A Sequins of Poems to Dance To
It’s #WorldArtsDay 2023! What better day to trace the stories, seeds and sequins of our Pomegranates festival of international traditional dance. What better day to launch into the world the new booklet with the shiny sequins of poems to dance to by our Pomegranates poet-in-residence Ian McMillan! What better day to also travel back to Hellenic Greece in 2nd Century BC and unearth the sparkling glass vessel shaped as a ripe pomegranate.
Preview and download Sequins by Ian McMillan
On this #WorldArtsDay be the first to preview and download our special Pomegranates 2023 commission A Sequins of Poems to Dance To by Ian McMillan – our festival poet-in-residence. Enjoy Ian’s poetry duet with traditional dance, including hip hop. Then try writing your own sequins for movement because as Ian says ‘after all, the alphabet dance never ends!’
Join us for our festival finale and experience Ian’s sequins of poems fly off the page and shine on the stage as part of our Pomegranates Promenade on 30 April 2023. Book now – a production which will see Ian’s poems come alive in the MC set of Kemono L. Riot and the dance graffiti of Gabriel Schmitz, alongside dozens of dancers and the drums of Nemo Ganguli. Stay on for our festival afterparty with Kemono’s special DJ playlist.
On this #WorldArtsDay find out what else besides Ian’s poetry has inspired our Pomegranates festival – Mother Earth stories associated with the humble pomegranate fruit, the seasons and the climate change. Start with another of our Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland commissions – the epic poem Beira and Bride by Donald Smith and see it reincarnated on the stage and screen as part of our Pomegranates film and dance double bill on 29 April 2023. Check our trailer and get transported to a near future world to meet Beira and Bride, as well as Isis – climate refugees whose lineage stretches back to their namesakes, the Egyptian and Celtic Goddesses as mothers and daughters of Earth. Book now.
On this #WorldArtsDay the ancient glass pomegranate vase is here to remind us that in Greek and Roman mythology the fruit with the ruby seeds was also associated with Mother Earth stories. Persephone, daughter of Demeter, the goddess of fertility and vegetation, was abducted by Hades, the god of the underworld, who gave her some pomegranate seeds to eat. The pomegranate is now associated with Persephone, the queen of the underworld, as a symbol of life in death. The multiplicity of the pomegranate seeds is also an obvious symbol of fruitfulness and fertility; thus, it is no wonder to find the pomegranate as an attribute of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, or Hera, the marriage goddess.
More stories, seeds and sequins about our Pomegranates fesitval: https://linktr.ee/pomegranatesfest
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Title image of Hellenistic Greek Cast Glass Pomegranate Vase. Image courtesy of Phoenix Ancient Art
