimate, expose the human psyche and make you laugh all at once.
- The Artists
- Bain & Bernard
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Biography
Bain & Bernard are a comedy duo hailing from Toronto. Having a keen interest in vaudeville comedy they exercise a mandate to create new vaudeville styled material and resurrect classic scripts. For the past seven years they have been involved in many different projects around Toronto and are founding members of The Canadian Music Theatre Reparatory Company. They have played various venues including The Rivoli, The Bad Dog Theatre, The Bathurst St. Theatre and The Bloor Cinema. At the 2008 Junction Arts Festival they performed “Bain & Bernard & Son’s This Thing That Thing Anything Everything Elixir!” to great acclaim.
About the Performance
Ladies and Gentlemen! Boys and Girls! Step right up to experience a world of un-seen wonders! It’s Bain & Bernard & Son’s You’ve Never Seen Anything Like It Show! Come see the strongman lift 1000 pounds and bend steel with his bare hands! Gaze your eyes upon the World’s Fastest Rope Tier, and the Art Elephant! Oh boy! Includes acts such as The Mystical Misfits do Magic! Place your bets on the Baffling Boxing Beasts! Be first in line for Dr. Fantasmo and His Fleas! And exclusive only with our show is a Tap Dancing Unicorn! Step right up and enjoy!
- myspace.com/bainandbernard
- Art Fuzion
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Biography
The Fuzionists: Founded by Jane Motyka and Dominic Simone in Port Credit, Mississauga in September 2008, Art Fuzion was born and nurtured by individuals who sought artistic growth through a sense of community. Open call brought the commitment of artists Claudio Ghirado, Zara Diniz and Rosanna Pizzo who officially formed The Fuzionists. As five artists, these individuals bring a diversity of skill and spring from various artistic careers, using their formal techniques to facilitate and advocate a free-style approach to the spontaneity of their work.
About the Performance
On a large drawing surface (approx. 4' x 8') The Fuzionist will collaborate on a single, free flowing and improvised piece. The audience will enjoy watching the creation, transformation and evolution into the final piece and are encouraged to express their views as to what they see and assist in naming the piece. Eeach performance lasts between 2.5 and 3 hours. In addition we usually provide a smaller work surface for the audience to make their own mark and try their hand at drawing "fuzion".
- www.artfuzion.wordpress.com
- Herciniarts
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Biography
Herciniarts is a collective endeavour where core members with foundations in aerial, dance, acro and theatre collaborate in an open door environment with artists from a diverse range of fields. Our goal is to continually blur the line between traditional art forms and create work that cannot necessarily be classified as a specific genre. Through our open-door collaborative process and by offering classes at accessible rates, we also aim to encourage and inspire young artists to do the same.
About the Performance
"Urban Growth" is a guerilla aerial based performance where roaming aerial acrobatic performers perform parkour-infused dance on found objects/structures. Dressed as plantlife, artists provide a social commentary on urban growth's stifling of the natural environment, reminding us how a touch of green can appear in even the least likely of places and reinvigorate its surroundings.
- www.herciniarts.com
- rad
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Biography
Since its creation in May 2007, rad has been involved in festivals and events including: Junction Arts Festival, Nuit Blanche, The National Ballet’s Mad Hot II Fundraising Gala, and The Business Arts Awards. Summer 2009 takes us traveling to the Guelph Contemporary Dance Festival, the Milton Street Festival, and on a tour to Saskatchewan with our latest work: |shift|. We continue to perform on the subway and are attempting to create a relationship with people not usually exposed to dance in a fun, interesting manner by working with themes that are accessible to all audiences and performing in unconventional locations.
About the Performance
Enjoy a wordless tour of the Junction with random acts of dance! Explore the Neighbourhood through the choreographed and improvised movements of our tour guides.
- www.randomactsofdance.com
- Gadfly
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Biography
Gadfly is the brainchild of Apolonia Velasquez and Ofilio Portillo. This company’s name speaks for itself and that is precisely what characterizes its artistic approach. Combining street and conventional dances, Gadfly demonstrates that there are no limits to their visual language. What makes Gadfly unique among the myriad of existing dance companies is not only the high caliber performers but its eclectic vision. Gadfly’s performances provides the opportunity for these individuals to express themselves without the constraints of commercial demands to an audience who can understand their vision.
About the Performance
For this unique and special occasion, head choreographers Apolonia Velasquez and Ofilio Portillo will draw their movement vocabulary into Hip hop, Contemporary, Vogueing, Jazz, Bboyin, Locking, House dancing and Acrobatics. This rich, exciting, and carefully crafted choreographic piece will highlight the single, purest and most powerful driving force within any human being. Indeed, this will be a thrilling and moving expedition into the discovery of the true essence of passion.
- www.gadfly2.com
- Aaron Water
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Biography
Aaron Water has performed, danced, and busked on the streets of Maryland, Montreal, New York City, Buffalo, and Toronto. He is an expert modern and hip hop dancer, mime and entertainer. He draws on ballet, martial arts and African dance as well as situational physical and spoken comedy to smile up audiences from ages 9 months and up.
About the Performance
Mime, robot, hip hop popping dance, roaming or stand in place.
- www.myspace.com/aaronwater
- Jay9Dance Projects
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Biography
Faerie-Go-Round is a dance theatre piece involving two performers portraying fun and flighty faeries separated from each other. Both performers will start in a different area and begin moving along the street in search of the other. They will stop here and there to dance as well as interact with the audience. Eventually they will find one another and celebrate by dancing together. They will supply their own music by playing simple instruments that they will carry with them; such as drums, bells, and shakers. The look of these faeries will be inspired by the artwork of Brian Froud.
About the Performance
Jay9 Dance Projects was created by Jannine Saarinen to choreograph/produce character-based dance that is versatile and expressive. She collaborates with different artists on a piece by piece basis and her work has been performed in shows such as Artists’ Play, In a White Room, Junction Arts Festival, and Dance in Dundas Square. Currently, she’s working on a piece for Nuit Blanche 2009. Jannine graduated from the George Brown College Dance Program and has worked with several excellent choreographers; including Donna Greenburg, Marlee Cargill, and Viv Moore. She has performed in fFIDA, Dance Ontario Weekend, Nuit Blanche and many other venues.
- Angola Murdoch : Look Up Theatre
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Biography
Angola has been working in the theatre industry for over ten years creating shows for a wide range of audiences. As well as producing her own shows she has worked as a technical director for The Second City Toronto, Martin Short, Volcano Theatre, and The Banff Centre of the Arts. Angola has trained and performed in a multitude of movement disciplines including ten years capoeira, aerial dance and hand balancing. Angola is an international performer some highlights of her career include; Le Chic (Hawaii), Kuten (Ithaca NY), and Mercury Descent (LuminaTo Festival).
The energy triplets are circus acrobats searching to balance the earth. They drive around in their eco vehicle (one low riding bike which they balance on) roaming festivals and stopping to help people live more environmentally friendly. The energy triplets add a lot of color and fun to your event. We introduce different environmental ways of getting to work or school by balancing on each other and flipping down the sidewalks. We interact with the children with different circus pyramids and balancing games. We also do this act as a feature performance.
- www.lookuptheatre.com