Archive | Dance

Center will have two separate wings that will house a dance school and a municipal conservatory and two auditoriums one seating 500 the other 150.

There is something amazing about the level of creativity in Israel. I came across this video last week and thought it was amazing, we contacted Lilach Chen form Holon (AKA The person with the dancing fingers) Here is a little insight…

Who is Lilach Chen?

I’m 24 years old from Holon. Right now I’m studying video editing and post-production at the open university.

How did you get into “Fingers Breakdance” ?

Long time ago… (when I was 16) I was actually breakdancing. One day I tried the breakdance moves with my fingers and it looked really funny. So my sister and I decided to make a short video.
About a year or two later we found out about youtube and uploaded this video which became very popular.

What Size shoes are your fingers? 

Size of shoes… I don’t know exactly but they were part of a keychain.

You did a commercial for Sony, tell us about that…

2 years ago, I was invited to Prague to film a It was a Sony Ericsson commercialTV ad for the Xperia x10 mini touch-screen cellphone. The idea was finger-dancing on the screen. The Dance was a collaboration between me and their choreographer. It was a really fun project. ( check it out )

Your Youtube channel has almost 24 million hits, that’s amazing! Did you expect that kind of exposure? 

I didn’t expect it at all. We got amazing exposure. When I uploaded my first video it was the first year of youtube. So the whole “Youtube stars” phenomenon hasnt’t started yet. I’m still surprised by the popularity of the idea.
By the way now I’m above 24 million hits.

Besides finger breakdancing, is Breakdancing big in Israel ?

Yes! Breakdancing became very popular in Israel along the years. There are always events and big competitions.

You filmed in various cities around the world, any favorites? 

I filmed in Mumbai, Istanbul twice, London and Prague. (I get request from many other cities which I film at home). My favorite city was Prague.

And of course, does Size matters ? 

Size does matter! It’s not only tiny shoes it’s also tiny background and tiny accessories that I create. For example the bed and the speakers from “fingers breakdance 5″.

Check out her Youtube Channel for more videos

Step by step, UK-born choreographer Rachel Erdos has established herself on the local dance scene Three of her new pieces will be performed Saturday to mark 10 years since her arrival in Israel.

At the age of 23, British choreographer Rachel Erdos packed up her belongings, said goodbye to family and homeland and headed for Israel. It was 2002 and she had already graduated with a first-class honors in dance from the Roehampton Institute in London, and completed an MA, specializing in choreography, at the Laban Centre, London. Although she came from a pro-Zionist family and had visited Israel a few times in her childhood, her Hebrew was limited and her knowledge of the Israeli dance scene minimal.

That is a distant memory now that Erdos has become a well-known figure on the Israeli dance scene. Over the last decade, she has created eight dance pieces, participated in nearly every Israeli dance festival, from Intimidance and Gvanim BeMahol (Shades of Dance ) to Curtain Rising and International Exposure, toured the globe, bringing her works to such desirable venues as the Kennedy Center in Washington and Royal Opera House at London’s Covent Garden, and won prizes and critical praise.

To celebrate the tenth anniversary of her arrival in Israel, three of her new dance pieces are to be performed together on Saturday at Tel Aviv’s Suzanne Dellal Center.

Erdos dreamed of becoming a choreographer ever since she was a child in Newcastle, where she was born and raised. Her family – who are of Eastern European Jewish ancestry – settled in the northern English city after her father, a psychology professor, took a job at the local university. Erdos was attracted to the world of dance and took dance lessons, but finally decided in a high school workshop that she preferred to become a choreographer rather than a professional dancer.

Never at home

Erdos says that she never felt that she completely belonged in Newcastle, where the Jewish community is quite small. The fact that she was the only Jew in her classes was clear to everyone. “The minute I didn’t want to attend school on Yom Kippur or Rosh Hashana, I became ‘the Jew.’ You’re a bit different – you refuse to eat pork at friends’ houses. Everyone knows you are Jewish.

“There I was more attached to religion,” she adds. “It was part of me. If I had to be different from everyone else, it was important to me to examine what made it so. We attended synagogue on Saturdays; it didn’t matter if afterwards we got into the car and drove to the shopping mall. It was something you did to be part of the Jewish community.”

Choreography was not considered a legitimate profession. In order to be allowed to study dance in college, she had to promise that afterwards she would complete a master’s degree in dance therapy – something she ultimately did not do. She spent her gap year in Israel, volunteering in various projects and understood that she wanted to remain here. But eventually she realized she would be better off returning to England to take advantage of her right to a free university education there.

