Alvin Erasga Tolentino: Promoting Pinoy culture through dance

For many Filipinos, rice is a staple food on the dining table. But to Filipino-Canadian dancer Alvin Erasga Tolentino, rice is more than just a glutinous sustenance; it is a representation of a cultural heritage best presented through movements and music. Since the last week of August, Alvin has toured the Philippines to perform “Field: Land is the belly of man," which will culminate on September 5. This one-man, 50-minute show incorporates music, movement, and video to pay homage to the traditional harvesting of rice. “Rice is the grain of life. It is a source of energy, livelihood, and social stability," Alvin said. He was first commissioned by Ballet Philippines to create and perform a dance piece reflective of the Balikbayan homecoming. Six years ago, amid the growing debate over Filipinos flocking the cities and leaving vast lands to go idle, Alvin found his inspiration. It was also around this time that the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) declared the Banaue rice terraces as an endangered World Heritage site. "So, at the time when I was researching it for Ballet Philippines there was a huge call to Filipinos to bring people back to the rice paddies," Alvin said, in an interview that appeared in The Vancouver Sun. "I was in the right place at the right time," he added. Dancing shoes In 1983, Alvin’s family decided to migrate to Canada. Like most Filipinos, his parents wanted to find a better life for him and his two other siblings abroad. Despite going away to Canada at an early age, one of the few things Alvin never forgot to bring from home was his dancing shoes. Before leaving, Alvin was a member of a cultural dance troupe in a school in Apolonio Samson, Quezon City. Unlike other families who might not always be open to having a male dancer in the family, Alvin’s parents were very supportive. They even prodded him to continue with his interest when he went to Notre Dame high school in Vancouver. Later on in college, he decided to leave the West Coast to pursue modern dance training at one of the schools on the East side. Alvin was enrolled at Toronto’s York School University and honed his skills in a dance program there. A year after, he tried his luck at an audition for a summer school at the Royal Winnipeg Ballet (RWB) and landed a spot to train and perform there for two years. After his training in RWB, Alvin realized that he wasn’t happy with his craft. He needed to change his ballet shoes. He left school and was drawn to modern dance which had the freedom of movement that the discipline of ballet cannot give. This change of heart eventually enabled Alvin to perform with Kokoro Dance, Lola Dance and Karen Jamieson. Armed with years of training, Alvin then tried on bigger shoes and founded his own dance group, Co. Erasga Dance Society in 2000. A dancer, choreographer, instructor, and visual artist, Alvin serves as the artistic director of Co.ERASGA Dance Society—a contemporary international touring dance company with an emphasis in exploration and collaboration of cross cultural work promoting dance across the nation and abroad. Among his company’s missions is to “recognize the Asian heritage and diversity within the Canadian multicultural context, and promote, share and celebrate dance to the widest and diverse audience in British Columbia, Canada and abroad." But after years of traveling and performing abroad, his feet ached for something else. This time, he felt he had to take his shoes back home. Retracing his roots “I was homesick and tired of the Western thinking, the excessiveness of the material world," Alvin recalled. “I was trying to find a way to discover new forms of dance, so I decided to come back to my roots and integrate [the culture] to contemporary forms," he added. At the beginning of his work with “Field," some Filipinos were skeptical if Alvin can fully achieve his goal. After living in Canada for years, he may be considered an “outsider" in his native land. However, Alvin was determined to prove his critics wrong. Alvin decided to trust his intuition. "It was an eye opener for me. I really began to formulate in the structure of my creation and my choreography about what it is like to integrate that background, those roots, into what I know and into what I have been transformed into in the Western world." He employed the help of Tad Ermitaño for the visuals of the rice fields reminiscent of those in Central Luzon and the Banaue rice terraces. Since then, he has toured other countries like Venezuela, France and Singapore to take the ‘Field’ to those who might not have seen its immense importance to a culture. “It is paying homage to the Filipinos who worked in the field and cultivated rice, which represents our cultural heritage," Alvin said. “For many centuries, rice-cultivation has adorned the rural landscape in the Philippines. Rice is the grain of life. It is a source of energy, livelihood, and social stability," he said. "The erosion of ancestral cultivation practices has inspired him to create “Field: Land is the belly of man." "This thought-provoking piece pays homage to the traditional harvesting of rice. It is a solemn appeal for preservation of the ancestral cultural heritage that is contained in a grain of rice, of two millennia of agricultural knowledge, and of historical and sacred customs. The performance encompasses emotion, beauty and reflection, and questions the ever-changing relationship between man and the land," a press release on Alvin's performance in the country said to describe "Field." Alvin's work as a Filipino-Canadian choreographer and dancer has earned him a distinct reputation as an original and an unpredictable contemporary performing artist in several countries such as Japan, France, Belgium, Croatia, US, Singapore, Italy and Venezuela. He has received professional art and dance training with The Royal Winnipeg Ballet , York University's Fine Arts in Toronto, SUNY Purchase, New York and the Limon Institute. This international touring initiative is supported by Canada Council for the Arts, the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, the British Columbia Arts Council, Myra Beltran Dance Forum and The Lemon Circle Event Management & Consultancy. Hosted by Samahan sa Sining (Department of Humanities) of the University of the Philippines-Los Baños (UPLB), Field will have the last shows of its limited-engagement Philippine tour at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) Havener Auditorium and D.L. Umali Theater, UPLB on Sept. 4 (7pm) and 5 (7pm), respectively, in partnership with IRRI and Asia Rice Foundation. For ticket inquiries, please call (049) 536-2320. After "Field," Alvin now sets his eyes on studying more about the issues in the environment which he will incorporate in his future creations. - Mark J. Ubalde, GMANews.TV