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Company Information & FAQs
Why and when was VDT started?
How often does VDT produce new work?
How is VDT funded?
How is the company structured?
Does VDT have its own studio?
How many shows does VDT perform in a year?
Where has VDT work been seen abroad?
How does the company find performers to work with?
Are VDT collaborators employed full time?
Do VDT collaborators work with other companies?
How do you train the dancers / warm up?
How can I arrange a work placement or work experience with VDT?
How can I involve VDT in my research at A level, BTec and Degree level?
Can I sit in on rehearsals with the company?
Can I interview someone from the company?
How can I involve VDT in my research at PhD Level?
How could I work with VDT as a composer, musician, designer, technician or production manager?
What should I do if I would like to stage one of VDT’s productions?
Is the music from VDT productions available to buy on CD?
Does VDT hold workshops?
Could you explain the company's devising process?
Why and when was VDT started?
VDT was formed in 1994 by Artistic Director Charlotte Vincent, after working as a performer in several small physical theatre companies and directing community theatre work in Newcastle Upon Tyne. After taking part in two group projects as part of a dance co-operative based in Sheffield, Charlotte decided to form her own company, making initial duets with Harry Theaker. Vincent Dance Theatre’s work has grown from there.
How often does VDT produce new work?
VDT produces one middle scale work every two years and tours it extensively in the UK and abroad. In between years, we tour our repertoire and create smaller works both live (solos, duets, trios) and using digital media (on video, film, installations). We also curate a range of research projects that document and explore contemporary dance theatre practice with our UK and international peers. Full details of the company’s current and archive work can be found under Projects.
How is VDT funded?
VDT is currently funded through a Regular Funding Agreement with Arts Council England, Yorkshire, which covers our core staffing, company management costs and some development activity such as research projects. All of our production, making, most touring and research work is funded by Grants for the Arts through Arts Council England, via commissions and earned income which includes touring fees and participation work.
How is the company structured?
We currently have three full-time posts: Artistic Director, General Manager and Administration & Marketing Officer. We work regularly with a team of freelance specialists, including a Marketing Manager, International Producer, Press Agent and Website Developer. See The Company for further details.
Does VDT have its own studio?
Despite being based in Sheffield for 15 years and involvement in potentially interesting buildings and shared production house schemes, VDT has not yet been able to locate, develop or secure a studio home in South Yorkshire. We currently hire and adapt a former film studio in the basement of the building where our office is located: The Workstation, 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield, or hire/borrow spaces in venues and dance agencies who support the work.
How many shows does VDT perform in a year?
New productions are performed around 25 times on tour across the UK, with additional performances of repertoire work scheduled outside our main touring periods in the UK and abroad.
Where has VDT work been seen abroad?
Live work has toured to the USA, Spain, Australia, Germany, Lithuania, Ireland, Austria, Poland, Italy and Switzerland. Video and film work has been screened in the USA, Canada, Japan, Lithuania, Norway, The Netherlands, Spain, Italy and Slovenia.
How does the company find performers to work with?
Artistic Director Charlotte Vincent usually works with a core group of associated artists to whom the company is committed. She builds key relationships with these performers over time. They provide a significant share of the identity of the company and share a common making language with the Artistic Director. Performers with long associations with VDT are Harry Theaker, TC Howard, Aurora Lubos, Janusz Orlik and Patrycja Kujawska. Charlotte unearths new collaborations through choreographing or teaching practitioners in commission, research or professional development contexts. Occasionally she invites collaborators to work with the company on instinct after seeing them perform and talking about work together in a casual context. Charlotte is also always interested to read CVs and biogs from performers over the age of 30 or with over 10 years of performance experience, particularly from those dancers who can also perform, act and play musical instruments. We keep enquiries on file, so if you meet the above criteria, please email admin@vincentdt.com with your details. To save paper and postage, please do not send hard copies of CV’s or photos in the post. VDT does not audition regularly but details of any forthcoming auditions will be posted on the Opportunities page of our website.
Are VDT collaborators employed full time?
Unfortunately Vincent Dance Theatre is not able to employ a full time ensemble. When VDT makes a middle scale work, performers are employed on short term contracts, on a weekly wage, for around 7 months of the year, making and touring the new work. In a repertoire/research year, performers are employed for shorter periods, depending on the project.
Do VDT collaborators work with other companies?
Yes and Charlotte actively encourage this practice as it keeps everyone fresh and encourages artists involved with the company to explore making new work in a wider context. Artists who collaborate with VDT also work with companies such as Kneehigh Theatre, Nigel Charnock, The Cholmondeleys, DV8, Forced Entertainment, Bare Bones Dance Company, Gravity and Levity Aerial Dance, Dada Von Bzdulow, CandoCo Dance Company and Lone Twin Theatre. Some collaborators also work as choreographers, directors and musicians in their own right, making their own work.
How do you train the dancers / warm up?