“When I finished my B.A. I didn’t have a lot of self-confidence,” she says. “It wasn’t enough that I was the best choreographer in my class, and I decided to study at the Laban Centre, which had a bigger name, to make sure I could survive [and receive] a choreography degree in another place, as well as gather professional experience.” During her studies she became interested in dances tailored for unconventional venues and mounted pieces in the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Royal Courts. She completed her degree in the nearly impossible span of one year, with a clear goal of moving to Israel.

“I could see myself living and working in England,” she says. “But I wanted to try to live in Israel. It seemed to me that I had met too many people who spoke of doing this but never took the step. Today it looks much scarier than it did then. I was a young and naive Zionist and I simply decided to get up and go.” Five years ago her parents joined her, moving to Jerusalem, and her brother has recently done so as well. Only her sister, she says, is not interested in leaving England.

An outsider

When she arrived, Erdos was surprised to discover that the Israeli dance scene was both rich and turbulent. It was clear that she’d have to do some homework before she could integrate into that world. For a year she attended every possible dance performance. “At first it was like going to a party where everyone knows everyone else and I didn’t know anyone,” she recalls. “I was an outsider and didn’t even know peoples’ names. I wanted to understand with whom I wanted to work, who was doing similar work.

“I was happily surprised by the fact that there was so much going on here. I felt that there was a place for every possible style and that something good was happening. I think that dance here is more interesting than in England. Everyone asks me if it’s easier here, and I don’t know if it is, because I think this is a career that isn’t easy anywhere. But something in the scene here works – there are always innovations, things happening all the time. I didn’t feel this in England.”

In order to make a living and become an integral part of the scene, Erdos worked as a rehearsal and performance manager, and taught in high schools. At the same time, she methodically developed her career as a choreographer. “I was told that if I wanted to become a choreographer, the route was clear: There are X number of festivals organized by size. I began with a small piece and enlarged the number of dancers and the budget each time. It was important to me to show people who I was and get them to recognize my name.”

An impressive repertoire

Erdos has created a long string of works: “The Birds and the Bees” (2007 ), “Alma” (2006 ), “Without Feathers” (2005 ), “Inside it’s Raining” (2008 ), “Last Orders” (2009 ) and “OU’” (1010 ). She has received international awards. “Alma,” a pas de deux for a man and woman (surrounded by apples ), won the Danish AICC international choreography competition. It was acquired by the City Dance ensemble in Washington and performed in the Kennedy Center. Her pas de trois “Inside it’s Raining” was performed at Covent Garden a year ago in the Firsts Festival; and “Last Orders,” created for the Danish troupe Mancopy, was produced and performed in a brewery in the city of Erhaus.

Last year was especially fruitful for Erdos, who created three new dance pieces that will be performed together on Saturday at the Suzanne Dellal Center in Tel Aviv, to mark her tenth anniversary in Israel. The first, “Why We Tell,” featuring Ori Lenkinsky and Idan Yoav, was created during a dance residency in Ireland at the beginning of 2011. The lovely pas de deux, which has already been performed in Italy and New York, is based on a theory by Christopher Booker that all stories are based on seven fixed elements. At the end of the year she mounted “in her words” ) at the Curtain Rising festival. A work for three dancers (Lenkinsky, Shiran Sharabi and Talia Bick ), it examines aspects of femininity and is accompanied by live music by the Monte Fiore band. The third, “And Mr.”, is a solo she created for dancer-choreographer Ido Tadmor. A minimalistic dance lasting 25 minutes, it was inspired by the famous Robert Louis Stevenson novel, “The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde,” and includes cello music by Adiel Shamit. “My goal was to present Ido Tadmor in a way that is different than the way nearly everyone sees him. He has a distinctive style of movement, ones he chooses himself – footwork, jumps, all kinds of virtuoso things – and I wanted people to see another side too. “It was a very interesting pairing,” she adds. “He isn’t the same age as the other dancers I work with. He’s almost 48, and I took this into account. Physically, he is capable of doing things that no one else can. He’s amazing, and usually takes roles for 20-year-olds, but I felt that the time had come for him to find a character relevant to his age.”

Tadmor, who initiated the collaboration, said in a separate conversation that Erdos is one of the most intriguing artists in Israel, and that the process of working with her was one of the most fascinating in the 30 years of his career. He mentions her seriousness and total dedication, intelligence and openness, and talks about exceptional precision.

