By Kirsten Bolton
FOR ARTSPRING
Visiting Salt Spring for the first time on Sunday, March 2 at 2:30 p.m. is the entire company of Ballet Edmonton as part of its exclusive three-venue Momentum Tour, which also includes Cowichan Performing Arts Centre and The Banff Centre.
The tour marks the debut presentation of Vancouver dancer and choreographer Kirsten Wicklund as the new artistic director for Ballet Edmonton, a role she assumed in the fall of 2024 from Wen Wei Wang — another Vancouver dance talent who transformed the company as artistic director over the past six years.
Having danced and vigorously trained in Canada, the U.S. and Europe, most recently with Opera Ballet Vlaanderen in Antwerp, Belgium, Wicklund is known for her strong technique and personality.
A bit of a free spirit, she recalls being a defiant child insisting tutus were not for her and wanting to go her own way. She refused to return to ballet until she was 12. By then, other students had surpassed her in traditional ballet poise, so she had to freestyle her technique into something new.
These were the attributes Wang identified seeing in her beautiful, striking and completely original movements that convinced him she had the vision to take contemporary ballet forward as artistic director.
On Sunday afternoon, audiences can look forward to that signature spirit with a trio of contemporary creations including Wicklund’s own 12-minute duet Meteorite, her first work designed for Ballet Edmonton. Veteran performer, choreographer and teacher Anne Plamondon’s 23-minute Feel No More and new choreographic voice Emilie Leriche’s 30-minute Terrific, and Everywhere, featuring the company of 10 dancers, rounds out the experience.
“Each evocative work has been meticulously crafted, embodying a powerful exchange between creator and performer,” Wicklund explained. “Every piece is like a direct conversation with the choreographer behind it.”
Of Leriche, who is taking the international dance landscape by storm, Wicklund said “she has a unique way of building physical systems across multiple bodies which translates and speaks to the audience like moving poetry.”
Wicklund’s inclusion of Plamondon’s choreography in Ballet Edmonton’s repertoire was not just a nod to her stature within the Canadian dance scene (she was awarded the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award) but a testament to the essentiality of her voice.
Finally, Wicklund revisits her classical roots to reinvent the vibrant and technical risk-taking of duet work right down to the intentional use of the pointe shoe. Meteorite is set to a score of electronic music and solo violin by Béla Bartók.
After months of rehearsals, bringing these works to life is Ballet Edmonton’s company of acclaimed dancers hailing from B.C. and across Canada to as far afield as Brazil, Paris, Mexico City and Australia. They will be hosting a post-performance talkback led by ArtSpring’s community dance connector Robbyn Scott.
Now in its 13th season, Ballet Edmonton is a contemporary ballet ensemble which creates and commissions original work each season from a variety of national and international choreographic voices. Its vision is driven by a passion and curiosity to explore new ideas and contribute to the evolution of contemporary ballet in Canada.
Tickets for Sunday’s performance are available through ArtSpring, at the box office and online.