Susan Berganzi & Emma Metcalfe Hurst
Interview for Coming Out of Chaos: A Vancouver Dance Story

October 16, 2020

To view more archival materials, see Susan Berganzi Archives

Susan Berganzi, Costume Designer for Coming Out of Chaos (1982) and Karen Jamieson Dance

Emma Metcalfe Hurst, Karen Jamieson Dance Archivist/Creative Director of Coming Out of Chaos

This oral history interview has been edited for length, clarity, and accuracy

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Let's hear your dancing story! What was your entry into contemporary dance?

Susan Berganzi: Karen [Jamieson] was my teacher. 8:30 in the morning, there she was. And that's how we met. And she doesn't remember, but I used to make films with [her]. My apartment was like the centre. We stayed up all night, making conversation, documenting our voices. I went to her dance class at 8:30am. I show up, and she's relaxing us on the floor, and I started to go to sleep. And she said, Susan, Susan, smell! I realized I was going to not pursue dancing. After the third year, I was quitting. I liked film photography. I liked pulling my own, whereas in dance you have to be so healthy. I took Jane [Ellison’s Boing Boing] class [at Western Front] since 1987. I don't think I stopped going until COVID-19. I officially quit [laughs]. I can do it in my sleep. The class is invaluable. It's been really good, but I can't go there anymore. She's like, You want to go on Zoom? I'm like, No. I'm gonna finish. When I first landed at art school [at SFU], he [Peter Bingham] took me straight to Western Front. He said you have to go. And I never left. Katie Craig was amazing. Everybody was amazing. Gamelan performances. Jazz Festival. The music program.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: The media residency program too. Yeah.

Susan Berganzi: And even Boing Boing. I used to go in and see the shows [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: It’s so special, right? The Western Front is a really, really unique place.

Susan Berganzi: They seem to be. Well, I don't know. Galleries are pretty crowded nowadays, but they're showing different kinds of artwork. To some extent. ‘Cause so much of it is commercial. I can't believe that VAG [Vancouver Art Gallery] is what it is, compared to what it was [laughs]. And I don't want to see the shows anymore. They're not sucking me in like they used to. Like the Noon Series at the [Vancouver] Art Gallery when it was on Georgia Street. Every day there was a film or something, I could just go there and watch an hour or two of films. And that kind of stuff hasn't really happened since.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, the professionalization of art has really been felt over the past few decades. I think that's why we need to record these undertold histories and make sure they have their place in the history of art in Vancouver.

Susan Berganzi: This [Vancouer] is an amazing place. I used to think it was a place that you got things done because you had the time and you weren't overstimulated by what was going on. But that's not true anymore.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs]

Susan Berganzi: Because if you look at what you want to go to, you can be pretty swept away and busy. In New York, by the time I figured out what I was gonna do, I'd go. What's going on now? I'd just go to [whatever] free lectures that's closest. We met some dancers at Pratt Institute when I was really, really young. And they were dancing with a pillow in the air, connected to hair dryers, and losing lots of weight because they were being cooked, basically, in a way, but it was so phenomenal to me. I just kind of fell on the floor laughing. And then that was the first time [I saw contemporary dance] and then we came here [to Vancouver] as hippies. And then there was Space Studio Dance, which was just fun. Geri Straubel her name was. You'd be doing jazz class with her and she'd have a cigarette sitting in second. She was across from [inaudible] Love Affair Studio for years. And then I ran into other dancers who went to SFU, and I had no intention of taking the dance program, but I ran into Iris Garland – and I was on crutches the first day at SFU [in 1981] [laughs]. That was my introduction to dance. But she's like, You must come to me. [I was] like, Okay. I had no idea I was actually gonna take it seriously. It was rigorous and fun. And Iris [Garland] was an amazing historian. And I loved her classes.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So these were the classes up at SFU?

Susan Berganzi: Yeah. First, she [Iris Garland] had to lie to the bureaucracy to make a dance program happen. She had to say to them, This is kinesiology. She got it through.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: And made something amazing from that. And then at what point did you start making costumes?

Susan Berganzi: Well, I went to IFT [Institute of Fashion Technology in New York City in 1973] before I went to art school, after going through liberal arts at CUNY [The City University of New York in 1971]. And I didn't want to work for rich people – I just didn't want to do that, and we had a year of lingerie ahead of us, and I was like, No, no, no. I'm not making underwear and paying $300 a credit to make underwear. I'm not going to do this. So, I went up to Canada on weekends to Hamilton [Ontario]. And they said, Let's go to Vancouver in a car, and the hippie that I was [went] all the way across Canada. All the way across Canada, are we there yet? Anyways, it was phenomenal. At the caves in Ontario, just like the fact that there were caves, icicles, and canoes, and lakes, and beautiful living creatures in the lakes. Coming from the East River, during the ‘70s, New York was becoming like a disaster zone. And people [were] shooting each other and funding was gone from everybody's life. And it was [a] really brutal place. So, getting out was really cool.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: At what point did you start making costumes in Vancouver?

