Among the line-up of guests at the Australian Teachers of Dance's "Come Together Dance Teachers" convention last weekend was Australian dancer Marc Brew.
This inspiring artist gave classes and workshops as well as the Keynote Address, which closed the event.
Brew is the ultimate example of the passion and determination that drives someone to dance. Rendered a paraplegic in a car accident in 1997, Brew has nevertheless gone on to forge a career as an artistic director, choreographer and performer.
Brew trained at the Victorian College of the Arts Secondary School and the Australian Ballet School before moving to South Africa to dance with PACT Ballet. It was there, at age 20, that his career seemed to end when he was in a car that crashed with a drunk driver going the wrong way down an off-ramp. The accident killed his three friends and broke Brew's spine, leaving him paralyzed from the neck down.
But with his dancer's determination and trained body, he eventually regained movement in his arms and, with it, the conviction that he could continue his career. "Once a dancer, always a dancer," he says. He is now based in the UK, the artistic director of his own Marc Brew Company, with an impressive biog that includes Infinity Dance Company in NY, CandoCo in London, Scottish Dance Theatre and Restless Dance Theatre in Adelaide. He was a guest performer, collaborator and media spokesman for the London Hand Over Ceremony for the Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Games Closing Ceremony.
This year Brew is keeping very busy with his new creation, Fusional Fragments, part of Unlimited, a series of commissions across the UK to celebrate the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad. __
This was the second such ATOD convention, and was held at the vast Ministry of Dance in North Melbourne. About 300 teachers and students were treated to presentations on topics such as Dance Education, Business, Psychology, Early Childhood, Alignment, Pointe Work, Musical Theatre as well as master classes in a variety of dance genres.
To see Marc in action, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DTgsqXEt8yU
To read more of Marc Brew's inspiring story, see the June/July issue of 'Dance Australia'.