Choreographer captures global attention with presence on China's burgeoning contemporary dance scene

The studio of TAO Dance Theater is in Beijing's northeast suburbs. It is off the highway, and a 10-minute drive across farmland is required to get to it.

The group's dancers, who need a lot of space but cannot afford the high rents in the city, gather in a village called Hegezhuang.

The TAO Dance Theater uses a two-story house as its rehearsal facility.

Tao Ye, founder and choreographer of the group, lives in a house 30 meters away.

Sporting a black T-shirt and black linen harem pants, the bespectacled Tao, 32, does not look like a typical dancer, let alone a choreographer who has captured global attention as a radical new presence on China's burgeoning contemporary dance scene.

Now, he is struggling to finalize his latest work, known simply as 9, which was set to premiere at the National Centre for the Performing Arts on Nov 3.

The TAO Dance Theater is performing a double bill - 8 and 9 - until the next day. Eight and nine refer to the number of dancers in each performance.

"It's difficult to create 9, because nine is the biggest number in Chinese culture," says Tao.

"I've explored all possibilities and pushed the limits of human movement - from the works 2 to 8," he says.

Tao says his original idea was not to educate or tell a story. "I wished to make the dance a way to invite you to join in. So no settings, fancy lights or costumes - just body movements.

"My choreography is about the logic of movement and presents repetition through numbers," he says.

In this, you can see Tao's unique language, the repetition of the natural sequence of the body. Through repetition, the variations in movements are reduced and progress toward a state that is pure and minimal in form.

The awareness of the body has a special meaning for Tao, who started dancing because he had a superflexible body.

He spent most of his childhood with his grandmother, since his parents were not in a happy marriage.

Then, one day when he was 12, he saw a dance program on TV and imitated the dancer to do a split.

His grandmother was impressed, since she had never seen a boy his age do this.

So she sent him to the local dance school in Chongqing, in Southwest China.

There, he received training in Chinese dance and a bit of ballet.

Later, he joined the performance ensemble of the Shanghai police.

But after the excitement of the first few months, Tao soon found that he was not very happy there.

That is, until he visited the Jin Xing Dance Company in Shanghai.

"I remember the floor of the rehearsal room was covered with a white carpet. Dancers were lying there stretching their bodies. The sun was shining over them. This scene changed my idea about dance," he says.

"The training for classical dancing required me to jump high, to split, to make my body tense, to fight gravity. I did not know dancing could be so relaxing. You just listen to your body and follow your heart," he says.

Tao joined the Jin Xing Dance Company in 2003.

"I then realized that while earlier I had been required to dance as a job, now I had the motivation to dance, to enjoy it."

In 2005, he moved to Beijing, where contemporary dance has more fans.

With the Beijing Modern Dance Company, his motivation and potential soon got full play. He even began to choreograph.

The dance company hosts a festival each year. There, some foreign choreographers who loved Tao's work offered him a chance to travel abroad with them. But Tao declined the invitation.

Then, in March 2008, he and his girlfriend, now his wife, Duan Ni, and another dancer, Wang Hao, formed the TAO Dance Theater.

They started with a performance for three dancers, Weight x 3, which premiered in Beijing in September 2009. They made it into a DVD and sent it to some festivals.

His unique choreography soon attracted attention and drew invitations.

The Singapore Arts Festival, Norrland Opera of Sweden and Dansmakers Amsterdam of the Netherlands commissioned him to create 2, for Tao and Duan.

Then, he started to explore other numbers. And the young company soon became the most sought-after Chinese contemporary dance company worldwide.

So far, it has toured more than 40 countries, and it was the first Chinese contemporary dance company to perform at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York City.

The United Kingdom's Sadler's Wells Theatre commissioned Tao for three consecutive years to perform at the event.

Lin Hwai-Min, founder and artistic director of Cloud Gate, the renowned Taiwan dance company, says Tao "is the most promising contemporary dancer on the Chinese mainland.

His works belong to the 21st century. They amaze and provoke deep reflection."

Sculptor Xiang Jing says, "In an era of entertainment where dance is losing its dignity and creativity, Tao's dances make us return to serious discussion, make us recognize and salute true creativity."

Cui Jian, the godfather of Chinese rock 'n' roll, compares Tao to "a devoted monk, a hardworking migrant worker, a rational philosopher and a sensitive 'madman'".

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(China Daily Africa Weekly 11/03/2017 page20)