Straddle #2025: A Cross-Cultural Dance Exchange Between KL and Montreal

Kuala Lumpur, March 2025 – The power of the arts to transcend borders and connect cultures is at the heart of Straddle #2025, a groundbreaking platform by Five Arts Centre. This initiative fosters meaningful artistic exchanges and will take place from April 8-11, 2025, at Five Arts Centre, GMBB, uniting contemporary dance artists from Kuala Lumpur and Montreal for a four-day exploration of identity, movement, and creative collaboration.

Bridging Two Cities Through Dance

The name Straddle reflects its essence: standing in two places at once—one leg in Kuala Lumpur, the other in another city—while cultivating artistic relationships with curiosity and care. This inaugural edition features five accomplished artists shaping the global dance landscape:

• Lee Ren Xin (Malaysia): My Body is a Kampung (April 8, 8:30PM)

Ren Xin’s practice explores the relationship between the body and the spaces we inhabit. Her ongoing project Re-Public examines how collective embodiment can re-code urban landscapes, drawing from the internal worlds of the body to shape shared space. In this Open Studio session, she revisits and extends her acclaimed works ANGGOTA (2022, 2023), delving into inherited physical lineages and the kampung within us all.

• Dana Michel (Canada): MIKE (April 9, 1PM - 4PM)

A multi-award-winning live artist from Montreal, Dana Michel is known for breaking conventional performance structures. MIKE creates an immersive, durational space where audiences are invited to witness her nomadic aesthetic in real-time. The work examines work culture, self-respect, and the question: Can our public selves reflect our inner lives? Blending elements of improvisation, comedy, and social commentary, Michel’s work redefines the possibilities of contemporary performance.

• January Low (Malaysia): Pending (April 9, 8:30PM)

With nearly 30 years of experience in Odissi dance, January Low presents Pending, a deeply personal reflection on tradition, mentorship, and the unseen labor of artistic practice. Inspired by her virtual mentorship with master Odissi dancer Bijayini Satpathy, Pending meditates on the slow, introspective process of sustaining an art form in a digital world, questioning the agency of the dancer beyond the spectacle of the stage.

• Kim-Sanh Châu (Canada): BLEU NEON (April 10, 8:30PM)

Inspired by the neon-lit streets of Saigon and the echoes of pop and rap music in Vietnam, BLEU NEON is a visceral, dreamlike journey through memory, nostalgia, and identity. Performed entirely from the squat position—a posture deeply embedded in Asian daily life—the work blends movement with audio recordings and shifting lightscapes. It interrogates themes of language loss, diasporic longing, and the objectification of Asian bodies in contemporary culture.

• Louise Michel Jackson (Canada): Bright Worms (April 11, 8:30PM)

In a world of iridescent surfaces and deep-sea hues, Bright Worms explores the human desire for light and connection. Inspired by bioluminescent creatures, this multidisciplinary performance integrates video projections, soundscapes, and physical movement to create a sensory experience. Blurring the lines between the underwater and the subconscious, Louise Michel Jackson invites audiences into a luminous microcosm where textures and reflections reveal hidden depths.

More Than Just Performances

Beyond the stage, Straddle #2025 invites audiences to engage in deeper conversations about dance’s role in shaping and questioning identities—cultivated, inherited, invisible, and evolving. In addition to solo performances, the festival will feature improvisation sessions, artist talks, lecture demonstrations, and a moderated discussion titled "We Build This City On…" (April 10, 10AM - 12PM), led by Bilqis Hijjas, where participating artists will discuss the joys and challenges of creating in different cultural landscapes.

This exchange allows Malaysian audiences to immerse themselves in international perspectives while offering visiting artists insight into Kuala Lumpur’s creative ecosystem. It’s a unique opportunity to see how dance serves as a universal language for storytelling, exploration, and cultural understanding.

Join the Movement

Date: April 8-11, 2025

Venue: Five Arts Centre, 9th floor, GMBB, Kuala Lumpur

More Info & Tickets: Straddle #2025

Sokong is excited to shine a light on this dynamic cross-border collaboration, reinforcing the importance of the arts in bridging cultures and sparking dialogue. By supporting and amplifying initiatives like Straddle #2025, we continue our mission of connecting people with meaningful causes and transformative experiences.

If you believe in the power of the arts to inspire and create change, consider supporting Five Arts Centre through Sokong. Your contributions will help sustain impactful initiatives like Straddle #2025 and empower local artists to continue their important work. Donate now on Sokong and be part of a movement that nurtures creativity and connection.

Stay tuned for more updates on Straddle #2025 and other initiatives celebrating the power of artistic expression!

For further inquiries, contact Five Arts Centre at [email protected] or +6012-6706191 (June) / +6016-3938138 (Hui Ting).