11 minutes | Monday, 24 February 2025
Xan Phillips: Southampton's Voice FM. My name is Xan, and welcome to Arts and Culture. And from choreographing the opening ceremony of FIFA World Cup to recently working with Gucci, Unmian is described as having a curious, daredevil nature. And an instinct to push things to their limits. Uh, Ambi is back in the UK with a multimedia show, Dragons, which she both choreographed and performs in.
And this is for a major tour opening in Southampton on the 24th and 25th of February. She's now in her. 60s, but Unmian is considered one of the most important artists in South Korea. And here to tell us more about the show is Joe Bates, who is chief executive of Dance Consortium, a group of venues touring the show.
Joe, a very good afternoon to you. How are you? I'm very well. Thank you, Xan, and thank you very much for having me on. No, it's a pleasure. I'm very excited about this. having seen the video, but it is contemporary dance. And for some people, um, contemporary dance either is like really exciting or it's a little bit off putting.
So how could you win the Lister over to come and see, um, Dragons at the Mayflower Theatre?
Joe Bates: Thank you for that. Well, I think personally that everybody loves dance. It's just that some people might not know it yet. Um, so for me, this piece of work I saw a couple of years ago with some of the programmers from the venues that we're touring to, and we were blown away by the real technicality of the dancers.
So, um, even though it infuses quite a lot of South Asian culture and Korean culture. It does have some more contemporary themes around it as well and contemporary dance. Most of the dancers will have done ballet, so in terms of their technique it's incredibly strong. But this is also really interesting because it's also one of the best digital media and live theatre performances that I've seen.
So it integrates these avatar hologram dancers with the live dancers on stage, so it almost becomes a bit of a game.
Xan Phillips: Wonderful. Well, that's a lovely lead into what I'm thinking about because not only is South Korea very well known for K pop and within that the dance routines that the boy and girl bands do are fantastic, but also of course in TV, Squid Game, which is another epic thing.
Thank you. production that has really gripped the world. So is it fair to say it hangs between the two of those?
Joe Bates: Um, a little bit. I would say that it has very theatrical elements to it. I think that the audience will sort of see that interactivity as part of it. It's a bit more uplifting and joyous, I would say, rather than the sort of deep dark nature of something like squid games.
But as you say, that kind of Korean culture that's really infusing and influencing across the world at the moment was something that I really felt was important to. bring to the UK at this moment in time. As you say, K pop is massively popular now. I see that you have a K pop show every Wednesday on this radio, which is great.
So, um, and then Korean cinema has obviously had, had a big kind of, you know, influx, um, into the global market. It's over the last couple of years and winning Oscars and things. So Eunmi really is part of that movement and you know, she is an icon in South Korea. As you said, she's worked with Gucci recently and is working with fantastic people.
So I think if people want to come and see Korean culture on stage in all its glory, then this is the show to come and experience it.
Xan Phillips: And she's also proof that dance is very good for you, because she's now in her 60s. She'll be on stage. So not only are you seeing a fantastic show, but you're seeing like a living legend of dance right there in front of you.
Joe Bates: Yes, absolutely. And she's so insanely captivating. It's unreal. And what's brilliant is that she, as you said, is in her 60s, but her dancers are very much young in their 20s. And this piece, Dragons, she wanted to work with young people who had been born in the year 2000, which was the year of the dragon. So there's another link in terms of why this piece is all about dragons.
And so seeing that intergenerational, uh, uh, performance on stage is, is just beautiful to watch. She often works with other older and younger, different dancers and community dancers in other projects as well. So she, she really has that passion and love for. for dance and what it can do for people and how it can inspire people.
Xan Phillips: And so when you came away from this show, how did you feel?
Joe Bates: Oh, uplifted and it's, it's everything. I can't really describe it. It's not particularly, uh, have a narrative or a storyline, but I always think that's okay within dance because actually you get more of a physical feeling when you, when you see people dancing, particularly when you see these dancers who, as I said, are just technically Um, I always like to say for people that perhaps haven't seen dance or don't see a lot of dance, um, but maybe they go and watch sports or football, you know, when you're watching a football match and a goal is nearly scored and, and, and you're, you physically go, Oh, ah, when those things are happening.
And I feel like when you see dance live, that's the same sort of feeling that you can get in your body when you're seeing somebody do an amazing leap or a. backflip across the stage. It's that moment of, oh, so yes, you'll see all of that in this show.
