Anya Allegra Saugstad
CURRENT PROJECTS
Paper Mountains (of memory)
full length work in creation. Premiering a filmed excerpt of the work live at The Scotiabank Dance Centre April 3rd 2022.
Plastic Orchid factory residency
January 2022, for the creation of Paper Mountains.
mpc collab
ongoing collaborations with Mount Pleasant Film Company as choreographer, co-director, and dancer.
Ocean roaring
site specific live dance and violin performance at the shores of bodies of water. Available for booking summer 2022-2024. looking to perform this work near more bodies of water.
artist in Residence at lena
Starting creation for new work, 'Flora and Fauna'.
Biography
Anya Saugstad is a dancer and choreographer based in Vancouver BC, living and
working on the traditional, ancestral and unceded territory of the Sḵwx̱ wú7mesh' (Squamish), Stó:lō and Səlílwətaʔ/ Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xwməθkwəyə̓ m
(Musqueam) First Nations.
Anya trained at ArtsUmbrella, and holds a BFA with honours in Dance from Simon Fraser University. In addition, she has trained with San Fransisco Conservatory of Dance, and with The Performance Research Project under the mentorship of Lesley Telford. Anya has danced for Vanessa Goodman, Lesley Telford, and Rob Kitsos, among others. Anya and her collaborators create live and digital performance works that foster space for women to tell their stories through movement. She has been able to grow her choreographic work through mentorships with the Performance Research Program, The San Fransisco Conservatory of Dance, and Made in BC Dance on Tour. Anya has choreographed works for Simon Fraser University, The Rotary Centre for the Arts, Vines Art Festival, SplitScreen (Boombox), F-O-R-M, and Mt Pleasant Collective, among others.
Artist Statement
Anyas work is often inspired by the world she dreams about; removed, intimate, empty, chaotic, or exhausting. She creates to let herself and others arrive somewhere else. Her process physically and visually tries to answer questions about who we are as complicated beings, and our relationships to others.
Choreographic works
paper mountains (of memory)
‘Paper Mountains (of Memory) is a live dance and sound work in progress about loneliness. The project started in March 2021 with an explore and create grant, five dance artists, a composer, 600 paper planes, and a drive to experiment a post lockdown world through movement.
This work is made up of an accumulation of choreography from self taped dance videos that we had taken of ourselves dancing during the first lockdown in 2020. We are now transposing that material into a collection of choreographed ensemble scenes. My original inspiration for Paper Mountains (of Memory) drew from seeing videos that my collaborators and friends were posting online of themselves dancing alone during the COVID lockdown. All of the dances in living rooms, kitchens, parking lots, and nature, were all very different, yet they all seemed to be products of true listening. I was inspired to share these intimate and lonely moments with more people.
The beginning stages of 'Paper Mountains' was created with the support of Canada Council for the Arts, and in support of Plastic Orchid Factory, Ziyian Kwan, and The Scotiabank Dance Centre. We hope to receive more opportunities to continue to build Paper Mountains (of Memory) into a full length work.
ocean roaring
‘Ocean Roaring’ is a site specific live dance and violin performance that follows the stories of six women on the shore of the ocean at dusk. ‘Ocean Roaring’ was created on the beach in Vancouver BC in 2019, was made into a film in July 2020, and then toured live to Kelowna in 2021. ‘Ocean Roaring’ has been supported by Dance West Network Dance on Tour, The Rotary Centre for the Arts, the Canada Council for the Arts, New Works, and Vines Art Festival. This no tech, environmentally conscious work, focuses on tireless and urgent movement as a means to describe distance and longing between people and the land, and directs attention to the ocean as a scarce and vital resource. It duets the power of women’s bodies dancing with the power of the water.
'Ocean Roaring' was created in Vancouver at the shore of kits beach and first performed at vines art festival in 2019. From there, the work developed into a film that was shared virtually in festivals in 2020 including Vines Art Online Festival, Made in BC, and ArtsStarts. The work was toured live to Kelowna in 2021. This piece has been supported through Canada Council for the Arts, the Rotary Centre for the Arts, Vines Art Festival, and Dance West Network. We are looking for more opportunities to share this work with other bodies of water, communities and audiences.
Photos by: Aaron Hemens
58 duet
'58 Duet' is a dance work in collaboration with Nasiv Sall that revolves around a story of two people keeping track of one another. The work was made during the second year of Covid and was created as a response to a yearning we had to be intertwined once again to the lives of others emotionally and physically. The piece uses 15 solos back to back in one pool of light, getting more urgent as the work progresses. As this work was premiered for a live online show, '58 duet' was composed of 15 solos all 58 seconds long, aiming to stay within the same length of an instagram video (58 seconds) and to keep the attention of an online audience.
This work premiered at The Scotiabank Dance Centre is January 2021
Choreographer: Anya Saugstad and Nasiv Sall
Dancers: Anya Saugstad and Nasiv Sall
Sound: Liam Carsley
Photos: Pat Kitlo
falling Still
Falling Still is an interdisciplinary performance work about the world between triumph and collapse. The piece follows a group of women who push back against all that falls on them. Light focuses on individual dancers to reveal their moments of solitude. In contrast to the group's control and stamina, these intimate moments capture the individuals numbness, longing, loneliness, and crashing. This work focuses on the pieces of our lives that are often hidden and associated with failure. It questions our assumptions about success and ideals, as it dives into a story with two sides; the war inside us, between lightness and darkness, between being lost and in control.
Falling Still aims to capture burnout as beautifully and as humanly as vigor. It questions our assumptions about human capability, using dance theatre and sound to shed light on the silent roaring fights within ourselves.
This work began its creation at Mascall Dance with the mentorship of Jennifer Mascall. It was then performed at BLOOM, at ArtsUmbrella through the Performance Research Project, and In a split bill performance at La Fabrique St. George 7e7 warehouse space in Vancouver BC.
Choreographer: Anya Saugstad and Collaborators
Dancers: Daria Mikhaylyuk, Eowynn Enquist, Shion Skye Carter, Katarina Nesic, Maddy Gilbert, and Sabine Raskin
Sound: Stefan Nazerevich
Photos: Mika Manning and Lara Abadir
jungle
Jungle is a work created to investigate separation, to accentuate the empty unknown spaces of our lives, and to bring ourselves back to our strong physical animal. It is a work that presents overlapping simultaneous scenes using light, to cage the dancers in place and separate them visually from one another.
about animals. waiting to be free again.
Choreography: Anya Saugstad and collaborators
Dancers: Shion Skye Carter, Kaylee Louis, Anya Saugstad, and Samantha Priya Wright
Composer: Stefan Nazerevich
Film: Asad Yahya
Photos: Brenda Nicole Kent
almost ghost
Almost ghost is a work about leaving. The work was inspired by my family's story of falling, breaking, and mending itself together and apart. It show fragments of stories, about the ways we empty from one place or person to the next.
This piece was made as a commission for the Simon Fraser University in October 2018.
