The curtain fell on the 22nd Guangdong Dance Festival on the evening of September 23, at the Guangdong Arts Theatre, as the Hong Kong City Contemporary Dance Company's As If Snowing brought the five-day celebration to a close.
This year's festival featured 72 works, offering audiences an immersive journey into the dynamism of Chinese contemporary dance. More than 2,400 spectators attended performances in person, with an average occupancy rate above 85%. Meanwhile, over 200,000 online viewers tuned in via streaming platforms, bringing total media exposure to over five million impressions.
Highlights included:
The Dance Stagecraft Gatherings: The Guangdong Modern Dance Company opened the festival with Folding Time, a retrospective weaving together eight landmark works spanning three decades. The piece was both a tribute to China's modern dance heritage and a declaration of openness to the future.
The Up to Date Creative Project: From over 350 submissions worldwide, 64 outstanding works were selected, highlighting the creativity and vitality of young choreographers. Performances ranged from intimate explorations of emotion to bold commentaries on social issues, showcasing the boundless energy of contemporary dance among younger generations.
The Youth Dance Showcase: Young artists from Los Angeles, Paris, Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, and beyond presented works that blended local cultural elements with cross-media experimentation. Their creations reflected the diversity and future potential of modern dance worldwide.
Masterclasses: This year's festival invited a roster of prominent domestic and international dance artists as mentors, including renowned choreographer Nir de Volff and Qiao Yang, a founding member of the Guangdong Modern Dance Company and currently a resident artist at the City Contemporary Dance Company. They led workshops that explored improvisation and interdisciplinary collaboration, providing aspiring dancers with a platform for growth.
The festival's finale, As If Snowing, epitomized the Greater Bay Area's ethos of cultural fusion. Combining cutting-edge stage technology with Asian aesthetics, the work juxtaposed natural imagery and human reflection, posing profound questions about beauty and fragility in life.
As the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area prepares to welcome the 15th National Games, the Guangdong Dance Festival highlighted another aspect of the region's vitality—its flourishing cultural scene. It demonstrated how dance—as a universal language—bridges borders, inspires dialogue, and positions the GBA as a rising cultural crossroads on the global stage.
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