The Rose International Dance Prize 2025 - a reflection
Rose and Bloom Prize winners, Christos Papadopoulos and Stav Struz Boutrous © Foteini Christofilopoulou
We have our first ever winners for the biennial Rose International Dance Prize and Bloom Prize: Christos Papadopoulos for Larsen C and Stav Struz Boutrous for Sepia.
Sadler’s Wells has been hosting and displaying works by the seven nominees across the two awards for the past ten days. The Rose Prize is for established choreographers with the winner receiving £40,000. The Bloom Prize is for choreographers with up to 10 years experience and the winner receives £15,000. Choreographers could be from anywhere in the world and work in any style (although this year leaned heavily towards contemporary), and the presented work had to have premiered between October 2021 and July 2023.
And here’s the interesting thing. I found the Bloom nominees that I saw much more interesting.
Boutrous’ now Bloom Award-winning work won me over by introducing me to a brand new dance form (Khorumi) and I loved how she used a war dance to meditate on the pitfalls of conflict. I don’t often understand the concept of ‘dance research’, but I really saw it in action here.
Meanwhile, Beings by Wang Yeu-Kwn / Shimmering Productions (spoilers for my review dropping later this week) was an absolutely beautiful work — a lyrical contemporary piece using paper in a fascinating way. It was captivating and my personal favourite of the nominees,. It was also only one of two I’d argue have commercial potential.
Kyle Abraham, An Untitled Love © Christopher Duggan
The other is Kyle Abraham’s An Untitled Love. I know, I wasn’t the biggest fan of this because the choreography was a repetitive and uninteresting, but I was in the massive minority. From the disco vibes as you entered to the sitcom premise, this could tour tomorrow and attract CROWDS.
I only saw one other Rose nominee (Encantado by Lia Rodriges), and have read some of the reviews of the other two pieces. From what I’ve seen and read, they were either poorly received by critics or just would not have mass appeal. They were, I’d argue, works to be appreciated by dance aficionados. Those who can sit and appreciate movement, and technique and composition. Which isn’t going to be a lot of us. It’s the difference between the audience for Marvel movies and arthouse cinema. Both legitimate, but with widely varying appeals.
So what really is the point of this award?
Is it to point you in the direction of the next big thing in choreography?
Maybe not.
I think the answer was on the website all along .
They want to be the next Oscars. The next Booker. The next Turner.
Do any of these awards reward blockbusters?
Rarely.
Do they reward great makers?
Absolutely.
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