Interview with EKLEIDO

As they rehearse their new The Dicky Buckle charity funded piece, we caught up with ekleido to share a little more about this year’s guest artists and the exciting two choreographic works they will perform.

ekleido is a choreographic duo made up of Hannah Ekholm and Faye Stoeser who choreograph for live performance and film. They have both individually had extensive dance careers within the contemporary dance world, commercial industry and underground club/street dance scenes.

Their work takes influences from both their vocabularies combining contemporary dance and underground club/battle styles including New Way Voguing, bone-breaking and threading. 

Photo credit: Jack Thomson

Their work has been performed at venues and festivals including Glastonbury Festival, Breakin’ Convention at Sadler’s Wells, Latitude Festival, Ballet Nights at Ministry of Sound, Secret Garden Party, The Place, Lilian Baylis, Dance Festival Croydon, Fairfield Halls, Stanley Arts, Dance.Film.Performance.

Photo credit: Jay Norman

Can you please tell us how you came to be working with Covent Garden Dance Company this summer?

Faye had been working with Rambert School students on a graduation piece and met Matt (Director of Covent Garden Dance) at a student showcase at the school and got chatting about Ekleido and the work we do as a dance company. We then invited board members of Covent Garden Dance to an open rehearsal of our piece SPLICE, and they took a liking to our work and invited us to perform at Hatch House.

What will you be dancing?

We will be performing SPLICE, a duet performed and choreographed by both of us and that has been touring to theatre and non theatre spaces such as music festivals for the last two years. This piece is our inaugural work as a choreographic duo. It came about after we both started pursuing choreography careers separately and serendipitously had been asked to create something individually for the same event; we decided spontaneously to create something together. The work received enthusiastic audience responses and further programming; and our collaboration flowed effortlessly through bringing together our unique backgrounds of contemporary dance with club dance influences which led us to create Ekleido.

The Dicky Buckle Fund also commissioned us to create a new work CLINQUANT which will also be a duet choreographed and performed by us both. CLINQUANT will delve into the tension between allure and authenticity, named after the word meaning glittering with deceptive beauty.

Photo credit: Deborah Jaffe

What has been your favourite moment whilst preparing for CGDC?

It always feels like a privilege to be given support to create new work, as it gives us the chance to develop as creatives. We are currently in a place in our choreographic practice where we feel like we’ve established a movement language that feels distinctive, so we are always eager to continue to push its boundaries further as well as delving into emotional arcs within our works. With the creative process of  CLINQUANT we have particularly enjoyed playing with musicality and playing into our feminine expression.

What inspired you to create this piece?

We are interested in exploring near perfect symmetry, and whilst remaining abstract in our narrative, we wanted to invite audiences to perceive their own meaning through the shapes we create with our bodies. We are fascinated by pushing the physical body to its limits leaving the dancers to have to rely on each other, as well as figuring out the efficiency as a pair. 

For SPLICE we were both really interested in how our backgrounds in contemporary dance and New Way Vogue could be incorporated into partner work, which is very much what the piece explores.

For CLINQUANT we were inspired by the power of femininity and the contrasts between order and chaos. Named after the word meaning glittering with deceptive beauty, it becomes a metaphor for the polished roles women are often expected to inhabit: captivating on the outside, but concealing strain, silence, and complexity beneath.

Photo credit: Henry Curtis

When you’re dancing this piece how does it make you feel?

SPLICE is a precise and technical duet which requires extreme focus so as not to miss a beat and to ensure the partnering is executed seamlessly. We have found that the times we have most enjoyed performing this work are when we use each other as support both physically and mentally, and allow the music to drive us. 

We haven’t performed CLINQUANT yet, however dancing it in the studio we definitely feel a sense of power and elegance, and we hope we can experience that feeling on stage too.

What do you hope the audience will feel/take away from your performance?

For SPLICE, we hope the audience will feel mesmerised, perhaps as though they've witnessed magic through the shapes and contortions we create; and inspired to get up and dance themselves due to the energetic movement and music.

For CLINQUANT, we hope audiences will feel a sense of femininity and empowerment from us, as well as being entranced by our movement.

Tell us about the piece of music you are using?

For SPLICE we’re dancing to an electronic track created by Floating Points - who’s known for creating innovative and cutting edge music. He recently created the ballet  ‘Mere Mortals’ for San Francisco Ballet. 

CLINQUANT has new music created by Ela Minus, Stella Mozgawa and Floating Points; a really exciting collaboration with three incredible artists.

How important are charities like the Dicky Buckle Fund for the future of dance?

Charities like Dicky Buckle Fund, gives new and upcoming artists opportunities to create and perform new work, which enables dance artists to continue to innovate, develop their practice and provide dance excellence to audiences. There is often limited funding for the dance sector, so charities like The Dicky Buckle Fund are crucial in keeping the dance sector alive.

Photo credit: Sophie Giddens

Where will you be taking this piece next?

SPLICE upcoming performances include Glastonbury Festival, Ballet Nights at Theatre Royal Glasgow, as well as touring in a double bill of our work ‘SPLICE | RORSCHACH’ to theatre and rural venues across the UK. CLINQUANT will also be performed in Ballet Nights at Ministry of Sound in the Autumn and we have exciting international interest for our work to be announced soon! 

You will be performing alongside some incredible artists from all around the world, who are you most looking forward to watching perform?

Having performed alongside Gareth Haw previously at Ballet Nights, it will be lovely to watch him again as he’s such a phenomenal dancer. We are of course excited to see everyone as it’s a stellar line up of artists. 

Photo credit: Genevieve Reeves

What do you like most about performing outside of the traditional theatre or studio?

There’s something more relaxed about it, and you can really feel that through the audience which is fun. We are both really used to dancing in unconventional spaces through Voguing and street dance, and it’s often where we see new people get introduced to dance which is lovely. 

Can you tell us three things people don’t know about you – fun facts perhaps?

Faye’s dad was in the band ‘The Foundations’ who famous hit was ‘Build Me Up Buttercup.’

Hannah was a competitive Ice Skater before going to dance school. 

As ekleido we work collaboratively, however in the Ballroom battle scene we’re competing in different teams (therefore we are also enemies!)