Susan Berganzi: So, I went to FIT [Fashion Institute of Technology] and then I went to art school [at Vancouver School of Art in 1975], because I liked making – doing the drawings better than making clothing. I didn't want to work for clients either. I didn't want to have private clientele where I just did a wardrobe. No matter what they paid me, I didn't think that was interesting enough. And so I sort of fell in at SFU, and I was asked to do choreography. I made my own costumes, which was the velcro duet and it was called – what was it called? Oh geez, I forget. It's on my resume, but something about Mac Tac Peal-Off, and the Hell of it Is They Pumped Millions of Dollars Into the Economy Each Year, which was a quote off a cartoon.

Anyway, the dance was a bit of a party – I was in stitches every time I saw it. The two lovers in, you know, long johns, ripping with a loud mic. They’re breaking hearts every ten seconds. I had industrial sound and lighting and it was just a lot of fun to do. And the step that I had used was a flex foot step, so you're moving forward in a circle, but you couldn't get forward because you were flexing your feet. So, it was kind of this political undertone. Anyway, so that was my first thing and then Karen and Savannah just said, You are gonna be working with us!

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So they were at your performance then?

Susan Berganzi: Well, I had it at several places. I had it at the [Unit/]Pitt Gallery. I forget. SFU mainstage. I had it at Terminal City Dance studio. A few times we did it with pretty much Lola [Maclughlin] and Tony [Giacinti], but another girl started it at SFU which I forget her name [laughs]. It's been ages. The laugh of it is Lola [MacLaughlin] had the costumes all these years. I gave them to her and she gave them back to me like ten years ago or something, and it was like: You still have them? [laughs] Anyway, they're still hanging around in my dungeon basement studio. I've been a recycler since the long johns, when we first got some free. And because of the dance budgets, I fit in perfectly [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: I guess working from recycled things gives you these pre-made structures to work within.

Susan Berganzi: Totally. Absolutely. I did a costume for Jennifer [Mascall] that was all garbage bags with logos, like Woodwards or Nikon, so it was a tutu made of plastic bags and it was really funny. And Nikon legs and I just sewed plastic bags together and it was very spectacle-driven. So, anyway, classrooms were in my life. My mother was also [a seamstress], she didn't want me to sew for a living. She said, No, you're not doing this. I said, Alright, alright. So I went and did it anyway.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs] Like the rebel you were.

Susan Berganzi: She made the first jogging bra for NASA scientists. She was a sample maker. And she ran a factory of immigrant women. Many of them didn’t speak English, and had nowhere to live, some of them. And so she had a factory job. And I was like, Oh my god, the factories are really scary places to go. I was in one since I was little. Just seeing her at lunchtime. So I have a background of sewing. We'd always have challenges [to see] who can do this faster. I can hem faster than you. So, costumes – clothing was in my life to begin with. And, of course, we had a good Value Village here [in Vancouver]. I mean, early on, I lived on – my first apartment, I lived above the people who own deLuxe Junk and we'd have breakfast with hats on, hats with Christmas balls, and just kind of [laughs] live it up. I lived in a kimono on Robson Street. I don't think I wore jeans that year [laughs]. Anyway, so then I did this dance at SFU and then Terminal City [Dance], they were the most logical, wonderful group of people. It was like every rehearsal was kind of like living music. It was like they did voice lessons. It was seriously art, during rehearsal, it was not just like, Let's sit on the floor and wait for our turn to do something. It was just a totally integrated lifestyle and people. And it was fantastic. And then Savannah [Walling] and Karen [Jamieson] were very important. Terry [Hunter] was a bit of a bond [laughs]. And they were very democratic. They had to discuss everything. And they got me to do costumes and pretty much, they'd say they'd want whatever I was wearing. Gimme! Can we wear – can we have that? I was like, Okay. [laughs] So anyway, I just started with Terminal City and I saw Runners' Tale by Savannah [Walling]. Of course, I was blown away. And Karen [Jamieson], of course, we started out with Kansas which made my heart kind of flapped on the floor. It was such an amazing dance. But even when I see these dances again, I still think they're pretty amazing. No matter how many dances I've seen. They hold. Yeah, they don't make towers in this world without having a reason to have that tower. And Karen [Jamieson] is pretty much – she's been solid art since the moment I saw her.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: It sounds like the contemporary dance scene in the ‘70s and ‘80s viewed life as art. You lived your art. Was that the creative ethos in Vancouver at that time? Susan Berganzi: Yeah, this is what you did with your time. Well, people were – Coming Out of Chaos is like a prime example. You have seven towers in one place. They all had something on their mind. And they weren't dancers that would just do the steps right for Karen [Jamieson]. So, no wonder they founded EDAM and Mascall Dance company. All these things happened because it was just so logical. That's what people were like. They were on their tracks, and going for it. I mean, I hadn't known Jennifer [Mascall for] very long. She was at SFU for a few classes, but I never took a class with her. But she's a pretty – I’ve gone to everything she does if I can. And Lola as well, either I went to it or I worked on it [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: As you said, people are on their tracks. They're starting to form their identities and their practice and their art and everything.

