Projects: Hong Kong Tour
Strangers on Tong Chong Street



Follow our creative process for this work by reading our Blog at GreatDance.com.
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Short video clip of the work:



Scroll down for an assortment of additional footage.
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View a slide show of photos from this work:



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Press Coverage:


"TVB8 Hong Kong Interview with Tom Pearson & Zach Morris of Third Rail Projects"
(11.6 MB Quicktime File)
December, 2007



"Students Step Up to Dance With the Professionals"
by Liz Gooch, December 8, 2007 (560 KB PDF File)



"UMagazine Hong Kong, Interview with Tom Pearson, Zach Morris, and Mayuna Shimizu"
December, 2007 (Large File: 16.9 MB PDF File)
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About the Work:
Strangers on Tong Chong Street explores what it means for a group of outsiders to descend upon a site and gradually affix themselves to its geography. Charting a course from an ostentatious arrival, through a cautious navigation of unknown territory, and finally to a state of comfortable activity, the work is often biographical of the process and of the individuals while examining notions of strangeness. The architecture of Tong Chong Street is familiar to its daily inhabitants, but it is the performers in the relation to this which establish a dynamic tension, pose a dramatic question, scramble the status-quo.

Hailing from New York, Tom Pearson and Zach Morris have sought to find the historical and contemporary commonalities between their home and Hong Kong. In both cases, New York and Hong Kong have always been changing, dynamic, mercantile, and maritime – where denizens gathered in the interest of achieving success, sparking perpetual innovation due to each cities’ unique position as a threshold. We feel this is especially relevant to Taikoo Place–a newly reinvented site built upon an effervescent past.

Our work begins when a motley group arrives, clad in garments simultaneously evoking fashions of the late Industrial Age and contemporary urban couture–in shades of sugary blues, whites, and grays. As they move about the street, their relationships to the space and to one another develop and unfurl.

In frequently poignant and often humorous moments of group locomotion or ritualized urban routine, there is the familiar feeling of waiting with certainty, moving with clear but separate intentions, of short gestures, and succinct expressions. Music is played live on a portable melodica that is operated by an iron worker’s bellows, and the score (both live and recorded) evokes cabaret, industrial sound, music box, and pop. By the time the piece resolves and the individuals have settled into their surroundings, the performers seem less a part of the past and more of a hybrid between past and present while the strange becomes more familiar, for both the performers and the audience.


Strangers on Tong Chong Street was commissioned by the Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation for the Swire Island East Urban Dance Festival, 2007 and was co-presented by the Hong Kong Youth Arts Foundation and Swire Island East.



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About the Workshops:

Click HERE to visit HKYAF website for more or read on below:

11/27 & 11/30/2007
SWIRE ISLAND EAST "URBAN DANCE FESTIVAL" - DANCE MASTER CLASS REGISTRATION BEGINS
Venue : YAF Studio
Enquiry : 2877 2656

Time: 7:30 – 9pm

YAF is thrilled to bring Third Rail Projects from New York City to join the Swire Island East Urban Dance Festival this December. Apart from performing an original piece of site-specific dance work at the festival, their artistic directors will also be conducting site-specific dance workshops for choreographers and dance artists.

In this hour and a half workshop, multi-disciplinary artists Tom Pearson and Zach Morris lead participants through their process of creating site-specific movement works. A grab-bag of choreographic tactics will focus on working with the architecture of a site to pull images and meaning from its components. Issues of developing work for the public sphere will be included: techniques for researching a site and exploring its possibilities in movement; finding hidden meaning in a space and developing methods to amplify it; and experimenting with the most effective methods of capturing and holding an audience's attention in a public setting.

A valuable opportunity FOR DANCE ARTISTS to work with this creative duo, so don’t miss out the chance! To register, please email your full name, contact number, valid email address, dance company name (if any) & experience to kerryL@hkyaf.com. Workshops places are on a first come first served basis.

Free admission
Registration is required
Suitable for choreographers and dance artists
Workshop conducted by:
Tom Pearson & Zach Morris, Third Rail Projects, NYC
Workshop will be conducted in English
Registration: kerryL@hkyaf.com
Deadline for applicationÅF5/ 11/ 2007