Shaun Parker
Shaun Parker is an award-winning choreographer, dancer, actor and counter-tenor whose work has spanned film, television and live theatre productions. He is Artistic Director of Shaun Parker & Company, which he founded in 2010.
Born on a grape-growing property in Mildura, Shaun discovered dance by accident when he attended one of his sister’s ballet concerts. He soon joined the Mildura & District Ballet Guild which complimented his work as a singer and actor in local theatre and musical productions. Even though he was a keen sportsman playing soccer with his brother, and martial arts with both his siblings, he loved the performing arts which ultimately took over his life.
Shaun went on to study Science at Monash University, but his call to dance returned and he went on to study dance at the Victorian College of the Arts. Upon graduation, the world-renown Meryl Tankard invited him to join her company, as she took over the reins of the Australian Dance Theatre. Shaun stayed at ADT for most of the nineties, touring to 13 countries with Meryl’s award-wining works, and views Meryl as being his dance ‘guru’, and his time with Meryl as ‘life-changing’.
Shaun went on to dance and sing with Kate Champion at Force Majeure, Chunky Move, Sydney Theatre Company, Opera Australia, the Song Company, Meredith Monk (New York), Company ALIAS (Geneva) and Sasha Waltz (Berlin).
Shaun’s own choreographic works have toured to 21 countries globally and include KING, ReMOTE, In The Zone, Am I, Happy As Larry, This Show is About People, The Yard, SPILL, TROLLEYS, Hover, Axle & Spin, The Box, Rika’s Story, My Little Garden, Blue Love, TUT, Love Instalment, Tenebrae III and the award winning short films ‘The Love Trilogy’ and ‘NO’.
Parker won an Australian Dance Award for both This Show is About People, and The Yard, for his work with underprivileged teenagers in Western Sydney, the Shirley McKechnie Award for Choreography, a Green Room Award for AM I, the Argus Angel Award (UK), the Bearer of Hope Award (Germany), the Banksy Award (New Zealand), the NSW Premier’s Creative Achievement Award, and was nominated for three Helpmann Awards and the NSW Premier’s Export Awards. Parker’s anti-bullying dance program into schools, and his other interactive community events have been lauded for their connection with audiences to deliver strong social impact.
Shaun's Artist Statement is "As human beings, we seemingly thrust about on planet earth searching and yearning for some sort of meaning and connection. Through movement, I endeavour to investigate and interrogate the notion of humans as spiritual beings." (Parker 2022)
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Current work and inspiration
"We are currently interested in old ‘junk and sets’ found within old film storage areas including items such as metal structures, broom handles, basketballs, hoverboards, lighting devices, witches hats, inflatable tires and a shipping container!
For example the ’shipping container’ idea has provided much artistic fodder and a triptych of works inside the container are being developed….the first is called THE BOX, the second is called CONTAINER and the third is called DANCE WITH ME BABY!"
THE BOX
... is a new, 10-minute, experiential immersive work for a single audience member, in which shards of light are as closely choreographed as flinging bodies. Taking place inside an ordinary shipping container, the audience member is led inside and asked to stand within a fluorescent tape square. Once inside, the doors are slammed shut and they are plunged into darkness. What ensues is an experience of light and movement as the dancers, who seem to appear out of nowhere, take the spectator on a journey through exposure and denial of lighting effects. Complete with muted sound devices and a ‘safe word’, THE BOX is not for the faint-hearted.
CONTAINER
...is a new 20-minute work, and forms Part 2 of our trilogy of works that take place inside a shipping container. Still in development, Part 2 of the trilogy sees the doors of the container swing open to reveal a series of highly physical dance and humorous acrobatic vignettes, interrogating and celebrating the micro and the macro impacts of isolation. Part Quarantine Tribute, Part Tribal Dance, the audience (up to 40 people at a time) sit outside the container, and when the doors swing open, they watch the action unfold with unlikely consequences. All set to the the pounding and immersive electro-acoustic score by Nick Wales and featuring five outstanding dancers.
DANCE WITH ME BABY
...is part 3 of our shipping container triptych! Groups of friends can book our shipping container to have their own dance party within! Driven by the tribal pulse of our dancers who will also party inside the shipping container , the group will experience a 10 minute intense and cathartic dance purging!
Our aim is to interrogate, yet celebrate the very notion of what it is to be human!
You can see Shaun Parker & Company and these great works at EDGE Art Camp on the GreenWay 11-22 May 2022 & EDGE Sydenham later in the year.
Website: www.shaunparkercompany
linkedin: company/shaunparkercompany/
Facebook: Shaun.Parker.Company
Instagram: shaunparkerco/