Susan Berganzi: They pursue what they gonna pursue. Painting, dance, movement, any number of things. I'm always surprised that when I look back. I’m always surprised when I look back at different dancers that have done the same choreography, or some of the dancers are so important to Karen [Jamieson] because they grew up. Like Kay Huang. She was like a twelve-year old or something when I first saw her as an understudy. I was like, Okay. Then she blossomed into like the best flower I've ever seen [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, it’s great to see the new generation rise. So, maybe jumping over to the Coming Out of Chaos costumes... Could you talk a little bit about the process behind these costumes or how you worked with Karen [Jamieson] to develop them?

Susan Berganzi: Karen [Jamieson] and I always had conversations and we'd always end up back at the same place which was “decayed elegance.” So, we always had elegance and decay. Always. It was a natural part of nature and she always dealt with the elements: earth, wind, fire. And she hasn't stopped doing that, even if she doesn't talk about it a lot. These costumes were a matter of extremely low budget. Also, Peter Bingham and [Lola Ryan]dressed alike because they were getting along so well. When I went to some rehearsals, for this piece in particular, it was like, Okay, who's making a move here? [laughs] Karen [Jamieson] was up on a ladder. I was like, Is she coming down? I remember things about it, but I don't remember how it cohered. In the end, all I remember is doing it and witnessing certain aspects of the dancers. I knew Ahmed [Hassan] from before. He was drumming up at SFU when I was taking classes and I gave him a ride down the hill all the time. And he was the funniest guy I've ever known [laughs]. He'd always crack jokes constantly. And he lived in New York when I was living in New York. And he studied with Don Sherry and – who's the other one? Naná Vasconcelos. He played the berimbau and he took it everywhere. Like, for some reason he showed up at my apartment, like at nine o'clock in the morning – which you don't do if you stay out all night [laughs]. But Ahmed would be nice. He's just making noise [laughs] until we all got it together. We go back a long way. So Ahmed [Hassan], he was a gentle spirit. He was in white because he needed protection, to me, that was because he was alone, and he was there to carry the exploration. I thought he was like the space between each of the moments. I'll see if that’s accurate when I get to see the dance again.

And so the costumes evolved out of budget and lack of budget [laughs]. And Lola [MacLaughlin] and I wanted to do something black, transparent, and she insisted on black transparent. So I said, All right, we'll do something. But then my friend Patty, she was my model for Jennifer [Mascall's] piece and she's like five inches shorter. But she forced me into, Okay now what? [laughs] So I was like doing a like collage. But luckily Patty was helping me out because without that, I was like, What am I doing? Anyway, she gave me the confidence to pursue it. And she was a model for that dance and many others. Rainforest (1987) particularly.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, Patty was a key assistant.

Susan Berganzi: She was like Mudwoman (1990) originally [laughs]. So got to dress her, make it on her body. It worked on Karen [Jamieson] because Patty knew better.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: When you're making clothes for dancers, you have to be thinking about–

Susan Berganzi: –everything.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: –and the fact they're moving around.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah. It was a joke. They [the dancers] had the “Susan” chant: If you didn't put the rope down the leg, you would not get back in it. That's the only way they could deal with it. You know, when you do something for the first time you never expect to... Well, I never got to finish a lot of what I started, right? It would just go on tour, and I’d be like, That's just basted. That’s just tacked together with stitches so I can get it apart really quickly. It's not sewn by anybody to last forever. And Daina [Balodis] and Catherine Lubinsky took great pains to keep my costumes together. I think they really honed their sewing skills thanks to me.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: And this cord, you would put in the pants of the costumes...

Susan Berganzi: Not a cord, a rope. So that you can get your foot in it: from top to bottom through the front of the bodice. If the cord wasn't tied and bunched up like that, you'd have a hell of a time navigating your foot into it. If you went the wrong way you'd be constricted. So you really had to – and what some people did, if it did that they'd cut it! [laughs] And then people would say, You don't sew a lot do ya?

