Immersive dance show comes to Chippendale

Machi Adventure: Step Into My Home, an immersive theatre and dance show, will take participants on an adventure across Chippendale this weekend. This “machi” adventure, which translates to “city adventure”, will see four Japanese artists take over a mystery location and breathe life into everyday spaces with the power of performance, ranging from experimental dance to solo theatre.

Step Into My Home is a Sydney-exclusive site-specific show. It’s presented by The Japan Foundation, Sydney and co-produced with Japan’s Steep Slope Studio. The experience staggers over two hours and has a limited two-day run on March 16 and 17.

Machi Adventure: Step Into My Home was inspired by current trends in Japan’s small theatre movement, where site-specific works and participative shows have been flourishing in recent years. The solo performances will encourage audiences to experience and engage with performing arts outside the bounds of conventional theatre settings.

Fresh from Festival/Tokyo last December, actor and theatremaker Takeshi Fukuda will host participants in groups and guide them to an undisclosed location, where the other artists will perform. In a theatre piece called Layer/Angle/Composition thespian Satoko Yoshida will act as a conduit, expressing the words of contemporary playwright Takahiro Fujita with the movements of dance choreographer Yukina Sakai.

Returning to Sydney are experimental dancer-choreographer Teita Iwabuchi and cross-genre choreographer Wataru Kitao. Iwabuchi, whose works meditate on the interaction between space, music and the human body, will improvise a solo. The classically trained Kitao, who stunned audiences with his powerful performance in The Unknown Dancer in the Neighbourhood at Art Month Sydney 2017, will perform an energetic solo piece blending various genres from hip-hop to jazz.

The Japan Foundation, Sydney continues to showcase contemporary Japanese art through an expanding public program that featured more theatre and performing arts in 2017. This year, they continue this trajectory with Step Into My Home, their third collaboration in Australia with Yumina Kato, director of Steep Slope Studio. Kato was inspired by Sydney Inner City’s scattered heritage buildings and terrace houses, and the history–both known and unknown–that can be sensed from them.

Kato said, “For Step Into My Home we want to deliver an immersive experience where the audience arrives at the place and sense that they too can leave a trace.”

To join the free experience, participants will need to sign up online to receive instructions and the check-in location. For more information, visit jpf.org.au/events/machi-adventure.

Photo: Teita Iwabuchi. Photo by Yoshitaka Shimada.