Award-winning dancer took Europe by storm – but something was missing
By Chantal Nguyen
In 2013, dancer Piran Scott moved from Australia to Europe, where he had a dream decade as a soloist with Germany’s Leipzig Ballet and Switzerland’s Ballet Theater Basel. In 2022, he was named tanz magazine’s Dancer of the Year.
But for all the success, there was something missing for Scott, who was brought up in Mackay, Northern Queensland. While he loved the beaches in Greece and Italy, he still longed for the Australian coastline of his youth.
“[They are] beautiful places to travel to, but they didn’t have the same energy that being immersed in waves in Australia has – where we think about sharks and stingers, and take our life in our own hands,” he says.
Now Scott has come home to join Sydney Dance Company (SDC), along with his wife, Brazilian dancer and fellow SDC artist Naiara de Matos. And this month SDC will feature Scott’s choreography in New Breed, its annual program featuring up-and-coming choreographers.
Piran Scott with some of the Breath dancers.Credit: Dominic Lorrimer
Called Breath, his work celebrates homecoming and Australian coastal life. Named after Tim Winton’s Miles Franklin Award-winning novel, it is performed to music by Australian guitarist John Butler.
Scott’s childhood memories are of long, idyllic days by the water.
“We’d go to the beach in the afternoon,” he says. “Walking for miles and savouring the beauty. It was almost untouched. And then playing sports on the beach or having barbecues. The beach was always present.”
Scott was 22 when the international dance scene came calling, and he moved to Europe.
“I immersed myself in the art, met friends I’ll have forever,” he says. “And then I met my wife dancing in Germany.”
But simultaneously he began seeking Winton’s novels and Butler’s music. “It was hard to reset … and build a life in Europe, being a young man.”
The books and music “were a way to bring me back to that identity of being Australian, being from Queensland, being someone who grew up so close to the beach.”
Breath features movement reflecting the shapes of cresting waves, tidal landscapes and the rhythms of Winton’s words.
“It’s a rite of passage, that experience, that surge of energy when you go into the water knowing the danger.”
Piran Scott
“He says the beach is our veranda … that we’re always looking out – that there’s a sense of being able to breathe, reset, escape. It’s a rite of passage, that experience, that surge of energy when you go into the water knowing the danger. You submit yourself to something so visibly visceral and living around you.”
Scott began creating Breath while SDC toured Western Australia, in a studio overlooking the ocean. “Down south where it’s so rugged … seeing the power of the ocean smash into our coastline. It transports you to that sense of being so small but at the same time just grateful for what we experience around us.”
Scott says much has changed in Australian dance during his 10 years away.
Breath is inspired by the Tim Winton novel of the same name.Credit: Violeta J Brosig, Blue Media Exmouth
“Coming back to Australia, it’s really interesting to see how dancing is shifting as well,” he says. “It’s got a lot of opportunities and possibilities still to be awoken. [Australia] doesn’t have the history of Europe in terms of dance in general. Or how dance is really pushing the boundaries now in Europe – dancers are becoming very versatile. They not only have those skills of incredible technique through the body, but also being able to use the voice, to sing, even to use different props and set design to create imagery.”
In Australia, Scott enthuses “it’s still a fresh sort of dynamic. Which is also exciting because new things can pop up.”
Scott says it’s been a long career trajectory from Mackay. He credits his parents, both passionate English and drama teachers.
“Alongside doing dance at a young age, I also was studying drama from my parents,” he says. “And they made all of my siblings and I go to piano lessons and sports – they really wanted us to be well-rounded, which is beautiful.”
Scott’s father was his main support through dance training. “He took me to this class when I was a toddler, a Tiny Tot’s dance class called ‘Mummy and Me’. Then he said to the dance teacher: ‘You can’t call it ‘Mummy and Me’, it has to be ‘Parent and Me’! That was so funny. They actually did change the name, too.”
Scott’s father found the dance school scene “a nightmare with the dance mums at the local eisteddfod”.
“He would help me do my stage make-up because he had a drama background. But the looks we got … these two guys amid the whole hairspray dynamic. We definitely felt out of place. But I’m glad my parents persevered.
“Now it’s like a beautiful moment that I get to share: not only being a dancer in Australia and coming back, being immersed in the cultural scene here, but also being able to create.”
New Breed by Sydney Dance Company, until December 14, Carriageworks