Xan Phillips: I totally agree with you. I felt the same recently when watching ballet and also opera was that, although I didn't quite understand what was happening in front of me, it was there happening in front of me.
And that's quite different to every other kind of thing that I watch or listen to. Because unless, as you say, sport is a great example of things happening in front of you, but we spend so much time on our screens, whether they're in our hand. We're in our front room, we're in the cinema, but to actually go out and see real people doing amazing things is, is actually, um, something to be celebrated and something to be very grateful for.
Joe Bates: Absolutely. I actually got this job, um, in. May 2022. So two and a half years ago, I took over dance consortium and I went to watch a performance of a company that the consortium were touring at that time. And it's the first time I'd been back in a theater, probably for a couple of years with, with the pandemic and everything.
And I felt it so kind of emotional and overwhelming to be sitting there and, and seeing such amazing dancers on stage, lifting each other and touching each other. And just at that moment in time, really that. It really did take over my body in a way that I just, it's really hard to explain, I think, to people, but I just urge them to kind of come and experience it.
Xan Phillips: I'll tell you one thing that's um, possibly very hard to explain. I'm sure I remember them having like a tube on their head, and on the top of the tube there's a little video screen with someone's face. So it looks like a worm with a face dancing around, and I just love that. I thought it was um, very inventive, but also it pushes your mind in a little bit of a different direction.
Joe Bates: Absolutely. And I think those sorts of digital technologies that are in the show. And as you said, they're, they're led fans that have these, these images of the dancers pulling faces. And I, it's the kind of thing that I think, um, every kid that comes to see it is going to want one of those to play with after the show.
Um, and I should say that this absolutely is for, for all ages, people can enjoy this. So when I went to see it. first couple of years ago in France, there was a, uh, a family with young kids, must've been eight, nine years old, and they were just absolutely captivated by what was going on, on stage. And then afterwards, the dancers all come round to the front of the stage and take their bow.
And then Open up for questions to the audiences and these kids were just like, I want one of those and what's that? And how does that work? And it's just brilliant to see that intrigue and interest from young people
Xan Phillips: now You mentioned this is a almost a new job or two years in the job as I think it's quite a long time But can you explain to the listener what's dance consortium actually is and its connection to the Mayflower Theatre?
Joe Bates: Absolutely. So dance consortium is a group of 22 large scale venues all over the UK and Ireland. And I work with the directors and programmers of those theatres to bring in large scale international dance companies. And we tour them round to those different venues. So not every venue is on every tour.
Um, but we have opened this one with the Mayflower in Southampton, as you said, who have been a long standing member of. Dance Consortium probably for nearly 20 years and are already all and they're always incredibly supportive of bringing in international dance to put something a bit different in their program for people to see and locally.
Xan Phillips: Yes, it's um, no it's, it must be, is that, but there is a reluctance isn't there amongst people to see dance because there's, I personally think that worry I think you answered a little bit earlier on, you're expected to understand it, but actually with this, it doesn't really matter if you don't understand it.
Joe Bates: Yeah, I think sometimes it can, particularly when you mentioned the words contemporary dance, that people think of contemporary art practice or museums and galleries. And I think, you know, if people go and see something in an art gallery. Similarly, particularly with modern art, you don't necessarily know what it was about or what the feeling behind that piece of work was.
But you will have a feeling because of it. And you don't necessarily need to have the same feeling as the person sitting next to you. That's okay. But seeing different pieces of art and different cultures, I think, is just really important, um, particularly at this moment in time, you know, open opening the world up and seeing where people come from and how they approach particularly artistic practice and choreography, perhaps a bit differently to what people might have experienced in, you know, their local dance class or doing their tap or their jazz or their ballet classes.
Xan Phillips: That's amazing. Well, um, I think I am very excited about this. Um, it's coming to South Hampton on the 24th and 25th of February. It's called Dragons. It's by the legendary choreographer Unmi Ahn. She is South Korean, working with Gucci, but also was, uh, respected enough to do the opening series of the FIFA.
World Cup and Joe Bates, Chief Executive of Dance Consortium. Thank you very much for explaining that to us. And we definitely look forward to whatever you're going to put on next.
Joe Bates: That's brilliant. Thank you so much for having me. And I will be down in Southampton for both of the shows. So I hope to see as many people there as possible.