A unique artist

Erdos is indeed a unique artist on the local landscape, a choreographer who did not develop out of a dance career and was not educated by a particular Israeli troupe or school. The fact that she comes from Britain and acquired her skills in the academic world stands out in her work. “There is something very communicative about my work,” she says, “and the people who dance are very important to me. The pieces don’t have to please the audience; what interests me is that it looks at the dancers and sees human beings. I think that the combination of English and Israeli tastes creates a different, more refined aesthetic.”

In her first years here, she says, many found it hard to accept the fact that she is not a dancer. “It’s as if you always wanted to be a movie director and not an actor,” she explains. “I don’t create dances so that I will have a place to dance. And I never understood how you could perform your own works; I have to be outside and observe. This looking in from outside is very important. And I like to stay in the dark, behind the scenes, watching the dances receive attention. I don’t need it. To me it’s my idea that makes people encounter each other. What’s interesting is the mixture of all the artists on the way to the result.”

What does Erdos like about Israel?

“I love Tel Aviv. Living here, working here. I think that’s why I stayed (in Israel ). “It is a big and a small city at the same time. Not like London which is big and feels big, where it takes you an hour on the underground or you need a car to meet a friend. In Tel Aviv I have a cafe downstairs from where I live; I walk around and meet seven people I know; and it only takes me 10 minutes to get to work.”

As for the difficulties of living in Israel, she cites the language. “At first it was hard. In England it was easy for me to express myself, and this difference wasn’t simple. I felt this was also a social barrier; I found myself shutting up completely during conversations in which I had something to say. I remember the first time I took part in Intimidance and they sent me to an interview on the radio. It was one of the most difficult experiences here; I left crying. I consider myself an intelligent girl – I have two degrees, but I spoke like a child of 4.”

And her heavy British accent, which she has tried to lose to no avail, doesn’t make things any easier. “I’ve considered myself Israeli for 10 years, but the moment I open my mouth I’m branded as English. In England I was a Jew and here I’m English. There’s no way to get around the fact that I’m not from here. But whoever gets to know me understands that I’m totally from here. I really opened up here. I’ve got a lot more confidence to say what I think. You have to become Israeli if you live here; otherwise you won’t survive.”

Source: Haaretz.com

VIDEO:

“Alma” is a gorgeous dance by Israeli Choreographer Rachel Erdos. The dance, in the repertory of the American dance company Company E is a work for two dancers and a stage-full of green apples…..

Learn more about the dance and the Company at www.companye.org

Bollywood music and dance has a very special place in Israel…check out this video to to get a glimpse of bollywood in Israel

The hip-hop dance style is just getting started in Israel, but the Breakerholics crew is confident that the movement has a bright future here.

In Tel Aviv, a team of breakdancers from disparate backgrounds has achieved unlikely success through a very Israeli blend of solidarity, drive, and chutzpah.

The 10 members of the Breakerholics come from four continents and speak seven languages. Half are immigrants and speak Hebrew as a second or third language. The team, or crew, includes both “b-boys” and “b-girls,” and the oldest members are twice the age of the youngest. They are black, white, and Latino. Despite these differences, they have formed a very strong and improbable bond around the idiosyncratic dance style, becoming “like a family,” says member Daniel Henry, 18. They have also been remarkably successful, both financially and competitively.

The distinctive dance form, which is also known as b-boying or breaking, was born in New York City in the 1970s and 80s and is one of the three pillars of hip-hop culture, along with rap music and graffiti. All were initially expressions of an underprivileged minority youth subculture, but today, hip-hop has gone global.

American rap stars are some of the world’s most recognizable celebrities, and street artists like Banksy and Shepard Fairey have won international acclaim. Breakdancing is similarly widespread. This year, teams from five continents will compete in the international Battle of the Year competition, b-boying’s World Cup. The competition has been dominated in recent years by crews from Europe and East Asia, and no American crew has won since 1998.

Breakdancing in Israel is not yet on par with countries like South Korea, France and Japan, but it has come a long way in recent years.

“The b-boying scene here is pretty new, it’s been alive for five or six years,” says Ross Eliyahu, originally from the United States. “The Breakerholics were established around the same time, and were one of the first successful crews in the country, despite starting out “basically on the streets.”

They recall practicing in places like in Tel Avv’s Central Bus Station and Dizengoff Center, before their crew found a home of their own.

Today, they not only have their own studio, but a busy schedule and successful business built around breaking. Eliyahu says. “We do it all. We perform, we teach, we practice, we do battles, we do shows.” They regularly perform at events like Bar Mitzvahs, weddings, birthday parties, and company shows. This month, they are doing a tour of the country involving 106 shows. They have competed around Israel and internationally, in places like France, Germany, Holland, and the United States.