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: And you’re like, This is my method! [laughs] So then just going back to [Lola MacLaughlin's] costume, she said that she wanted black and transparent–

Susan Berganzi: –transparent. She wanted, like either a dress, a black transparent dress, and I couldn't give her a dress because there was nothing female about what she was doing. To me, a dress is a really significant – from my generation of people, sexist [laughs]. Okay, we are autonomous, we are androgynous, we do not have that exact role. If it's [a dress] asked for, I'll use it. But if it's not, I'll stay far away from it. And Peter [Bingham] and [Lola Ryan], the yellow and the green. They were like the gardeners [laughs]. The worker bees. The men, in the political notion. I'm not sure exactly what they did, but they were always funny with each other, and very cooperative. And then whereas Jennifer [Mascall] was – like her choreography in the piece – she was in her own world. And that's part of the piece. And I never really figured out what Karen [Jamieson] did to tie that world together. But she did it [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, somehow she did. It sounds like your process was very much thinking about each individual’s role.

Susan Berganzi: Other dances that I worked on, I knew I had to learn a lot more – to literally learn when something would be a problem, and when something needed to change. If you're on the stage too long doing the same thing, it just doesn't work unless the lighting designer and the set and we all come together.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Did you make the choice to put the bells on the costumes?

Susan Berganzi: That's Ahmed [Hassan] [laughs]. He wanted to pick her [Lola MacLaughlin] up and shake her. I don't think they were a couple, but I think they were flirting at that point. I'm not quite sure. I didn't keep track.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs]. Yeah. So, there were a bunch of different bells, right? Cufflink bells?

Susan Berganzi: Lola [MacLaughlin] was surprising. She had a really good voice, she could sing really good tunes. And it was no wonder that she spent time with Ahmed [Hassan]. They were both in New York together and both, you know, he was with Don Sherry and she was taking classes everywhere, and she even sewed a couple of knapsacks with me. Savannah [Walling’s] wearing a silk bedspread [laughs], a parachute. We could afford red silk for Karen [Jamieson], but after that the budget sort of died. And this is like, probably what's it called “unidentified” fabric. It was like $2 a yard or something [laughs]. I didn't know if it was gonna rip before she walked through it. You never can tell with these fabrics, but it lasted.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. There seems to be this common motif of wrapping and containing bodies in your costumes.

Susan Berganzi: Well, there was a dance that we did for Terminal City that I took very seriously. Our first meetings were Terry [Hunter], Savannah [Walling], Karen [Jamieson], and then Karen asked for lumps. I was like, You want lumps? I gave her what she wanted. And I was like, What, am I crazy? I'm gonna give her lumps? [laughs] I can think of lots of ways of doing lumps but she's not giving me that much time [laughs]. So bondage was kind of her anthropology [connection], being mummified under the ground, and being above the ground, it's an underground kind of comment. And she's above the ground, and some kind of poetic logic [laughs]. I can make up a good yarn!

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: You've used wrapping in other costumes for Karen, haven’t you?

Susan Berganzi: Not quite – the wrapping was – Catherine [Lubinsky] worked with me for a whole summer once and we made a lot of mummies. I worked on a King Tut show in New York for my sewing job when I was there, in-between this dance and who knows what? A lot was going on in those years. It couldn’t have been in, I don't know, was this '81?

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: '81, ‘82. Yeah.

Susan Berganzi: It had to be ‘82. This one [refers to a handbill] says '81 and that's the show I had at the Helen Pitt [Gallery]. So that was '81. And that's when I moved back and forth constantly between Canada [and the USA]. I was already an immigrant here, but my family was beckoning and I had no choice but to be there. And then twenty-five years later when I applied to be a citizen, they asked me for documentation of every time I left the country. And I said, See ya! I'm not a citizen [laughs]. I'll stay landed. I've no documentation since 1973. I mean, I have pictures of dances [laughs]–

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs] –that show you were here.

Susan Berganzi: I have a resume. So, working with each dancer. In this case, I didn't get to know [Lola] Ryan as much as I'd like to. I knew Savannah [Walling]. Peter Bingham. He was intimidating because he was so cute [laughs]. He didn't say much, but he was friendly [laughs]. And eventually he and I fought long after that because I put him in a skirt [laughs]. He didn't want to wear it. But anyways, Peter [Bingham] and [Lola Ryan] were just fantastic. And they're just wearing two shirts sewn together.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Mm hmm. And you said the shirts were from Army & Navy?

