The myth of the artist, who falls in love with the creature of his own creation, goes back to Ovid’s Metamorphoses.
In the 55 short verses (X 243-297) there emerges the mini-drama of Pygmalion and Galathea (here, untitled), which, as a poem, epic, novel, drama, musical or film has meanwhile undergone countless adaptations and variations.
Obsession, male fantasies, crazed demiurges? Pygmalion’s transgression of hybrid borders have fascinated the human imagination since time immemorial, courting body and soul in an erotic interplay.
The contemporary ideal of the body oscillates somewhere between the obsession with fitness and virtual future, between the cult of the body and complete disembodiment, or questions of mental and physical hindrances.
And yet, the body is always expression and medium of a self, far more than just a surface of pure externality. Power relations are defined through the body.
Hence, the question is how today artists perceive the body. In "corpus pygmalion" we also seek the specifically female standpoint in this interplay. "corpus pygmalion" takes place in a multi-dimensional image space in which the perspective on the observed subject undergoes perpetual transformation.
The body is the venue of confrontation; cultural conditions change the artistic process of transformation.
The artist finds himself, all of a sudden, in a relationship of antagonism with his work: what is cause, what is effect, what is creation, what is creature?
direction, Stage: Chris Ziegler
dance: Moya Michael, Unita Gaye Galiluyo
text: Michael Hewel
software: André Berhardt, Niko Völzow, Martin Bellardi, Chris Ziegler
music: Hugo Paquete
Chris Ziegler's page in dance-tech.net
premiere: ZKM Karlsruhe / Media Theater
sat. 17./su.18.dec. 2011 8PM 10€/7€
Dancer:
moya michael (brussel)
Moya Michael was born in Johannesburg South Africa where she trained in ballet under the direction of Dianne Sparks.
She went on to study to obtain a national diploma in Contemporary and African dance at the Tswhane University in Pretoria between 1994 and 1997. She was then awarded a full three year scholarship to study at P.A.R.T.S the School Of Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker ROSAS. There she met Akram Khan and after completing her studies moved to London and became founder member of his company.
Moya toured various of his works for a period of five years. She was nominated for a best dancer award at the “ITS” festival in 2003.
During her time in London she was commissioned to make her own work and so she created 'Hatch' which premiered at the South Bank in London in 2003.
That same year she was awarded the Standard bank Young Artist Award for dance at the National
Arts festival in Grahamstown South Africa. She was then invited back to Belgium by Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker and became a member of the ROSAS dance company where she stayed and still free lances with. In 2009 Moya was invited to create a duet for two dancers of the Attakallari dance Company for the India Bienniale in Bangalore.
That same year she was also invited to create a work on the graduate students at Arizona State University. Moya has also been member of “Eastman” and part of the latest creation of Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui "Babel" (Words)
2010.
Her latest collaboration was with the Jin Xing dance Theatre in Shanghai China and she hopes for further collaborations too.
Moya lives and works in Brussels Belgium."
