The August 1984 subject of Dance Journal included a profile, written by Linde Howe-Beck, of then–30-year-old fashionable dancemaker Margie Gillis, who had discovered an astonishing diploma of worldwide success as a solo performer. She’d grown up in Montreal in a household of athletes (her mother and father had been Olympic skiers; her older brother, Christopher, was a number one Paul Taylor dancer; her youthful siblings skied and performed hockey professionally), “However we had been all very a lot inspired to play piano and paint and do artistic issues,” she stated. “It actually was like wall-to-wall kindergarten rising up.”
In 1979, she was “found” dancing in a park whereas in China and was shortly embraced by live performance dance audiences there; Pierre Trudeau, the Canadian prime minister on the time, subsequently named her an honorary cultural ambassador. By 1981, Gillis was a “firmly ensconced cult determine” in Montreal, as Howe-Beck put it. “She was heralded as Canada’s queen of unbiased dancers, a sure-fire sellout, a stocky stick of dynamite with a hip-length fall of hair used to melt among the jagged, dangerous, and extremely private gestures….As an artist, she stands alone, her earthy, vibrant model relying much less on any recognizable dance vocabulary than on a response to her personal spirit and her personal want to speak emotions.”
In parallel to her solo work, Gillis is a famous collaborator with quite a few artists and firms, has been commissioned by the likes of Cirque du Soleil and the Paul Taylor Dance Firm, and developed a workshop using motion as a device for battle decision. She was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 1987, in recognition of each her dance and advocacy work, and in 2013 was promoted to Officer for her continued contributions to up to date dance. She’s nonetheless educating, creating, and performing.
