Laura Taler

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| name = Laura Taler

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| birth_place = Brașov, Romania

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| website = {{URL|www.laurataler.ca/}}

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Laura Taler is a Romanian-born Canadian artist. Beginning her career as a contemporary dance choreographer, she now works in a range of media, including performance, film, sound, sculpture, and installations.{{Cite web |last1=Odom |first1=Selma |last2=Bowring |first2=Amy |date=2 February 2011 |title=Dance and the Media |url=http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/dance-and-the-media |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221204173617/https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/dance-and-the-media |archive-date=4 December 2022 |access-date=13 February 2023 |website=The Canadian Encyclopedia}} Taler's films The Village Trilogy and Heartland are heralded by Dance International Magazine as marking the beginning of the dancefilm boom in Canada.{{Cite web|url=http://danceinternational.org/evolving-story-dance-film-overview-new-forms-now/|title=The Evolving Story of Dance on Film: An overview of new forms then and now|date=2018-05-18|website=Dance International Magazine|language=en-US|access-date=2019-03-09}}

Early life

Laura Taler was born on 21 December 1969 in Brașov, Romania and first became involved in dance in elementary school.Encyclopedia of Theatre Dance in Canada/ Encyclopédie de la danse théâtrale au Canada (2000). Arts Inter-Media Canada/Dance Collection Danse, Toronto, 672p.{{Page needed|date=November 2017}}

Art career

In 1995, Taler made her directorial debut with the village trilogy,Judy Mitoma (2002). Envisioning Dance on Film and Video, Routledge, New York{{Page needed|date=November 2017}} a 24-minute film that alludes to the millions of lives uprooted through emigration in the past century while reinterpreting the physical characteristics of early cinema. According to Gaby Aldor, "...it is as if the old language is no longer adequate, as if a new way of being, and therefore of dancing, has to be invented."{{Cite journal|last=Aldor|first=Gaby|year=1997|title=Labeling: The Dichotomy between Jewish and Israeli Dance|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=W2rYAAAAMAAJ&q=%E2%80%A6it+is+as+if+the+old+language+is+no+longer+adequate%2C+as+if+a+new+way+of+being%2C+and+therefore+of+dancing%2C+has+to+be+invented&pg=PA151|journal=Jewish Folklore and Ethnology Review|volume=20|pages=150–157|via=books.google.ca}} The film was screened worldwide, and won three significant awards: the Cinedance Award for Best Canadian Dancefilm at the Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film and Video (1995),{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=meKNAQAAQBAJ&q=laura+taler+the+village+trilogy&pg=PA305|title=Envisioning Dance on Film and Video|last1=Mitoma|first1=Judy|last2=ZIMMER|first2=ELIZABETH|last3=Stieber|first3=Dale Ann|date=2013-10-18|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781135376444|language=en}}{{Citation needed|date=March 2019}} the Best Experimental Short Film Award at the Worldwide Short Film Festival (1996),{{Cite web |title=Laura Taler - Awards |url=https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1387614/awards |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230213045004/https://m.imdb.com/name/nm1387614/awards |archive-date=13 February 2023 |access-date=12 February 2023 |website=IMDb |language=en}} and a Gold Hugo for Short Subject Experimental at the Chicago International Film Festival (1996). In 2002, the Los Angeles Times' critic Lewis Segal wrote: "For depth of feeling, photographic sensitivity and movement invention, the central (duet) portion of Laura Taler's 1995 'A Village Trilogy' may be the most memorable footage in the festival. ...[H]er mastery of choreography and direction is unquestioned."{{Cite web |last=Segal |first=Lewis |date=19 April 2002 |title=An Intriguing Marriage of Choreography and Camera |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-apr-19-et-lewis19-story.html |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230213044548/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2002-apr-19-et-lewis19-story.html |archive-date=13 February 2023 |access-date=12 February 2023 |website=Los Angeles Times}}

Taler followed this up in 1997 with Heartland, a documentary about the dancer and choreographer Bill Coleman. it received the Best Experimental Short Documentary Award from Hot Docs (1998){{cite web |url=http://www.hotdocs.ca/archive/awards-1998 |title=1998 Awards - Hot Docs |website=www.hotdocs.ca |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170821212028/http://www.hotdocs.ca/archive/awards-1998 |archive-date=2017-08-21}} and the Cinedance Award for Best Canadian Dancefilm from the Moving Pictures Festival (1997).{{Cite web|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/dance-and-the-media|title=Dance and the Media {{!}} The Canadian Encyclopedia|website=www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca|access-date=2019-03-09}} In 1998, her Dances for a Small Screen, a collaboration between directors and choreographers from across Canada, premiered at the Canada Dance Festival. The film was nominated for five Gemini Awards, including a best director nomination for Taler, and went on to win the Gemini Award for best editing.{{Cite web |title=Filmek - Love Songs |url=http://mediawavefestival.hu/index.php?modul=filmek&kod=3027&sorrend=kategoria&nyelv=eng |access-date=12 February 2023 |website=Media Wave Festival}} Deirdre Kelly, dance critic at The Globe and Mail wrote, "Dance has a reputation for being precious and esoteric, but Laura Taler wants to change all that." Kelly described Taler's contribution to Dancers on a Small Screen as "an idea distilled to its bare essentials, a choreographed poem that would have made the symbolists proud."{{Cite news|title=Independents a Hit in Informal Setting|last=Kelly|first=Deirdre|date=16 January 1991|work=Globe and Mail (Toronto)}}

Taler's A Very Dangerous Pastime won Best of Festival award (2001) for Dance on Camera Festival.

Taler was a fellow at the ICI Berlin Institute for Cultural Inquiry.{{Cite web|url=https://www.ici-berlin.org/people/taler/|title=ICI Berlin: Laura Taler|website=www.ici-berlin.org|access-date=2019-12-04}}

Taler's publications include Tension/Spannung (Turia+Kant, 2010); Revisiting Ephemera (Blue Medium Press, 2011); and Embodied Fantasies (Peter Lang Publishing, 2013).

Filmography

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!Year

!Film

!Notes

1995

|The Village Trilogy

|Director/Producer/Distributor/Choreographer/Dancer{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=meKNAQAAQBAJ&q=laura+taler+the+village+trilogy&pg=PA305|title=Envisioning Dance on Film and Video|last1=Mitoma|first1=Judy|last2=ZIMMER|first2=ELIZABETH|last3=Stieber|first3=Dale Ann|date=2013-10-18|publisher=Routledge|isbn=9781135376444|pages=305|language=en}}

1997

|Heartland

1998

|Dances for a Small Screen - The Barber's Coffee Break

2000

|A Very Dangerous Pastime

2001

|Perpetual Motion

2003

|Death and the Maiden

2005

|Forsaken