Choreographers combine to present Indigenous dance show

Taane Mete has been a leading dancer in New Zealand for more than two decades and is co-artistic director of Okareka, a prolific company that creates compositions that inspire and provoke audiences around the world.

Alberta choreographer-on-the-rise Troy Emery Twigg and internationally renowned Indigenous choreographer Taane Mete recently presented Spirit,  a new dance works exploring themes of beauty, tragedy, truth, and courage. Created and refined as part of the Indigenous Dance Residency program at The Banff Centre and presented in late August, Spirit brings together choreographers and dancers from across North and Central America, Asia, and the South Pacific. Twigg is from the Kainai Tribe. He also showcased his new work They Shoot Buffalo Don’t They? Using mask, dance and storytelling, the performance embodies the evolution of the wild buffalo in North America. Audiences witnessed the duality of fate between the buffalo slaughter and the cultural genocide experienced by all the Indigenous cultures across North, Central and South America. Taane Mete, an Indigenous Maori, is considered one of New Zealand’s most versatile dance practitioners.