In 2011 Helena Franzén was selected to create S" which premiered at Dansens Hus in Stockholm in September 2012. One month after, she talked with us about her project.
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moduldance (46)
Slovenian dance house Plesna Izba Maribor proposed Jasmina Križaj for modul-dance with the project The Very Delicious Piece. She talks about its development in this interview, done in October 2012 during the modul-dance conference that took place in Tilburg.
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When I first heard about modul-dance and realised that 20 European dance houses would be taking part in this project I thought I’d struck the jackpot.
However, on a personal level, modul-dance remained a ghost in my eyes. Indeed, I did have my 3 partners with all of whom I had shared unquestionably fruitful experiences.
But somehow it was still a mystery to me how this huge network could have really worked between us all and how we could communicate. Meetings with my partners were on a one-to-one basis when I visited them. I choose the word “visit” as I was not seeking a residency but instead opted to visit them and engage in a number of experiments at their destinations or their festivals that were linked to my research at the time. Hellerau was the "only" partner who was able to handle the "presentation-modul", and I am delighted and thankful for that. I say "able" as I have realised that the people involved in the modul-dance project like to make reference to the "weak" or "strong" partners one comes to rely on. I discovered that Hellerau constituted a strong partner as they were able to back the artistic project with funds. Perhaps I have won the jackpot after all? (not to say that I, personally did not find my other partners strong as well).
Indeed, I am very pleased to be able to appoint Hellerau as my co-producer/partner for the future! And this is of course thanks to our experience with modul-dance. So, I won the jack-pot afterall!?? But is the modul-dance jackpot not more in the sense of widening your European connections and engaging in personal and artistic dialogue with many European partners!?? And shouldn’t that be the real jackpot that all of these modul-dance-partners are already being inter-connected enabling artists to use an entire network speeding up the dissemination of artistic work because artists do not need to approach each party individually!?
And is this the reason why the network stays a ghost to me, as I have not been able to connect to new partners! ? Or is it due to the fact that Hellerau is a German partner I knew previously, and this does not feel very European to me!? However, perhaps it is because at these modul-dance conferences I met so many people who are involved with the network who then disappear again? Or is it because I had a different concept of how dissemination should operate? Maybe, therefore, I should simply let my own image go. As images always remain a ghost.
First I thought that my personal problem was that I was not seeking a residency. Yet, I believe residencies are perchance the best way to engage in direct, personal dialogue with an institution - thus getting to know the ghost. Therefore, I decided to visit the two partners I knew were unable to present my work but were supporting the artistic research for it. And without going into detail, both visits - the festival with Goran/Kino Šiška and the modul-dance-festival in Stockholm - were highly friendly, enriching experiences. But then again, I knew Goran from before and I knew my main contributors from Dansens Hus. They seemed real to me before. But despite the advantage of such a huge network with so many houses I had formerly been unfamiliar with, they still somehow remained a ghost to me.
Even when I recently performed my latest work nimmer in Hellerau I was fortunate to meet other modul-dance artists but no modul-dance institution. But perhaps that fits in with the subject I was working on in that piece, which ist he subject of "disappearance".
However, I state in this work that "nothing can disappear. It all comes back again, doesn't it?"
I know one day I will meet these ghosts. I merely need to learn how to call them.
Antje Pfundtner in Gesellschaft
Picture: © Anja Beutler
Mala Kline is one of the modul-dance artists selected in 2011. Her project, entitled Eden has been awarded in Slovenia. She was proposed for the modul-dance project by Kino Šiška Ljubljana. Interview done during the modul-dance conference that took place in Tilburg in October 2012.
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The German artist Irene Schröder visited Graner in October 2012 for a modul-dance Carte Blanche residency.
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Danish choreographer Tina Tarpgaard was proposed for the modul-dance project by Dansehallerne Copenhagen and was selected in 2010. In this interview, done during the modul-dance conference that took place in Tilburg in October 2012, she talks about her experience within modul-dance and the project developed, entitled Living Room.
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I Description
The performance is in the form of a circuit situated in a horticultural nursery on the outskirts of Cologne. The circuit consists of three buildings whose interiors are divided and semanticised during the course of the performance: a big, brick-walled greenhouse, a small glass greenhouse and a hothouse with a solid sliding door and side sheets. These buildings are at right angles to one another, with the small glass greenhouse, about 2x3m, at the intersection.
The performance begins at the front of the large brick greenhouse. The five female performers – all “experts in everyday life” – plant flowerpots lined on a trolley, each bearing a sign. On each pot is a label for different gender identities, key concepts of gender studies, names from queer culture, general expressions of uncertainty, symbols and lettering in Bengali. Each of the small flowerpots is planted together with a colourful piece of candy: “Take a goody – take a fixation”, the installation seems to say, “Both are sweet – and neither are natural”.
After the flowerpots are planted, the five performers move to their respective positions, among which the audience can move freely and decide for themselves where and when to enter and leave the on-going performances (I also jumped from one place to the next, meaning that the following cannot be a full representation of what was going on).
