Artist Spotlight: Shion Skye Carter + Miya Turnbull

Revealing layers within...

VIDF 2025 presents the Western Canadian premiere of Omote (面) by Shion Skye Carter [Vancouver] + Miya Turnbull [Halifax].

By choreographing with handmade photo-masks of their faces, Shion + Miya explore their mixed Japanese Canadian heritage. Coming in myriad shapes and expressions, the masks’ distorted imagery borders on uncanny, challenging traditional ideas of beauty.

Omote (面) translates to both 'surface/face' and 'mask'. With original music by Stefan Nazarevich, gestures and tableau explore layers of being and fragmentation of the self, manipulating what is revealed and what is hidden.

From co-creators/performers Shion + Miya…

“In a way it’s kinda ironic that I’m putting my face on the front of the mask, then hiding my real face behind it, but there’s something in that process that gives me control back of how I am ‘seen’.” The Bulletin

“Through Omote (面), we inquire: how do cultural expectations, and one’s ancestral history, influence the parts of ourselves that we express to the world, and the parts that we keep hidden away?"

“The relationship between the masks and our bodies articulates the Japanese concepts of 'honne (本音)' and 'tatemae (建前)': the private vs. public self. The masks also represent fractures, fragments, and layers of ourselves, serving as tools to reflect on our experiences of a distorted sense of cultural identity as mixed-race Japanese Canadians navigating duality and 'in-between-ness’."

What the press says about Omote (面)...

"I discover an illustration of what we have been, what we are, what we want to show of us, what we hope to be and what we hope to become throughout our lives… I hold back from saying out loud ‘wow’!!!!" Sur les pas du spectateur

“I felt like I was in a cinematic work on the edge of reality... the masks are simply amazing!” Le Petit Septième

"An act of letting go and letting in. A journey of embracing the self, in all its segmented fragments. Making a whole of multitudes. A beautiful collaboration…" Sharan Ahluwalia

Bios

Shion Skye Carter (she/they) is a dance artist originally from Gifu, Japan, who lives and dedicates time to their artistic practice in Vancouver, Canada on the unceded, traditional lands of the Coast Salish peoples. Through choreography hybridized with heritage art forms like calligraphy interacting with objects and design, Shion’s work utilizes a sensitive intensity to navigate the body’s complex internal and external worlds through performance. Recent presentations of Shion’s work include Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto), FTA/OFFTA (Montréal), Tangente (Montréal), and Kinetic Studio (Halifax).

Miya Turnbull (she/her) is a multi-disciplinary visual artist based in Kjipuktuk (Halifax, N.S.) originally from Onoway, Alberta. She works with many different mediums but is primarily a mask artist, and new to her practice is performance. She focuses on Self Portraits, using her Photo-Mask technique to make life-like variations and representations of her face, often distorting, erasing or manipulating her image as a way to explore identity. Miya has exhibited her masks, photos, and video in galleries internationally.

CONTACT

Deanna Peters + Victor Tran

Festival Co-Directors

deanna@vidf.ca / victor@vidf.ca

The Vancouver International Dance Festival is dedicated to bringing the finest in dance to the unceded territories of the xʷməθkwəy̓əm, Skwxwú7mesh and səlil̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ Nations, showcasing innovative and diverse dance performances from around the globe.