FRONTIER
The wildness of woman. Is it something to fear? To flee from? Or is it the inception of freedom? Set in the Alberta foothills during the early 1800s, a dangerous time for those who face the world in a woman’s body, Jane races through the unforgiving woods, weaving through the canebrake, dragging her funeral skirts up river to erase her scent. And the dogs still come…
Frontier is a new, devised creation from a team of Calgary’s top theatre-makers, exploring the tension between delicacy and power, vulnerability and strength, truth and myth.
Can you outrun the lies of your story once the trigger is pulled and the noose is tied?
2024 WORKSHOP CREDITS
Conceived & Created by Jamie Konchak and Eric Rose
in collaboration with
Movement Director Tania Alvarado
Sound Designer / Composer Allison Lynch
Designer Hanne Loosen
Stage Manager Meredith Johnson
Performed by Jamie Konchak
Directed by Eric Rose
Frontier completed Phase One Development, January 29 - February 19, 2024
Phase One Development Workshop Co-Produced by Jamie Konchak and Ghost River Theatre with support from Alberta Foundation for the Arts and Handsome Alice Theatre.
GRT supports the development of new work through a significant investment in creative research, often bringing together teams of devising collaborators for multiple development phases. During this first phase, the artists collectively explored and developed the theatrical language and aesthetics that will form the foundation of FRONTIER.
We invite our community to follow the journey of FRONTIER’s development over the next few seasons.
Jamie Konchak
Co-Creator and Performer
Jamie is an award-winning actor, singer, puppeteer and deviser based in Mohkinstsis (Calgary). Her creative curiosity and diverse skill set has nourished a twenty plus year career of performing everything from classics to contemporary fireside shows in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia. She has performed in countless premier productions of new works, devised theatre productions, a one-person puppet show in which she sang several duets with herself and recently as a background puppeteer on the set of Apple TV+ with The Jim Henson Company’s first season of Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock. Jamie’s work has earned her multiple Betty Mitchell Awards, Robert Merritt Awards as well as The Calgary Critics Award for Best Solo Performance.
Tania Alvarado
Movement Director
Tania Alvarado is a contemporary dance artist whose career has shifted through diverse performance mediums and somatic practices. She has performed across Canada, interpreting the choreography of various notable Canadian dance artists.
Tania's choreographic work has been presented at significant festivals and contemporary dance venues nationwide, and she has taken her solo performances to international stages in Europe through Bancs d’Essai Internationaux, presented by Tangente in Montreal.
Allison Lynch
Sound Designer & Composer
Allison is a Calgary-based artist, appearing as an actor in both stage and film, a singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, composer, sound-designer, musical director and voice artist. Allison has performed on stages across Canada and internationally, from Theatre Calgary to the National Arts Centre and as a soloist with the Calgary Philharmonic and the Malaysian Symphony Orchestra. She also scores for film, TV and documentaries. She received 3 Betty Mitchell Awards for acting, one for outstanding score, and a Greater Victoria Critic’s choice award for outstanding score.
Eric Rose
Co-Creator and Director
Eric Rose is an award winning multi-disciplinary director and creator of live performance and the Artistic Director of Calgary’s acclaimed Ghost River Theatre. His passion for the creative process has inspired the diversity of his multidisciplinary experience spanning: large scale contemporary and classical theatre, site- specific performance, devising theatre, new play development, physical performance and dance. Eric’s work embraces a hybrid of high tech visual spectacle with low-fi theatrical magic and is developed through a significant investment in imaginative research and development.
Hanne Loosen
Designer
Hanne is a set and costume designer living and working in Calgary. She grew up in Belgium and got a BA from the Academy of Visual Arts Maastricht in The Netherlands and an MA in Scenography at the Technical University Berlin. Before her move to the beautiful prairies, Hanne worked in opera where she gained traditional experience at major repertory houses in Europe and at experimental opera laboratories of Berlin.
In Calgary, she has worked with Theatre Calgary, Vertigo Theatre, The Shakespeare Company, Alberta Theatre Projects, Verb Theatre, Calgary Opera, Rosebud Theatre and others. She is a regular guest at the Shaw Festival and is excited to be part of their upcoming season once more.
Meredith Johnson
Stage Manager
Meredith is a Calgary-based stage manager. Meredith has worked all over Mohkinstsis and Turtle Island with the likes of Alberta Theatre Projects, Arts Club Theatre, Bad Knaps Theatre, Black Radish Theatre, Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, Calgary Young People’s Theatre, Ghost River Theatre, Globe Theatre Regina, Handsome Alice Theatre, Heritage Park, Major Matt Mason Collective, One Yellow Rabbit, Theatre Calgary, The Shakespeare Company, Spontaneous Theatre, Quest Theatre, Vertigo Theatre and Verb Theatre.
