With a strong line­up of per­for­mances from T&T and across the globe, the CO­CO Dance Fes­ti­val is on and on­line. The 2021 in­car­na­tion, from Oc­to­ber 30 to 31, will fea­ture the work of ma­jor in­ter­na­tion­al chore­o­g­ra­phers such as Reg­gie Wil­son and Re­na But­ler, both from the US, as well as T&T con­tem­po­rary vi­su­al artist Akuzu­ru, who has an in­ter­na­tion­al rep­u­ta­tion for her site-spe­cif­ic per­for­mances. Al­so on the list of guests is Amir Den­zel Hall, a young artist al­so from T&T, who will present a mul­ti­dis­ci­pli­nary work.

Re­na But­ler, a re­cip­i­ent of the pres­ti­gious Princess Grace Award for Chore­og­ra­phy, has pre­sent­ed work around the world, in­clud­ing at The New Or­leans Mu­se­um of Mod­ern Art and CHTV Sto­ries in Switzer­land. Reg­gie Wil­son has per­formed and con­duct­ed work­shops and com­mu­ni­ty projects through­out Africa, Eu­rope, the Amer­i­c­as, and the Caribbean. His chore­og­ra­phy is heav­i­ly in­flu­enced by the spir­i­tu­al tra­di­tions of the African di­as­po­ra, blend­ing the rit­u­al style move­ment with con­tem­po­rary dance.

Megan Moss (USA)

The fes­ti­val al­so boasts chore­o­g­ra­ph­er par­tic­i­pa­tion from Bar­ba­dos, the UK, Mex­i­co, Sint Maarten and Zim­bab­we.

With COVID-19 re­stric­tions con­tin­u­ing to im­pact the abil­i­ty to re­turn to live stage per­for­mances, CO­CO’s two-day line­up, in keep­ing with its goal to nur­ture up-and-com­ing dance artists as well as high­light es­tab­lished ones, will in­clude dance-on-video works by sea­soned artists who have be­come skilled in craft­ing dance per­for­mances for the dig­i­tal do­main, along­side those now en­ter­ing the are­na.

Son­ja Du­mas, co-di­rec­tor of the CO­CO Dance Fes­ti­val, said: “The fes­ti­val it­self has had to ad­just its se­lec­tion cri­te­ria from work made for live stage per­for­mance, to the pieces craft­ed for vir­tu­al the­atre—defin­ing a di­rec­tion for the evolv­ing on­line fes­ti­val. With the in­cred­i­bly steep learn­ing curve, the CO­CO team al­so ap­pre­ci­ates that sub­mis­sions are dis­play­ing a clear di­ver­gence in­to two branch­es, from the in­ter­na­tion­al and more di­verse com­mu­ni­ties, the fes­ti­val now reach­es. It’s al­ways been CO­CO’s goal to nur­ture up-and-com­ing dance artists as well as high­light es­tab­lished ones. We con­tin­ue to do this, pan­dem­ic or no pan­dem­ic.

Lovar Davis Kidd (USA)

“The en­tire CO­CO team, com­posed of dance prac­ti­tion­ers Nan­cy Her­rera, Dave Williams and Nicole Wes­ley, is al­so heart­ened by the 50 per cent uptick in ap­pli­ca­tions. We’re glad that we can be a cre­ative out­let for those who are brave­ly mak­ing work, in the face of a tremen­dous up­heaval of the sec­tor.”

The CO­CO Dance Fes­ti­val runs on­line via WACK 90.1 FM, at 2 pm next week Sat­ur­day and Sun­day. Ad­mis­sion is FREE, but do­na­tions dur­ing the show via WACK’s crowd­fund­ing plat­form on fund­met­nt.com are wel­come.