Scottish Dance Theatre’s new artistic director to succeed Fleur Darkin is to be the popular choreographer Joan Clevillé. He will be the seventh artistic director of the popular Dundee-based company.
Barcelona-born Clevillé has a long history with Scottish Dance Theatre. After joining as a dancer in 2009, he made his first piece for them, Dreamt for Light Years, in 2011. He made Dundee his permanent home following his departure from the company in 2013, and in 2015 founded Joan Clevillé Dance, where his Plan B for Utopia and The North both met with significant success. Clevillé is presently developing a new solo piece, Antigone, Interrupted with long-standing collaborator Solène Weinachter, which will premiere in Spring 2020.
Photo Brian Hartley
Apart from his time in Dundee, Clevillé has also worked extensively across Europe including for Lost Dog, the Ballet of the Graz Opera, the Choreographic Centre of Valencia, and Ballet Carmen Roche in Madrid (Madrid). He is a member of Collective Endeavours, a Glasgow-based music and dance improvisation collective, and works regularly as a guest teacher for international companies and vocational schools in Sweden, The Netherlands, Austria and the UK.
Clevillé’s choreography has been presented in venues and festivals across the UK and Europe, and as far as Argentina and Japan. Since summer 2014, he has been associate artist of Scottish School of Contemporary Dance, and was one of Glasgow Tramway’s 2017 associate artists.
Speaking at the announcement of his appointment, Clevillé said, “It is an immense joy and an honour to have been appointed artistic director of Scottish Dance Theatre, the company that brought me to Scotland from Barcelona ten years ago. Back then, SDT offered me the opportunity to find my own voice as a dancer and choreographer, and Dundee became both a new home and a springboard from where to launch my own independent company.
“As a Catalan choreographer, I have always felt incredibly welcomed and supported in Scotland, and I am now thrilled by the prospect of leading its national dance company. I look forward to developing an ambitious and inclusive artistic vision driven by artistic exploration, learning and a desire to engage with our contemporary reality. Working from our home at Dundee Rep, we will continue to create world-class dance that is engaging and engaged, sharing Scotland’s distinctive creative voice with audiences around the world.”
Scottish Dance Theatre is currently touring Scotland and the rest of the UK with Velvet Petal by Fleur Darkin with upcoming dates in Newcastle, Edinburgh, Derby and London before returning to Dundee. The summer sees a tour of a new work, The Circle by Emanuel Gat, alongside Colette Sadler’s RITUALIA, plus dates at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August.