![]() The eclecticism of the production reflects Diabo’s background. And then I show the consequences,” says Diabo.ĭiabo’s family connection to the Quebec Bridge collapse girdles her most ambitious artistic endeavors. I really wanted that to be very visual and for the audience to feel that after they’ve met the people. They’re fearless and I really wanted to capture that,” she says, adding that her father was also an ironworker. “It’s a super dynamic, athletic dance because the ironworkers are like superheroes. The staging then shows the ironworkers on the bridge. Some of our dances are included in this section,” says Diabo. Sky Dancers first shows community life before the bridge disaster, because “I really want people to understand who we are. Diabo herself dances the role of storyteller and “ghost of the story”. There are four male and four female dancers. Now Sky Dancers is a multidisciplinary presentation lasting more than an hour, with different sets, projections and live music. “That was really key to the show’s growth,” says Diabo. advertising 5ĭiabo has expanded her work over several years thanks to grants such as the $120,000 she received from NAC’s National Creation Fund, which has provided approximately $3 million annually to support new theater, dance and music projects since 2018. “It started out small, like a seed,” says Diabo. When the first iteration of Sky Dancers was presented shortly thereafter, it was only 15 minutes and three scenes long and only a few dancers were involved. Some things are more than coincidence,” says Diabo. “We both thought about it at the same time. In 2015, Diabo and her brother Michael, a guitarist who composes music for their productions, began discussing how they could create a production inspired by the accident but told from the perspective of the Mohawk community. Photo by Emily Smith / National Arts Center Handout “It opens up a little bit more inside me every time I visit,” she says.īarbara Kaneratonni Diabo, choreographer and creator of the Indigenous dance production Sky Dancers, playing at NAC January 19-21, 2023. The memorial at Kahnawake, a small replica of the bridge with plaques naming the names of the dead and survivors of the community, continues to make an impact on Diabo. The latter project led Diabo to learn more about the accident and its aftermath from other descendants of the dead. But with the 100th anniversary of the event in 2007, memorials honoring the fallen ironworkers came in Lévis and in Kahnawake. The 53-year-old Montrealer choreographed and directed Sky Dancers, A’nó:wara Dance Theatre’s award-winning production, which begins its three-day run on Thursday at the National Arts Centre’s Babs Asper Theatre.Īs a child, Diabo knew little about the Quebec Bridge disaster. There was nothing but water.ĭiabo’s family connection to the Quebec Bridge collapse girdles her most ambitious artistic endeavors. As she walked across, Diabo kept glancing down into the river, hoping to see some of the bent steel. The body of D’Ailleboust, who was in his 30s and had three children when the bridge collapsed, is still in the river, she says. “I could imagine the catastrophe that would ensue when all that steel fell down,” says Diabo. This ad has not yet loaded, but your article continues below. Among the 33 Mohawk ironworkers was Diabo’s great-grandfather, Louis D’Ailleboust. Of those 76, 33 were Mohawk ironworkers from Kahnawake, the First Nations reservation south of Montreal, where Diabo is from. Of 86 workers on the bridge that day, 76 were killed. In 1907, four years after the bridge was built, its south arm and middle section collapsed into the river. In 2018, due to a tragedy that dates back to the bridge’s early days, Diabo was drawn to cross it on foot. ![]() Opened southwest of Quebec City in 1919, the bridge spans nearly a kilometer between Sainte-Foy and Lévis, more than 100 meters above the Saint Lawrence River. Please try again content of the articleĭespite being afraid of heights, Barbara Kaneratonni Diabo once forced herself to take the 30-minute walk across the Quebec Bridge. The next issue of Ottawa Citizen Headline News will be in your inbox shortly. If you don’t see it, please check your junk folder. Postmedia Network Inc | 365 Bloor Street East, Toronto, Ontario, M4W 3L4 | 41 Thanks for registering!Ī welcome email is on the way. You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of our emails or any newsletter. ![]() Sign up to receive daily headlines from Ottawa Citizen, a division of Postmedia Network Inc.īy clicking the subscribe button, you agree to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. ![]()
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