Choreographer Eric Cheung to Premiere CONTRA at Scotiabank Dance Centre

The recent Iris Garland Award-winning emerging choreographer and interdisciplinary artist Eric Cheung will premiere his debut full-length work, Contra. Set within an ethereal world, Contra merges dance with interactive technologies, sculpting multi-laser projections and a sound-resonant water installation into an ever-changing environment.

Within the transforming landscapes, Contra explores the endless journey of self-actualization, revealing the contradictions and complexities of the human condition. A pursuit that exposes the tension between opposing extremes of our identities, emerging fully in response to the striving for an elusive, innate fulfillment.

Bringing together an exceptional group of artists and collaborators from diverse disciplines, the work features three distinct performers-Kinui Oiwa, Tegvaran Sooch, and Eric Cheung-whose backgrounds span Ballet, Contemporary, Street Dance, and abstract movement forms. Together, they craft singular characters that evolve through shifting layers of noise and precise low frequencies composed by Matthew Tomkinson.

Cheung reunites with long-time collaborator and Creative Technologist Cristian Gonzalez for the interactive systems, alongside Sean Gregor for laser projections and Jack Chipman, who bridges technical systems and lighting for the final work.

About

Eric Cheung is a street dance and interdisciplinary artist based in Vancouver, on the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Originally from Calgary, Alberta, Cheung is a second-generation Chinese Canadian artist whose practice merges choreographic and technical movement systems to create experiences of self-contemplation and introspection.

Eric's movement practice began self-directed, cultivating a singular approach to generating movement and choreography that is recognized nationally and internationally, with his specialization in the street dance style of "Popping," while incorporating outside influences and other dance styles.

Beginning his movement journey through self-directed exploration, Cheung developed a distinctive approach to generating movement and choreography, recognized nationally and internationally, with a specialization in the street and funk dance style "Popping," while incorporating outside influences and other dance styles.

Working across film, theatre, new media, and interactive installation art, Cheung's multidisciplinary practice spans projects such as E_GO (2018), I(n)finite (2023), and Null (2025) in film; iye (2018), Re:1974 (2021), Flux (2024), and Contra (2025) in stage works; and new media installations including iyeism (2022), Diverge (2023), Liminal (2024), Everlasting (2024), and Array (2025).

Cheung's work has been presented and exhibited at Place des Arts, PACT Zollverein, PHI Centre, La Nuit Blanche, Music Conservatory of Montreal, VIVO Media Arts Centre, Polygon Gallery, Vancouver Art Gallery, and Simon Fraser University.