Susan Berganzi: [refers to archival photo of Peter Bingham and Lola Ryan in Coming Out of Chaos] Well that's a shirt and that's a shirt. Two shirts [laughs]. I sewed it at the waist, and then I cut it apart, and did whatever. So, it was like a fifteen-minute adaptation. And a lot of what I did in those days, I never knew how much time I'd have with them, and then I never knew how much time it would take me to do what I wanted to do. And then when I couldn't make a move ‘till I knew where the piece was going, it always put me between a rock and a hard place. I'd be like, Okay, now there's no sleep coming here [laughs]. ‘Cause the time length is even shorter [laughs]. But if I made a move – there's one dance I made a move really early on and it was so dead wrong [laughs]. I couldn't believe it [laughs]. I listened to a few notes of the composer and I believed that those notes would stay, but that was not true [laughs]. So I dressed them all like piano keys, black and white satin, kind of strange Susan things. And it [the piano] didn't make it in. Anyway, so I made sure I lingered ‘till the last possible moment of judgment. Then I can understand where Karen [Jamieson] wanted to go with the piece, even if it hadn't actually gotten there.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Do you remember doing some dress rehearsals with her?

Susan Berganzi: [laughs] Oh, I definitely remember some of them. Some of them, they were wearing wet [unfinished] costumes. Thank god, they were such nice people. And Ahmed [Hassan], at Van East once, he did another round of intro music, ‘cause he knew I would show up [laughs] – exactly when was questionable. [refers to archival photos] Anyways, so this is all recycled fabric. It was very cheap. And it was very little time.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Did you have assistants for sewing these ones?

Susan Berganzi: No, these were straight me rushing as quickly as possible to do it. I put that one on [refers to archival Coming Out of Chaos photo] – if it worked on me and I liked it, it was a go.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: And so it was. I think Karen's the only one who has an open back in her costume. [shows Susan Berganzi image of Karen Jamieson’s costume from Coming Out of Chaos].

Susan Berganzi: Yeah.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: The tie?

Susan Berganzi: That's how she got in it. Because it was just quick. As Daina [Balodis] said: “My quick and dirty solutions.”

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs]

Susan Berganzi: Well, you know, sometimes there's nine of them [dancers] and there's one of me, so... [laughs] It's like, Okay, we’ll make a solution here.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, they [the costumes] seem like art works in and of themselves and the way that you conceptualize them. Even just how the dancers enter your costumes seems like entering a piece of art itself.

Susan Berganzi: Definitely. With the Susan rope and the Susan chant. I didn't do it right, they were in trouble. And I knew they'd be in trouble. But I wasn’t there on tour – thank you, Daina [Balodis]! Thank you, Kay [Huang]! [laughs] And Catherine [Lubinsky]! And even Andrew [Olewine] – all the time he was just amazing! He'd find a way to get in it. If the rope wasn't there, he'd do it anyway!

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, you're talking about that cord from earlier.

Susan Berganzi: Oh yeah, the other thing I did with Karen [Jamieson] in rehearsals is the most important – I forgot all about this. I wish I had kept this piece of paper with me later in life ‘cause I could show her. The verbs, I used to keep a list of verbs after I'd seen her, or before I'd see her again. When we're talking about the dance because so much of a dance is not a real word. So, how do you talk about it? How do you know what she needs? So, I have this one piece of paper where I kept on writing verbs [laughs] on. Anything with "-ing" on the end: "Blowing" "Sitting" "Spelling" "Huddling" [laughs] "Chaining" [laughs] “Linking”. So, I made it up – that was my original relationship with Karen [Jamieson]. Just try and find a way to say it wasn't about steps. It wasn’t about fixed emotions. It was always about something.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, you had a list of verbs that you would use when you and Karen were talking about costumes?

Susan Berganzi: Well, just to get my brain to start working so I could say something back. You know, ‘cause when they dance – if you've ever been invited to Karen [Jamieson's] rehearsals, they can make you speechless! [laughs] I have nothing to say. So, if you have a meeting right after that... [shows card of written verbs] Very funny.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Oh wow!

Susan Berganzi: "Pulling." Fetching." [laughs]

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: "Swaying." "Pulsing." Wow, it's like a poem!

Susan Berganzi: "Inhale." "Exhale." [laughs] "Inhaling."

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: "Seeing." "Sleeping." "Shaking." "Teasing." Wow.

Susan Berganzi: That's what I figured out today. That's where dance is going: it's gonna go literary, I think. There's gonna be a lot of writing, I think. Because they always criticize dance for not having a voice. A language. So, I have a feeling there's going to be more. Somehow. Back to dance, here we go.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Back to dance, yeah, let me see here. What was the dance scene like in the ‘70s and ‘80s?

