2002

A highlight of the 2002 Auckland Dance Festival was Dancing City to City. In the days prior to the ‘Super City’, Auckland was divided into four distinct cities: Auckland City, Manukau City, North Shore City and Waitakere City. On Sunday April 21st, from 10:30am until 2:30pm, dancers traversed across the four cities in a relay-type event. Performers/perambulators included Banda Latina, Victoria Phillips Academy of Jazz, City of Auckland Morris Dancers, NZ Silver Ferns Marching Squad, Yun-Tzu Cheng-Chueh of the North Shore, and Sahara Spice Troupe, amongst others. At 1:30pm, the MP for Auckland, the Hon. Judith Tizard, officially opened the festival in the Aotea Square.

Many of the artists from the 2001 festival offered productions again in 2002; Poyema Dance Company, Atamira Dance Collective, and Lifeform, in addition to other repeat events such as Shake a Leg, Chance to Dance and Critical Mass. An exhibition of photographs from Ruth Ames taken from the previous two festivals called Dance AfterImages was on at the Auckland Methodist Mission Gallery.

The festival director Sonja Bright commented that the 2002 festival was focused on productions from ‘emerging artists’. Two such groups were a company comprised of dance artists Vicky Kapo, Brent Harris, Anna Bate and Tania Bond, named Theatre of the Heart, who presented their evening of short works, Polished Up! at K’Road’s Alleluya Cafe and Scratch and Sniff Short Dances in a studio in Titirangi, directed by Willhemeena Gordon.

Behind the scenes, the Auckland Dance Festival Trust (ADFT) board expanded in 2002 with Shona McCullagh appointed as Chair. Other board members at this time included Claudine Bjorklund, Stacey Daniels, Ann Dewey, Marama Tracey Lloyd, Susan Jordan, John McCrae, and Briar Wilson.