DANCE Limerick will host the premiere of I’d Like to Get to Know You, a dynamic new piece by acclaimed choreographer Philip Connaughton, created to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Step Up Dance Project.
Performances will take place at Dance Limerick from Wednesday July 30 to Friday August 1, before moving to DanceHouse, Dublin for a studio showing.
Commissioned as part of Step Up 2025, the work explores the challenges of connection between artist and audience. Performed by Alice Gavigan, Sophie Gray, Ciara Hannon, Luke Maziarek, and Catriona O’Connor, the piece draws on Connaughton’s signature themes of longing and isolation, celebrating the act of striving itself.
Limerick Post chatted with Philip Connaughton this week
Step Up is an opportunity for dancers who are recently graduated and in their early career to work with an established choreographer and really get a sense of how a dance career works.
The call out for auditions to take part happened last December. Step Up is described by Philip as, “well recognised and an incredible experience” for the young participants.
Phillip works with the dancers for seven weeks in the run up to the shows at the end of July. The participants are a mix of local and international dancers, Alice Gavigan, for example, is based in Limerick and graduated from UL.
Philip has been, “in and out of Limerick over the last few years and is really loving this longer visit where he has had time to explore the city – he has even had a go on the big ferris wheel to get a better look at the place
Each year, the selected artists spend their summer in the context of Dance Limerick and the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance, training and refining their skills as performers with a different choreographer each year, as well as guest teachers, artists and mentors.
The aim of the programme is to help develop and showcase the work of the next generation of Irish dance talent. To date, over 80 dancers have benefited from the programme, building vital networks and gaining the experience necessary to sustain a professional career in dance.
The performance, ‘I’d Like to Get to Know You’ explores the often-impossible task of bridging the gap between the artist and the outside world.
At the heart of all of Connaughton’s choreography—whether explicit or understated—lies a deep thread of isolation. The very impulse to perform arises from his own longing to reconnect with something that feels lost.
The beauty of the work is not in resolving this tension, but in the attempt itself—in striving for the impossible, in refusing to give up, in the sheer act of doing.
Philip wants his dancers to express themselves as if they, “couldn’t care less about the audience”
He is layering tasks for his dancers to do within the piece which will make the performance highly energetic and fun to watch and will allow his dancers to open up to the audience, be “less careful” as they grow in confidence to dance like nobody’s watching.
The sound design for ‘I’d Like to Get to Know You’ has the effect of techno dance music being played in the room next door to the performance.
The 2025 edition includes collaboration with Luail – Ireland’s National Dance Company – and participation in the Moving in Collaboration International Intensive, broadening dancers’ exposure to a range of choreographic voices including Mary Nunan, Mufutau Yusuf, and Justine Cooper.
Lucia Kickham joins the project as rehearsal director, helping shape a work described as energetic, surprising, and thought-provoking-with a good dose of humour.
Philip’s philosophy on making dance is that it must be entertaining and impressive – it has to be a piece worth missing Fair City for and never be boring
So cancel that Netflix and chill evening and enjoy the creativity of these young dancers who have put months of work in this performance
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