Susan Berganzi: Well, the ‘80s was this more radical formation of the ‘60s. So, in the ‘80s in New York, I mean, we were not allowing any documentation. It was just not done. If you were documenting, then you were outside. If you're inside, you were just showing up to do something. So we'd get a call and you're gonna just pull it for, ah, I don't know, a poetry thing in a video or something. Anyway, the ‘80s were exuberant that way. And on the same hand, it had AIDS and all the other stuff that was going on. The politics of the world was really changing in the ‘90s. By the ‘90s, I got embarrassed to be American. I was just like, this is really not a good thing.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, what's your opinion on the ‘90s?

Susan Berganzi: So You Want to Dance came on TV.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: You've also worked in theatre and film contexts as well and done art direction. How would you say working with dancers differentiates from working in those environments?

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, I think that dancers, they come alive during that rehearsal or that run-through and they work really hard to get to that point. And so much of filmmaking is standing around [laughs], hating the rain [laughs], knowing the noise of the rain, which is a whole different story altogether. Dancers, to me, when you're working with them – I used to try and find out who they wanted to be like, or how they dressed before they came into rehearsal. Hiromoto [Ida] has always been really pissed at me because I'd never give him a shirt [laughs]. Why are you doing this to me? and I said, Because you're so pretty! [laughs] I can't help it. I need to see you! I need to see more of everybody else, but they can't really pull it off [laughs]. It was really hard for me to watch a dance and not just watch Karen [Jamieson], and try and follow every one of them from point A to point B, and so I got to know them as much as I could. And when I say I design something particularly for them, yes and no. Like, say Karen [Jamieson], to wear a mask, she'd need something to go with the mask.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, it's more about your engagement with the people – the dancers, who are wearing those costumes?

Susan Berganzi: Well, I have to see where their legs are gonna get tripped up, or how many times – like Drive (1987), as a dance, I gave them cushions wherever I saw their bodies bruising. That's where the design went. It was like, Daina [Balodis is] on the ground, she's gonna get pants. Jay [Hirabayashi] has a red shoulder from carrying Catherine [Lubinsky], he's gonna have something there to protect him a little bit. So, I played that way and even though it went Wild West and silly stuff, I was trying to be humorous. Some people got the joke.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs] So there's a necessary functionality to it as well.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, I had to see who's gonna hurt themselves. I know that the feet are the most important part of your body, but I could never afford shoes with the budgets I was given. It's totally ridiculous. I mean, eventually, I had two shows with this company where shoes were part of it. And other companies, you start with the shoes, and they'll buy many pairs.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, I guess budgets are also a big difference between small dance companies and the film industry.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, you buy everything and duplicates. I would love to have a couple of duplicates. People asked me, Why are you giving them silk to scale walls? I said, Because they look good? [laughs] It breathes. It makes the sweat go away. It gets stronger when wet [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: So, silk is like the preferable material for dance?

Susan Berganzi: It was just something I could paint on and get a new image as opposed to something I've seen. I was always looking to find a surface of decayed elegance, or the vocabulary that we used in our meetings. To try and get that to work.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, I guess silk is a natural fiber too which works with the concept.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah. I mean, I didn't know very much about it really. Like everything else in my life [laughs], How do you do it? Okay.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs] So, the way that you developed costumes with Karen [Jamieson], it sounds like you would have meetings with her–

Susan Berganzi: –depends on how difficult the piece is. If she's still developing an idea, there is no meeting. I could be there, but I still won't have a question, or as I say a verb [laughs] to work with. And that really makes a difference to how you approach something. And when she [Karen Jamieson] shared my studio, that social distancing made that whole conversation fall apart. In order to work with them as dancers, I had to stay as far away as possible to observe what they needed or what was going on. I couldn’t be their friends. So maybe I'm just a natural alien! [laughs]

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: As an artist, you need space for yourself and your projects. When you get into that creative process, you can't always articulate it or know where it's going to go. So, when you have someone who's trying to get you to do things in a specific way, or meet deadlines, it can be hard to work within that.

Susan Berganzi: Well, some dances I spent more time in a production meeting than actually getting time to do the work. And I didn't think that was very fair. Or very fruitful. But on the other hand, for many dance shows, I didn't even have a production meeting [laughs]. There was no such thing. I should have had a manager [laughs], but couldn't afford it.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, administration takes a lot of time.

Susan Berganzi: And if I had had a manager, they would have made me quit.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: [laughs]

Susan Berganzi: And I didn't want to quit! [laughs] It was more love than it was anything else.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Did you ever make drawings or sketches for your designs?

