As a child Stephanie Lake was, in her words, “a lounge room dancer”. “My early memories of dance are playing around, getting into dress-ups, putting music on and making shows,” she tells Broadsheet. “It’s interesting because that’s what I do now, isn’t it?”
Except instead of the family living room, Lake creates performances on stages around the world, from Paris to Germany to Hong Kong. The Helpmann Award-winning contemporary dance choreographer is known for her striking visual aesthetic, balanced between chaos and control. She’s created commissions for top Aussie dance companies including Chunky Move and the Sydney Dance Company, and directed multi-award-winning works like Manifesto – a pulsating show featuring nine dancers and nine drummers – for her own Stephanie Lake Company. Most recently, Lake was appointed as The Australian Ballet’s resident choreographer, a position that represents the “next big significant marker” in her career.
It’s been a gradual journey to get here. Born in Canada and raised in Tasmania, the Melbourne-based creative started taking contemporary dance classes in her mid-teens. Only after finishing school and not knowing what to do next did she realise dance was the answer.
“I had a moment of clarity where I thought, ‘I have to study the thing I enjoy doing the most’, and at that point it was dance,” Lake says. “Even though I didn’t have a lot of training, I thought this is the thing I’m most interested in – it was a pretty bananas choice at the time.”
While studying at the Victorian College of the Arts, Lake began getting work as a dancer and touring with influential companies like Chunky Move, Lucy Guerin and Balletlab. But it wasn’t until she got her first paid commission, a three-minute show for Chunky Move, that she decided to take the gig seriously.
Lake’s distinctive choreographic style is a combination of wildness and precision. “I really like a big physicality and kind of recklessness in the body, but then I also really like rhythm and a mechanical-like way of moving.” It’s a duality that’s developed from working with different types of dancers and seeing the breadth of their movement, she says.
Inside the studio, things toe a similar line. Sometimes it’s an organic and spontaneous process, where Lake starts with a blank slate and the energy of the dancers drives the personality of a piece. Other times there’s a clear idea in place off the back of research, reference images and music.
With Circle Electric – her commission for The Australian Ballet which recently finished its Melbourne and Sydney seasons – it’s been a combination of both impromptu creation and careful pre-planning. The large-scale production featured 50 dancers set against an electro-acoustic Robin Fox score mixed with a live orchestra, and explores the paradoxical ideas of being both insignificant and profoundly important.
Almost always, Lake is juggling many shows at once. These days, aside from working with The Australian Ballet, she’s putting on Assembly Vol. 1 – a performance she originally made in 2019 in China – as part of the Brisbane Festival, and opening Colossus in Korea. The latter is a touring performance that started in 2018 and features a cast of 50 local dancers from each city it arrives in (so far 13 countries and counting).
“It’s a really special experience because it’s full immersion in the culture. We’re in their studios for a month and get to know them really intimately.”
Up next, Lake is preparing for Mass Movement, a 1000-person piece for the opening weekend of Adelaide Festival next year. Commissioned with The Australian Ballet, the performance will feature members of the public with some level of dance training and experience. In the past, Lake has also crafted works like Multiply that require participants to have no background in dance whatsoever – an incredibly rewarding and nourishing process, she says.
“I believe deeply that anyone should be able to dance if they want to, and there’s a great amount of joy to be had in that kind of connection.”
This article first appeared in Domain Review, in partnership with Broadsheet.