Margie Gillis

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Internationally acclaimed modern choreographer/dancer, Margie Gillis has been creating original works for over forty years. Her repertoire now includes more than one hundred pieces, which she performs as solos, duets, and group pieces. Born in Montreal to a family of accomplished athletes, Margie Gillis could not have wished for a better environment in which to develop her talent. Showing a passion for dance early in life, she began ballet and gymnastics lessons at the age of three. In her youth, she trained and rehearsed on her own and later continued her studies with such prominent teachers as May O'Donnell, Linda Rabin, Lynda Raino, and Allan Wayne. Over the years, this charismatic dancer has developed a remarkable personal style.

 

In 1979, Margie Gillis was invited to teach and give lectures in Maoist China, thus becoming the first artist from the West to introduce modern dance in that country after the Cultural Revolution. Two years later, she founded her own company, the Margie Gillis Dance Foundation with the mission to support and present her artistic work. Her international tours have taken her to Asia, India, Europe, and the Middle East as well as across North and South America. In parallel to her solo work, Margie Gillis collaborates on projects initiated by her peers. She participated in the creation of two of Martha Clarke’s major pieces in which she danced principal roles. She has performed with The Paul Taylor Dance Company in pieces created by her brother, the late dancer/choreographer Christopher Gillis. With Les Grands Ballets Canadiens de Montréal, she danced the role of Miss Lucy in James Kudelka’s Dracula. She has also been a guest artist with the National Ballet of Canada, Ballet British Columbia and American companies such as Momix and The Bruce Wood Dance Company. She has collaborated with many other important artists in the world of dance, most notably with John Butler, Paul-André Fortier, Pauline Koner, Peggy Baker, Robbie LaFosse, Joao Mauricio, Tedd Robinson, Rina Schenfeld, Paola Styron, Rex Harrington, Risa Steinberg, Veronica Tennant and Emily Molnar. In Canada, she has shared the stage with Quebec soprano, Suzie Leblanc. Recently she toured in Sacred Ellington with the celebrated opera singer, Jessye Norman.

 

Margie Gillis has been seen on television and in film on several occasions. Her life and art have been the subjects of several documentary films, the most notable being Veronica Tennant’s Wild Hearts in Strange Times. For her participation in this film, Margie Gillis was awarded the 1998 Gemini Prize for Best Performing Artist on Film. Among other collaborations in film and television, Margie Gillis choreographed the Delilah sequence for John Turturro’s film Romance and Cigarettes and danced the principal role in José Navas’ choreographic film Adela, mi amor.

 

Margie Gillis also creates for other performing artists. She has choreographed works for companies such as Coleman Lemieux & Company, The Bruce Wood Dance Company and the Alberta Ballet Company. In 2006, the Cirque du Soleil commissioned her for two solos for the Las Vegas production of LOVE, a tribute to the legendary Beatles. The world premiere of M.Body.7, a group piece Margie Gillis created to celebrate her 35th anniversary season, was performed in January 2008, at the Festival Montréal en lumière.

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Linda Rabin 

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 Linda Rabin brings to her teaching more than 50 years of experience in dance, movement education, coaching and directing. As a Canadian dance pioneer, Linda has contributed to the emergence of several generations of dancers in this country. As a somatic practitioner, she facilitates individuals and professional artists to realize their personal, creative and performance processes.

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A graduate of the Juilliard School (BFA in dance, 1967), she worked as rehearsal director and teacher for Israel’s Batsheva Company and with Ballet Rambert in London, England. She taught and choreographed extensively across Canada for many of the country’s major dance companies, professional schools and university dance programs. Her unique perspective on dance was deeply informed by studies in the 1960’s and ‘70’s, in the Alexander technique with Rika Cohen & Katya Michaeli, Pilates with Bob Fitzgerald, Ideokinesis with Lulu Sweigard, Kinetic Awareness with Elaine Summers, as well as Voice and Theater with Ann Skinner and Richard Pochinko.

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The desire to integrate mainstream dance training with creative and personal processes, led Linda with colleague Candace Loubert, to co-found Les ateliers de danse moderne de Montréal (LADMMI) in 1981. Today it is recognized as one of Canada’s leading professional schools in contemporary dance training. In 2012 the school was renamed L’école de danse contemporaine de Montréal (EDCM).

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Thirty years ago Linda oriented her focus on Somatic Education. She studied Experiential Anatomy and Infant Developmental Movement Patterns, to become a certified practitioner of Body-Mind Centering®, the work of Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen. During that time she discovered Continuum and began intensive studies with founder, Emilie Conrad and with Susan Harper, creator of Continuum Montage. In 2001 Linda was made an authorized teacher of Continuum, and maintained a mentor relationship with Emilie until her passing in May 2014. While Linda draws upon her background in Dance, Theater, Body-Mind Centering® and other Somatic Studies, Continuum dwells at the heart of her practice today.

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As an international workshop leader, Linda teaches in her native Montreal, in Canada, Europe, Asia and Israel. Her love for travel, languages and meetings with people of different cultures has brought her to countries around the world. She shares her life passion with people from all walks of life:  movement both as art and healing, as a way of life knowledge and spiritual practice.

Linda is a founding member of CTA (Continuum Teachers Association), a member of BMCA (Body-Mind Centering Association), ISMETA (International somatic education and therapy association), RES (regroupement pour l’éducation somatique), RQD (Regroupement québecois de la danse)

• 2018, honoured by the Quebec Ministry of Education as a  Distinguished Member of  l’Ordre de l’excellence en éducation.

• 2019, Member of the Order of Canada.

• 2020, honorary award, Le prix de la danse de Montréal, Contribution Exceptionnelle.

• 2022, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award, lifetime achievement in dance