Susan Berganzi: Well, that was the other thing. I could only draw them after I made them. Because other people draw it first and then they make them and I'm a hands-on experimenter. I have to touch everything and make sure it works with me and the body and what will happen to it. I don't know what it's gonna look like any more than they do. Sometimes, yeah, of course, I could do a drawing of a dress that I know I'm making six of [laughs]. I wish I'd used more street clothes with Karen [Jamieson] but again, the conversation didn't go there. It just never took the form, or sometimes we never finished the conversation. I can name two or three shows that I worked on and I go [puckers face]. It didn't quite hit the mark! Didn't work for me! [laughs] I wish I had not taken any steps. I should've gone shopping.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Oh, that must be a hard thing when you don't have the time or the resources to actually get the costumes to the exact image you're imagining.

Susan Berganzi: Sometimes what they're [the dancers] doing is so complicated, and it just takes that much time. If the piece doesn't have an ending, how do you know what the beginning really means?

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. So, the next section of questions is for Coming Out of Chaos and we've also talked about that a bit.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, you wanna know about Lola [MacLaughlin] and Ahmed [Hassan]?

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah!

Susan Berganzi: Ahmed [Hassan] was a brilliant comedic [laughs] musician. And I'm really glad he ended up with Peggy Baker. What a nice thing that was [laughs]. He spent two years maybe on and off – a year and a half or something in New York and he was just hysterical. Andy Warhol would be at an opening and he'd be like, Andy Warhol is standing next to me! [laughs] It’s okay Ahmed, you’ll live! [laughs] He was just adorable.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Did you make costumes for him a lot?

Susan Berganzi: No, he was with Karen [Jamieson] a few times, not just in Chaos. What was he in? Good question. Was it Rainforest?

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: I'd have to look that up too. Then he went to Robert Desrosiers [in Toronto]. And then was going back and forth between Toronto and Vancouver (for EDAM) for a few years, and then ended up out East.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, Desrosiers. I lost track at that point because I was anchored in New York. I lost track of him and a lot of things [laughs]. Well, my mother died in ‘84, so I was holding a job at a cartoon syndicate, I was doing costumes. It was a very incredible time [in New York City]. I worked at a nightclub. Didn't see daylight for a year [laughs]. Except when I was coming home [laughs]. So, it was a very good time. I mean, graffiti is underrated. The whole period of the ‘80s is. Sometimes I just want to stomp my feet and say, It wasn't shoulder pads, people! It might've been a touch of Cyndi Lauper, okay, but... [laughs]. It was a lot more complicated than that!

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. Were you doing film work at that point too?

Susan Berganzi: A couple times [laughs]. Video too. I'd shot a video in the club I worked at and all these famous people were in it. All these poets and writers and the catch was they handed me the camera in the dark. And so I put my hand in the handle so I couldn't even watch the video [laughs]. It was humiliating. But you know, I said, You know, next time give me a shot, go out in the street and show me the camera. I just, you know, picked it up and pressed “On” and started. And that was one of my early video experiences at the club [laughs]. Every party I ever had we always had film material on the walls. It was just the way we did things and we also projected on buildings. It was just a fun way to live.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: An experimental time.

Susan Berganzi: I was also encouraged to be an interdisciplinary student, then they took it away, at SFU, which was not fair. We governed our lives according to, you know, four different programs. And all of a sudden, it doesn't exist as a degree! Hello?? I tried to go to Cooper Union [in New York City after that] and work with artists that I wanted to be under, like Hans Haacke, but they wouldn't let me because I had too much education. I was spoiled because I went to SFU and I had such good training. And I was lucky. SFU was pretty phenomenal as a place.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. And all of the people who were at SFU at that time.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, the teachers and faculty.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. And that cross-disciplinary nature that you were talking about too. It was really present there.

Susan Berganzi: And it was encouraged at that point. Anyone could make a film and – well, not anyone. The film community is pretty hard up for funding, and same thing with the dance community, but it's still a generous situation. As competitive as it may get, it's generous [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: What about Lola MacLaughlin? Because you worked with Lola Dance too and did costumes for her...

Susan Berganzi: I met her, and she was a bank teller on Robson Street. And then I talked her into becoming a waitress next door with me. So she did. And then she was with Paula Ross. And then I said, You wanna be a dancer? Quit your job! [laughs] And so she did, and it was really, really good. And then she's always had her feet in the visual arts, deeply. Not just one time to see the show, she'll go see it as many times as she needs to see it. And her research in terms of her choreography really did – I mean, I think she did a lot with her work. And I'm sad to see her go [inhales]. Anyway, Lola [MacLaughlin], she was my waitress friend [laughs]. That's us [refers to photo of Lola MacLaughlin and Susan Berganzi]. We're just doodling on postcards. In Maria's kitchen house. She had a little house over by Cypress and Cornwall [Streets, in Vancouver]. We used to go for walks.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: How did you approach working with Lola MacLaughlin? Did that differ from your work with Karen Jamieson?

