Numbers add up to dance success

Breathing heavily and sweating, 11 dancers move to the numbers they utter in low voices while walking fast from one direction to another. The air is humid and the noise they make between their foot and the ground is hard to ignore. They wrap up their 30-minute showcase by sliding down to the floor.

They are dancers of the TAO Dance Theater and what they performed was a preview of their latest contemporary dance piece, 11, which will be premiered at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing on Aug 24 with three shows running throughout Aug 26. Then, they will tour nationwide with the new dance piece.

"The first thing I want to mention is that there will be music for the dance work. However, the composer Xiao He hasn't finished it yet," says Tao Ye, choreographer and founder of the theater, right after the showcase. "But we are used to it. It's been a very long time that we work with the composer. He gets our ideas and will finish the music right on time."

Sporting a loose, black T-shirt and black harem pants, Tao, 36, talks in the center of the theater, which is located in Beijing's northeast suburbs. The dancers, who need a lot of space but cannot afford the high rents in the city, gather in a quiet village, called Hegezhuang. The two-story house, which serves as their training studio, is painted all black, except the dance floor, which is pure white.

Tao's latest choreographic piece, 11, will be his longest piece so far, which will be around one hour.

Audiences will see the choreographer's interpretation of the number 11 through dance moves by soloists, pas de deux and group dances.

"The number 11 presents conflict and harmony to me. Thus the choreography for the dance piece involves dancers to move to display the two characters," says Tao. "Improvisation is also used in the dance piece, which is the hardest part for me. From their waist below, dancers move based on choreography. Waist above, they move impromptu, which will present 11 different dances."

The choreographer adds that he is always careful about improvisation.

"When a dancer improvises, the moves he or she makes should be connected to the audiences. The awareness of the body is crucial for the dancers. It's like a conversation with themselves while they dance and the energy should be passed on to the audiences," he adds.

As a young choreographer, who has not only stood out among his peers of China's burgeoning contemporary dance scene but also captured global attention, Tao is fully aware of the logic of movement and he tries to explore the possibility of the body as well as the relationship between the body and the space. He believes that dancing is beyond techniques.

He says that his dance works aim at inviting people to join in.

"There is no story told through my dance works. I wish that you could reflect on your own body after watching my works," Tao says.

Naming his dance works after numbers is a tradition for the choreographer.

In 2008, he and his girlfriend, now his wife, dancer-choreographer Duan Ni, and another dancer, Wang Hao, formed the TAO Dance Theater.

They started with a performance for three dancers, Weight x 3, which premiered in Beijing in 2009. Soon his unique choreography attracted attention and drew invitations.

Singapore Arts Festival, Norrland Opera of Sweden and Dansmakers Amsterdam of the Netherlands commissioned him to create a dance piece, 2, for Tao and Duan. Then, he started to explore other numbers. Xiao He, whose real name is He Guofeng, has been composing for Tao's choreographic works since the dance piece, 2.

So far, Tao and his theater has toured more than 40 countries, and it was the first Chinese contemporary dance company to perform at the Lincoln Center Festival in New York City. Sadler's Wells, a British dance company, has commissioned Tao to perform at the event for three consecutive years since 2016.

Born in Chongqing, Tao was sent to a local dance school to learn classical Chinese and ethnic dances by his grandmother when he was 12 years old, because "my body was very flexible and I imitated the dancer I saw on TV to do the splits, which impressed my grandmother", Tao recalls. He fell in love with contemporary dance after he visited the Jin Xing Dance Company in Shanghai, which enabled him to dance by "listening to my body and following my heart, rather than dancing based on techniques," he says.

Tao joined the Jin Xing Dance Company in 2003. In 2005, he moved to Beijing, where he danced with the Beijing Modern Dance Company.

In 2019, Lin Hwai-min, founder of Cloud Gate, a well-known Taiwan dance company, invited Tao to produce one new piece: 12, since Tao worked with 12 dancers from Cloud Gate then.

Speaking about Tao and his choreography, Lin said: "He is the most promising contemporary dancer on the Chinese mainland. His works belong to the 21st century. They amaze people and provoke deep reflection."