Ex-Madonna dancer Carlton Wilborn to attend Hong Kong dance video festival
Wilborn will attend a post-screening discussion on documentary Strike a Pose at the Jumping Frames International Dance Video Festival, a nine-day celebration of cutting-edge dance videos from around the world
Carlton Wilborn and six other dancers were thrust into the limelight when they joined pop diva Madonna on stage for her third concert tour, Blond Ambition, in 1990. They were young and bold, unafraid to be themselves, but their fall came just as quick.
As Wilborn reveals in Strike a Pose, a moving documentary about the lives of the troupe, he was only “faking it”. Diagnosed as HIV positive at the height of the Aids epidemic, the Chicago-born artist kept it as a secret from the other dancers, two of whom were also HIV positive at the time.
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The documentary, released last year, is one of the films to be screened at Hong Kong’s upcoming Jumping Frames International Dance Video Festival, which starts on September 7. While the film invites more questions than it answers, local audience members will have chance to speak directly with Wilborn, who will be attending a post-screening discussion.
Strike a Pose is among more than a dozen films from around the world selected by the festival organiser, the City Contemporary Dance Company (CCDC), that look at the lives of dancers. The company has also commissioned three shorts and, for the first time, three full-length features.
“In the past, directors have explored different interpretations of dance or experimented with choreography, but this year there is a lot of experimentation in terms of narration,” says Raymond Wong Kwok-wai, managing director of CCDC and curator of the festival.