Susan Berganzi: Well, Lola [MacLaughlin] and I fought because she would say things like, I want velvet. I'd be like, I can't do that, I don't like it. Pick someone else. Go shopping at Holt Renfrew! [laughs] Works for me! And so I think one of the things Lola [MacLaughlin] learned early is that she wanted to do every bit of the painting. And I kind of found that hard, because when you hire a composer, you just don't chop up his music and throw it at us. You give him some credit. I don't care if you chop it up. But, it's his music [laughs]. So, you can't just do that. And I did one dance with her and I just never wanted to work with her again after the velvet, I was like: No, no, no, no. I want to be your friend, I don't want to fight. And, Theme for Nino, she came to my house, she had nothing. I went through her videos: I said, start here. Pick the leg up. Charlie Chaplin. Let's go. I wear black and white. You wear black and white [laughs]. By the way this has been my uniform since the Seventies [laughs].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: It's timeless!

Susan Berganzi: Timeless! And so anyway – Lola [MacLaughlin], I did four really wonderful dances with her and that was enough [laughs]. Yeah, we did Chiaroscuro.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Oh, that's a visual art term.

Susan Berganzi: It was beautiful. It was at Van East. A set designed by David Eng. Beautiful. And then that's when she finally woke up and chose Claudia Moore as her principal dancer. I said, You are the result of your material. If you keep giving me a little material that have no brains, I will get bored and not look. You have to give me full-body people and then I'll be there. [laughs]. Yeah. So she did. Lola [MacLaughlin] was – I wish she was still here. And Ahmed [Hassan].

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah. I know. They both mean so much to everyone I’ve interviewed. What do you think has changed the most for Vancouver contemporary dance since the early ‘80s?

Susan Berganzi: There's so much more of it. Before there was like Gisa Cole, Jamie Zagoudakis studio, and what was the other studio? Two or three studios, and Goh Ballet and there was – Main Dance had the other... forget her name. There's just so much more. Yeah. Valuable. Good stuff to see. I think sometimes though, I'd like to separate the issues. It becomes so much that you know, theatre is dance and dance theatre. But everyone who I've ever worked for has found me on Facebook. I just find it shocking [laughs] that everyone that I've ever known – well, everyone that's still around. I did a lingerie piece when I was at SFU. And that's a Paris window that I based it on. And the lingerie girls are still chatting with me on Facebook now. And they want copies of everything.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: I bet they would! [pointing to more archival photos] These look like they’re also made of repurposed silks and cottons.

Susan Berganzi: Probably old second-hand cotton, knowing me. I've been Value Villaging all my life. Anyways, I looked up the word "Chaos." And disorganized? You got it [laughs]. I'm good at that.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Yeah, it seems like the piece [Coming Out of Chaos] itself was also quite chaotic, so it's fitting all around. Did you ever get asked to design costumes for ballet performances?

Susan Berganzi: Oh, yeah. Many times. Harkness School of Ballet in New York (on 75th & Madison). Oh, it was so intimidating taking those measurements. I was like, Oh my God. That's the part I didn't like, having to measure every guy I ever saw dancing. I was like, I don't wanna do it! [laughs] [points to archival photo] This was Danceland. And that's a drawing [points to another archival photo]. A phone conversation with Lola [MacLaughlin]. How that was made up. Just talking on the phone with Lola [MacLaughlin], made her a costume at the end of it.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Dance photographs, so well. They're just some of the most amazing pictures.

Susan Berganzi: Yeah, I was the SFU photographer for theatre and – well, not so much dance because there wasn't that much dance going on. I was on video camera. But it's so easy to take a good picture of dance. Like, there they are. Hello! We had all the best visiting artists at art school [at SFU]. We had Chris Burden and we had Dan Graham. They wanted to further their careers, some of the teachers that we had, and they did. But on the other hand, SFU was a pioneer for bringing in good dance. Sara Rudner, who I think was one person from the Joffrey, maybe New York City ballet. I forget where she was from. But they had amazingly strong filmmakers. I mean, they had the people that you wanted to know show up. It was pretty great in terms of learning.

Emma Metcalfe Hurst: Do you have anything to say about why preserving contemporary dance history is important to you and what needs to be done?

Susan Berganzi: What can be done? I think it could be more democratic with the future of the dancer. In other words, we shouldn't just be forced to be dependent on unemployment [insurance]. After dedicating a lifetime to injury, they [dancers] should be given – I don't know, a role in the community. If that's in any way possible, ‘cause I think that serves them. A few less things to lose your sleep over, you lose your body, you lose your abilities, and not everybody can be on the top floor of The Dance Centre. A lot of people say that I have an issue with credit, and giving credit to the right people. I think that the dancers should be considered as important as the choreographer because they are pouring their soul on the ground and that's what you got [laughs].