San Francisco International is proud to welcome Mele Broomes to make her North American debut with the U.S. premiere of VOID. The piece is a reimagining of JG Ballard’s cult novel Concrete Island—seen from the perspective of a black female protagonist. VOID is a statement that is a questioning of critical consciousness and a radical intervention in the discourse of race and representation. In this re-telling, Concrete Island’s protagonist Maitland – a white male architect, intent on breaking out of the real world – is depicted as Angela – a black female architect, desperately trying and failing to break in. VOID is staged as a meshing of experimental dance and abstract glitch video landscapes drawing parallels from Stefano Harney and Fred Moten’s The Undercommons, a study of fugitivity and blackness,

Mele Broomes is an award-winning choreographer and performer. Her work embodies stories from the collective voice, creating visceral and sensory collaborations through her ancestral inheritance: activating social questions, remembering and celebrating. Mele is the founder of Various Dance Artists (V/DA), a multi-disciplinary collective where her roles cross between directing, performing, choreographing and assistant producing. Mele is also part of the Take Me Somewhere Artist Constellation team. She has choreographed and performed nationally and internationally.

Various Dance Artists (V/DA) (Creators / Producers)
V/DA was founded by Mele Broomes. V/DA is a woman of colour led multi-disciplinary collective including Claricia Parinussa and Sabrina Henry. Their current works include Sonic Séance (Take Me Somewhere Festival 2019), Sonic Séance: The Gathering an exhibition and program of events and workshops (CCA 2019) and Grin (Dance International Glasgow 2019).

Dav Bernard and Bex Anson (MHz) (Design/Performance Directors)
MHz are Bex Anson and Dav Bernard, immersive visual theatre makers working across circus, dance, live music and visual arts. They have spent over a decade devising multi-artform performances across the genres of circus, dance, music, visual arts, digital arts that can be experienced in theatres, big tops, music festivals or DIY spaces. MHz have carved out a reputation for producing work rooted in electronic culture which is technologically innovative, narratively compelling and with a high touring potential.

Jill Smith & Kathryn Boyle (Feral) (Producers)
Feral are a Glasgow based Producing house who support artists making cross artform work and champion makers who explore new performance languages through their practice. Under their Feral banner they produce a portfolio of performance and movement practitioners which has included critically acclaimed artists such as Liz Aggiss, Colette Sadler, Al Seed, Oceanallover, Mele Broomes, MHz, Nic Green, Peter McMaster and Sita Pieraccini. They are particularly interested in work that makes bold provocations and strive to create new contexts for the presentation of multi-disciplinary work.