This success is not accidental, but due to their absolute dedication to dancing, which may be the one trait they all share in common. Eliyahu says that “the whole thing is being addicted to breaking, it’s like making it your lifestyle, you wake up and you just breakdance, and you go to sleep breaking, and you’re taking your lunch breaking, and everything is tied into that type of mind frame.”

Michelle Morali-Mezarina, who has been successful in international competition, also cites her work ethic as the reason for her success. “It’s hard, you need to work really hard all the time and practice all the time, everything needs to be really strong,” she says.

In addition to performing and competing, most of the team teaches. They teach out of their studio on Bograshov Street and roughly fifteen other locations countrywide, and like the crew itself, their students are a diverse group. They range in age from four to forty-nine, and include doctors, lawyers, and mechanics.

Some want to become part of the crew, others just want the experience and exercise. “It’s the best exercise that you can get, period,” Eliyahu says. It’s gonna keep you healthy.”

The crew enjoys teaching and sees it as more than just a job. Morali-Mezarina describes how dancing benefited her when she was younger.

“I grew up and now I have many students, it makes me feel really good, and like dancing helped me, now I have students who need to be helped,” she says. “I think dancing is doing amazing things for people who need help.”

The team learns from teaching as well, gaining real-world experience in things like marketing, business management, advertising, and promotion. They also see deeper and more personal benefits to dancing.

Vadim Klasits, of Ukraine, teaches in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, but says that he “doesn’t dance for a job but for the soul. If I feel weak, I can dance.”

The feeling is “like a drug,” he says.

Eliyahu describes a similar experience from his own dancing. “You feel like you’re the center of the world, the energy level you get from being inside of a battle or onstage, it’s so overwhelming, the energy is so high and it’s just something you want all the time,” he says.

He stresses the effect it has on people’s self-confidence and self-awareness, saying that it can provide “that extra something to get you to say okay, you are somebody, you can do something.”

The team has also developed strong bonds with each other through the experience, which is evident just watching them in the studio. They almost constantly applaud and help teach each other while practicing.

The Breakerholics find other inspiration in competition. Hip-hop has always been a competitive culture, which is most obvious in rappers’ boastful lyrics, freestyle battles and frequent feuds. Battling is also an essential part of breakdancing.

The crew appreciates the value of competition, and sees all battles as both an individual and a team effort, even a one on one battle, in another demonstration of their solidarity and support for each other.

“I never take examples from anyone, you need to have your own style,” Morali-Mezarina says. “I represent myself, I represent my crew, and I represent my country.”

“We take every battle as a group effort, because if one person wins and he’s from Breakerholics, it’s a win for the crew,” Eliyahu says. The groups finds motivation from competition, adds Eliyahu. “That’s what keeps the thing alive, because it’s a very competitive industry, you want to stay on top, somebody’s always coming out with new moves, new flavors, new routines, and if you want to stay on top of your game, you got to stay in shape.”

The competition also brings dancers from different crews together. The Breakerholics pays respect to other Israeli crews like the Unstopabulls and Kosher Flava, and describes cross-cultural connections they have made.

“It brings people together on the international level, like they’re just coming together to spin on their heads, and none of them speak the same language and they’re having the best time in the world,” Eliyahu says.

Morali-Mezarina met her Venezuelan husband, also a breakdancer, at a competition in Brazil. She only spoke a few words of Spanish at the time, but says that “while breakdancing we don’t really need to talk much, we understand movements and things, so we started like this.” They can now converse in both Spanish and Hebrew.

The crew agrees that there is a world of potential in Israeli breakdancing.

“It’s definitely coming up, definitely becoming more popular,” Eliyahu says.

“We really hope it’s going to grow because all the students need to be our future, it’s important for us,” adds Morali Mezarina They envision themselves and other Israelis winning international competitions, and using dancing to help bring people together. In a country with so many problematic divisions, the possibility is encouraging, if unlikely.

The team does not seem deterred, however. “The start is always hard, but I think if you really want it and you’re going in the right direction, you can make it,” says Morali-Mezarina.

Source: Haaretz.com

The new and fresh gay bar of Tel-Aviv is located in the Gay Soho of the city. It has a unique design and offers a special atmosphere of cool and happy music, good looking Israeli guys and quality drinks for reasonable prices.

In case you visit TEL AVIV the addy is 43 Nachlat Binyamin Street

Source: Gaytlvguide.com

Time for WINTER2012 Promo items!

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

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Tuesday, January 3, 2012

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