Cirque du Soleil lays off 400 employees

Artists of Cirque du Soleil in Amaluna / Photo by Laurence Labat

>> by Andrew Guilbert
Cirque du Soleil recently announced it would lay off 400 employees due to a variety of economic factors putting pressure on the usually robust entertainment giant. Most of those jobs will be cut at company headquarters in Montréal, home to roughly forty percent of Cirque’s 5,000-employee worldwide workforce. In a statement, Cirque spokesperson Renée-Claude Menard acknowledged that the company was dealing with rising production costs, but denied that the Cirque was in any deep financial trouble. “The Cirque is not in crisis, let’s get that straight,” said Menard. “We had a record year in terms of tickets sold. We sold more than 14 million tickets this year. We had a record year for total revenue, with more than $1 billion.” In spite of the record sales, Menard agreed that times were hard. “The organization at the moment is not profitable.” She said that for each cent the Loonie gains over the U.S. dollar the company’s profits are negatively affected by nearly $3 million. Cirque du Soleil currently has nineteen shows touring worldwide and is working on a new show set to open in Las Vegas in May.

L.A.'s MOCA gala sparks controversy

>> by Naomi Brand
Performance artist Marina Abramović's centre piece performance for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles' (MOCA) annual donor gala has sparked controversy and debate over alleged exploitation of performers. During last month's gala dinner attended by 750 celebrity and art world guests, dozens of performers knelt beneath the large dinner table with their heads protruding through holes in the table slowly rotating and making eye contact with guests. Others lay nude rotating on top of circular tables with fake skeletons on top of them re-enacting Abramović's signature piece Nude with Skeleton (2002). After attending an audition for the project in early November, L.A.-based dancer/choreographer Sara Wookey wrote an (at the time) anonymous letter informing MOCA about the conditions being asked of artists for Ambromavić's piece, which Wookey described as "extremely problematic, exploitative, and potentially abusive." In an open letter to artists, Wookey states that performers were expected to commit to fifteen hours of rehearsal time, to lie naked and speechless as human centrepieces during the four-hour event even in the case of harassment and sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement stating that they could be sued by the event’s producer for a sum of $1 million if they spoke to anyone about what occurred in the audition. American dancer, choreographer and filmmaker Yvonne Rainer also wrote a letter to MOCA director Jeffrey Deitch criticizing the organization for "stoop[ing] to such degrading methods of fund raising." Wookey's letter to artists calls for the creation of labour standards and fair wages to protect performing artists in L.A. and beyond.
http://theperformanceclub.org/2011/11/open-letter-to-artists/
http://blogs.artinfo.com/artintheair/2011/11/14/read-yvonne-rainers-final-letter-decrying-marina-abramovics-moca-performance/
http://cadabc.org/
http://cadaontario.camp8.org/

CADA-ON publishes professional standards for dance, version 3

CADA-ON Executive Director Elizabeth Chitty and Co-chair Nova Bhattacharya / Photo by Brodie Stevenson

>> by Samantha Mehra

The Canadian Alliance of Dance Artists, Ontario Chapter (CADA-ON) has published Version 3 of its Professional Standards for Dance (PSD), a living document that provides guidelines for members of the organization for negotiating work agreements and for providing minimum standards regarding fees, hours and working conditions. The latest version, which replaces the 2009 Version 2, includes new sections, such as Copyright and Touring, as well as updates on fee minimums and cost of living increases. The PSD is distributed to CADA-ON members and is available at no cost as an electronic copy on the organization's website. CADA-ON was formed in 1986 to improve the working conditions of dance artists by strengthening the self-representation of its members.
http://www.cada-on.ca