> Qdos opens new Civic with Holocaust Memorial Day Event
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Qdos opens new Civic with Holocaust Memorial Day Event
photo: Paul Hamilton
Qdos Dance Theatre is honoured to be participating in the National Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration, the first performance at the new Civic in Barnsley, on Saturday, January 17 in the brand-new Assembly Room.
Organised by Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council’s Community Safety Service and Berneslai Homes, the event will feature Holocaust survivor Arek Hersh, and James Smith, the director of the Aegis Trust’s Holocaust Centre in Nottinghamshire, who has kindly agreed to speak. The Aegis Trust is an international organisation which campaigns against genocide. “It is a great honour to be asked to create such an important piece of work for this event," says Anjie Taylor, artistic director of Qdos. “We have a long-standing partnership with the Community Safety Service, and value our collaborations with them. This commission has come at a very exciting time for Qdos as the company is about to be re-born under the name ‘Qdos Creates’. This will be the start of a new chapter as we move to our new base at the Civic.”
The piece, a dance theatre performance in three sections, is called Still Seeking. Using original text, dance and movement, three performers explore the displacement of people in a modern context. With resonances of the Holocaust and through the eyes of a family the piece aims to show the dehumanising and catastrophic effects of fascism on people in the modern world. The third section shows hope and a way forward in recognising the seeds of fascism and standing up to hatred and intolerance, based on the premise that the greatest courage of all is that of the individual against the crowd: “For the sake of my child, I carry on. Through fear and pain I carry on, for her sake, her future, in the desperate hope for a better place, a better life away from here.”
This year’s event is inspired by the Holocaust theme, STAND UP TO HATRED. It is fitting because of what is happening across the world, in countries such as Zimbabwe, the Congo and in Rwanda, where the loss of innocent lives is taking place, says Maxwell Senior, BMBC’s Principal Hate and Hidden Crime Officer. “It is also important to reflect on the serious situation in the Middle East where again the loss of innocent lives is all too evident,” adds Mr Senior, “That is why we must remember what has happened and is still happening across the world. We must bring it home to the people of Barnsley that even at a local level, we can and must stand up to hatred.”
Barnsley Central MP Eric Illsley will give an address and the Mayor, Cllr Ken Sanderson will open the programme, which will also feature Sheffield’s first gay choir Out Aloud, and a number of other participants.