DANCE PIECE TAKES AIM AT GYM INDUSTRY
Although both involve sometimes extreme degrees of physicality, modern dance and body-building rarely intersect. In his show Feasting on Famine, Vancouver dancer/choreographer and now gym-goer Shay Kuebler uses the dancer’s idiom to explore the relationship between strength training, health, and the fitness industry. We talked Kuebler, who is also artistic director with Radical System Art, about how dancers stay fit, inspiration for the show, and The Rock, Dwayne Johnson.
Q Did your dance experience lead you to the gym?
A I’d been in Vancouver for six or seven years, and I’d started to get some injuries from performing. A few physiotherapists suggested I cross-train, so I started going to gyms.
Q Is it unusual for dancers to go to the gym?
A There are some companies where dancers do Pilates, or they’ll cross-train with yoga or
weight training. It is something that’s being practised a little more. I think the science of conditioning and how the body can be trained is growing. For me it was something I was adding on.
Q Had you not gone to the gym before that?
A Not really. I would do warmups before class or rehearsal. But I didn’t go to the gym much for a number of years. Once I got into it, it made me realize that I could maximize my potential. The shows I was performing were increasingly demanding. I felt like it made sense. And I started noticing the big heavy bulky lifting guys, and how there’s a whole industry that feeds into this. I was brought into it to become hopefully better as an artist, as a mover. It was in that time I looked into gym culture. And, after training, I realized how much I was looking at food differently, as fuel.
Q In the write-up for the show, there’s something about you taking in the caloric intake of a family of five. What’s that all about?
A We wanted to talk about how, for me to get bigger, I would have to take literally the caloric intake of three or four people. For me, that directly talks to this industry. It’s very much capitalism, very much consumption. It’s almost like a corporate setting in the body. You’re continually trying to take in more to get bigger. That’s how much I’m taking in to be an active person in this industry.
Q It seems like the show has a satirical edge. Is that fair?
A It’s got this balance between being positive and negative, between being beautiful and kind of gross. Satire is a nice way to talk about something with serious and dark undertones, but not in a way that comes across like a public service announcement. We’re blurring that line between reality and absurdity. I grew up doing theatre and martial arts, so there’s always been a sense of theatricality in my pieces. And I have a weird sense of humour. So I think the humour happens naturally.
Q What do you think of The Rock?
A (laughs) I think he’s a pretty amazing dude. He’s a total proponent of the industry of fitness and success. He’s like a monument to it. There are so many conversations that are had, like, he’s 45, and people are like, “Is that (his physique) natural?” Because there’s so much drug use and supplements, it discredits people who may be doing it all naturally. He clearly has an extremely strong work ethic. He’s an interesting guy, pretty inspiring — someone who came from football in Calgary and is now a movie star. And I’ve heard that he’s an amazing person.