North Bay connoisseurs of culture, art, music and dance – and those who just enjoy the spice of life – are in for a treat when the ‘Resilience’ tour takes the stage at the Davedi Club Saturday, July 30. Tickets are $20 and the show starts at 7 p.m.
Other stops include the Midland Art Gallery July 29, Temiskaming Art Gallery in Haileybury Aug. 3 and the Kirkland Lake Art and Culture Fair Aug. 6.
Joining forces for this unique performance are eight internationally-acclaimed and diverse artists combining all art forms to create an “optimistic message from the pandemic to the future.”
“Our group of performance artists – singers, dancers, and musicians – has worldwide recognition and experience,” says organizer Cesar Forero, describing how they include Ontario residents living in the north and south, as well as international artists who are multilingual, multi-ethnic, francophone, and members of the LGBTQ2S+ group with an age range from 21 to 60.
The emcee for the North Bay performance is Justine Gogoua, a culture and music teacher with African roots, who is also francophone and based out of North Bay. She is the artistic director for the 2022 World Culture Fusion Fest taking place at multiple venues in North Bay Sept. 16-18, with the Resilience show providing the opportunity to announce the Fusion Fest details and celebrate the second year of the festival.
Forero said the Resilience show is inspired by the World Culture Fusion Fest goal of combining multiple disciplines and artists bringing a variety of backgrounds to create together.
“It is a spoken word, poetry, acting, flamenco, hip-hop, acro-contemporary dance with the soprano Samanta Izquierdo and the baritone Mateus Fantelli F2, F4 performers,” Forero says. “The music grows its inspiration on the string finger style- Latin guitar and Spanish styles.
More about the performers:
- Carmen Romero is an award-winning established flamenco dancer positioned at the national and international scene. He coached Latin Pop star “Shakira” in her 2010 world tour.
- Daniel Gomez was nominated for Outstanding Ensemble Performance at the 2018 Dora Awards, works with Gadfly Urban Dance Company, Citadel and the crew Twisted Ankles and is at several commercial projects.
- Gabriel Cifuentes, a renowned finger style musician and founding member of the Jazz Faculty at Incca University in Colombia, has been touring and directing for world-famous Latin artist and performs with Don Ross in Canada.
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Alex Boudreault: He is a wildlife photographer, dancer and acrobat. Alex’s duets with Cesar Forero incorporate dance, poetry and music, as well as technical elements of figure skating, dance, acrobatics and counter-balanced yoga positions with the intention of appearing during the performance as living sculptures. Fantasy, body painting, costumes and accessories recreate the visual dialogue and narrative of each project. Alex has a bachelor’s from Humber College and is currently living and working in Kirkland Lake, Ontario. He is a Francophone fluent in English and French and has an active record of exhibitions at the national and international level.
- Sandra Eichler, Born in Stuttgart, Germany, her parents were both opera stars. The tot was performing by the time she was three—her inaugural role was playing the son of Madame Butterfly in an operatic production of the seminal Puccini opera. Sandra was in a number of telenovelas, including Pecados Ajenos (Telemundo/NBC), Una Maid en Manhattan (Telemundo/NBC) and Marido en Alquiler (Telemundo/NBC). In 2010, she married artist Gabriel Cifuentes and the two artists decided to combine their myriad artistic talents and form their own company Saga11 Productions.
- July Arboleda, first Violinist of the Orquesta Filarmónica Juvenil de Tlalpan Mx, works as music composer and played for musicals and Charlie Zaa’s album Primera Fila.
- Samanta Izquierdo, currently a North Bay performer, received awards from the government of Ecuador and world music competitions like Unsigned Only, in Nashville, Tennessee.
- Cesar Forero, Kirkland Lake based architect, artist/performer and curator, has shown worldwide, received multiples awards and sits at several art-boards in Ontario. His works stand in public and private collections and currently performs with acrobat and photographer Alex Boudreault.
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Mateus Fantelli Stelini, Mateus born on 10/06/1983, in the city of Campinas, state of São Paulo in Brazil. He studied Social Sciences at the University of São Paulo from 2004-2010. From a young age with music, playing in bands, singing in choirs, he studied guitar and singing. He currently composes his own music and works with music and visual arts, doing performances, photographing, writing poetry and using other media, also in collaboration with other artists. He also studies the art of Luthierie.
See a video interview with Cesar Forero and Gabriel Cifuentes at the World Culture Fusion Fest YouTube channel:
To arrange interviews or a media pass, please contact Dermot Wilson, executive director of the Nipissing Region Curatorial Collective at 705.358.1764 or email: nrcc2014@gmail.com
Tickets can be purchased through HERE online, by contacting Dermot Wilson above or at the Davedi Club.
Writer, photographer and proud father. My mom’s family is from the Soo with its Algoma Highlands, dad hailed from Cobden in the Ottawa Valley and I spent my teen years in Capreol. Summers were at the beach on the Vermillion River and winters at ‘The Rink.’ Born in East York but Toronto never was my thing. Ever since a kid looking out the window on long trips, I imagined living on the highway in a little house with a big yard and trees growing all around me.