When making work as an ensemble, Charlotte usually starts the day leading a yoga, floor release based or partnering warm up. This often feeds directly into an improvisation where dancers and musicians move freely together. Then through directed improvisation the group begins to generate material that, directed by Charlotte, offers starting points for the day’s work during the early stages of rehearsal. Responsibility for leading warm ups is shared amongst the creative team. Some days the group are given private time to warm themselves up, to give their bodies what they know they individually need. At least once a week when the process is in full swing, Charlotte and others lead massage/hands on sessions to eased fatigue and release built up emotional and muscle tension.
How can I arrange a work placement or work experience with VDT?
We receive many requests to accommodate work placements both in the office and in the studio, and accept two or three placements a year, depending on timing and the company schedule, but these are based in the office rather than with the company in the studio. Please email admin@vincentdt.com if you are interested in a placement.
How can I involve VDT in my research at A level, BTec and Degree level?
We have created this comprehensive website to support students with their research, especially around specific productions. For recent projects you will find Director’s Notes, Blogs mapping the artistic process, dancers’ diaries, research photos, videos that reflect on our making processes and links to published resources. DVDs and detailed contextualising packs of our live work, written by Charlotte Vincent are also produced for productions the company creates. These describe the process and production in detail and are available to buy from our Shop.
Can I sit in on rehearsals with the company?
To maintain the intensity and integrity of our work, VDT’s devising and rehearsal periods involve a closed process, accessed only by those taking part in the making of the work.
Can I interview someone from the company?
Due to the many requests we receive, we are unable to communicate directly via interviews with individuals regarding specific questions about our style, approach and working methods. We hope that most questions are answered within this website.
How can I involve VDT in my research at PhD Level?
Charlotte welcomes PhD students writing about VDT’s work and will sometimes accommodate interviews and significant access to our making process if an appropriate proposition is made by a practitioner/student to the company, with a good lead in time. We aim to then publish/host completed PhD documents about our work on this website.
How could I work with VDT as a composer, musician, designer, technician or production manager?
Artistic Director Charlotte Vincent usually works with a core group of associated composers, technicians and designers to whom the company is committed. However we are always interested in hearing from experienced back stage crew: production managers, lighting and sound technicians. Please email admin@vincentdt.com. For specific vacancies please see our Opportunities page.
What should I do if I would like to stage one of VDT’s productions?
VDT’s work is copyrighted and we do not permit any reproductions of the work without negotiated consent. This includes student, amateur and professional productions.
Is the music from VDT productions available to buy on CD?
Soundtracks on CD are not currently available, although filmed productions are available on DVD from our Shop.
Does VDT hold workshops?
VDT teaches a comprehensive programme of professional development and participation work at theatre/venues, colleges, universities and dance agencies as part of our touring activity. These workshops and residencies are taught by members of the company and the Artistic Director and are often based on ideas concepts and themes from the current touring production. For more information and to view our workshop calendar, go to our Participation Information page.
Could you explain the company's devising process?
VDT devises dance theatre. This means we make work from scratch. Our work involves sets and/or a feeling of place, original live music, original texts, original song, dark humour and (increasingly) a live acknowledgment of the audience watching the show as we perform it.
Initial stages of development involve Charlotte Vincent conceptualising the work and the core ideas, themes and aspirations that she thinks will drive the work. This is usually done in isolation, through writing, reading, sketching out ideas. Charlotte then starts to discuss the idea with a potential creative team, and with her management team (informing the Board of Directors of her intentions along the way). She then writes about the work so the company can approach funding bodies, venue co-producers and commissioning partners to support the making of it. VDT roughly schedules the making and touring aspects more than a year in advance of getting into the studio, and once funding is in place approaches collaborators (performers composers, writers, set and lighting designers, dramaturgs) to confirm their interest and involvement in the production.
When the making process begins, Charlotte gathers collaborators in the studio for around 10 weeks to make a middle scale work or 3-5 weeks to create a small scale production. Sometimes the company will stagger the rehearsal process, with smaller groups working for 3 week periods over 16 weeks for example, coming together as an ensemble only for the last 4 weeks of the making process. Led and directed by Charlotte, the performers, musicians, writers and actors develop a language together, through improvisation in the first instance, that slips between the forms, integrating text and movement, music and dance, gesture, song, speaking, joking and sometimes swinging from things in the air.
Found objects and found costumes are brought in by Charlotte (and sometimes the performers) to create a sense of place and to fix a kind of style and aesthetic for each new work. Increasingly we build a ‘set’ as we go, establishing an environment to play in that everyone can relate to. For each production we always ask: Who are we, where are we and what are we doing here? VDT performers devise personals that work as extensions of themselves, not as fictional characters. Using their imaginations, bodies, voices and their developed sense of ‘play’ they aim to create work that will draw you in, move you, engage you, entertain you, make you feel something and make you want to know more about who we are, where we are and why we are here, taking up your time. A Dramaturg helps Charlotte during the process to be as clear as she can be about the content, form and structure of the work and how it is functioning.
Once the structure and content of the work is set and rehearsed, we go on tour to test it out, gathering feedback along the way. Charlotte spends the first leg of any tour tweaking and re-rehearsing the work, to ensure it is the best it can be, and that it is somehow ‘saying’ what it is she wanted to say when she initially conceived the work.
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