Annonya and Katha stay at the large greenhouse. They are both hijra, representatives and activists of the “third gender” in Bangladesh, and trained dancers. They begin by presenting the hijra culture from its ritual colourful side. Flanked by two canvases showing films from their everyday lives and urban and rural street life, along with familiar religious moments, they erect a ritual space with silver vase-like vessels and colourful gift boxes, lining it with Bengali lettering in flower potting soil. Here they dress in traditional garments, speak and sing into microphones, thereby illustrating the traditional role of the third gender of blessing families at weddings, house-warming celebrations and births of children. There is something double-edged about the processes throughout; the performers seem ironically distanced and at some point a shifting occurs that is unavoidable if the hijra are not to be idealised but realistically portrayed: the pictorial Bengali façade breaks. The performers move towards the audience, clapping. “Hey, hey, hey, we’re hijra. We’re poor, give us some money”. They leave the ritual space. In a monotone green-planted part of the greenhouse, Katha erects upside-down hammers, sheathing the stems with condoms. She plants the colourful Bengali condom packaging amid the green monoculture. Poverty and forced prostitution: the dark side of the otherwise colourful third gender, which in modern secularised Bengali culture has no alternative income. Katha is instructed in her sheathing of the hammers by Annonya, who (we learn from the performer biography in the programme) also works as an activist and sex worker consultant in Bangladesh.
At the end of their multi-faceted performances and stories, the two dancers move into a tent located in front of the large greenhouse, where they prepare food on gas stoves and eat until the end of the event: a working day consisting of conversation, feast, charity, education and paid sex reaches its humble end.
In the second position, the small greenhouse, there is a red sofa. Here, Cuban native Melissa Marie García Noriega tells the story of her life – sometimes face-to-face, sometimes simply lost in her own thoughts. A carefree childhood, in which no one was bothered by the boy behaving girlishly; then a rape, the knowledge that the girl in her had been abused; a lack of family acceptance of her feminine demeanour at puberty, the grotesque urge to become a Cuban macho, then, finally, deliverance. Art studies, psychotherapy, the birth of a son, the possibilities of a new self-determination in living with a man and eventually her sex change to become the woman she had already been. Melissa still lives with the same partner; the audience is caught up in the sweet relief of a happy ending. During all these stories, which may have given rise to either concern among the audience or, even worse, the feeling of psychotherapeutic authority, the dancer and choreographer succeeds in remaining dominant throughout. The red couch is not a Freudian spot for self-exposure, but an arena in which Melissa moves through gloom, aggression, ironic poses, excitement and truly refreshing directness. The amiability that she arouses in doing so, the self-confidence that she exudes, catches the audience and turns it into a close friend – and if there were not the other “stages” yet to visit, one would stay to listen to her much longer.
Melissa’s story alternates between her experiences in Cuba and Germany, the greenhouse serving as an intercultural intersection which connects the Bengali scenery in the large greenhouse with that in the hothouse opposite. The latter are dedicated to gender approaches in Western culture. Initially, the sliding door of the hothouse is open and we see earth grooves in the fore room, jackets on hangers above. In perspective, the “asparagus field” – masculine connotation attended – stretches out into a monoculture of pansies. The trained mathematician and physicist Michelle Niwicho begins to label the sliding doors with the milestones of her life. Then she closes the door from the inside and it takes a while before the audience discovers that they are not locked out, but can observe the interior through the rolled-up sheets at the side. At first, one feels forced to a voyeurism, but the inner actions soon clarify that the opposite is the case. There is a need for the construction of this interior, or rather, this inner life, in order that messages may be sent out of this mentality of security.
Michelle constructs her workplace: desktop, laptop, mouse. Here (as in real life) she writes a blog that can be read both on the PC screen, and on the canvas located at the inner side of the sliding door. The text is about the decision to live as a transgender woman, about the problems arising from the fact of being a father of three when she finally came out, of the bureaucratic difficulties of being recognised as a third gender in Germany; but also about acceptance in one’s own family, managing one’s career, rising assertiveness and wonderfully grotesque moments of everyday life. Following Michelle’s words as she writes, her correction of spelling errors, the search for the right phrases, produces a similar emotional closeness as to the life story told by Melissa in her greenhouse.
While she writes, Michelle gets up and with a pair of pliers cuts the wires holding the jackets one by one, letting them fall to the ground. Every time a male garment is removed, she pulls a cord, and female clothes grow from the asparagus beds... like Spartoi springing from dragon’s teeth: the ancient warriors of Thebes – the modern struggle of the transgender woman.
At the back, in a field of yellow blooming pansies (also cropped with high heels), the Brazilian performer Greta Pimenta removes her female clothing and puts it on hangers, much like the jackets at the front. She showers naked for almost the entire performance and presents her female body with male genitals. She remains silent throughout. As always when an audience is confronted with nudity, there is irritation, and the mixture of sexual markers certainly intensifies this. But the fact that the performer is naked for over an hour, in which she never gives the impression of being watched or feeling embarrassed, alters the perception of her bi-gender body to a normality: it belongs – to both the performance and the utopia of a free society.
As a whole, the two areas of the hothouse function as the union of two aspects of transgenderness: Michelle’s intellectual approach, which does not shy away from self-doubt, and Greta’s unquestionable confidence: two states of an inner life, intellect and body, which is presented to the audience with a permissiveness that annihilates the exploitative habit of voyeurism.
II Relation to spatial theory
The production convincingly works with the cultural semantisation of the physical structures: the “otherness” of the Bengali hijra in the large greenhouse, the link of interculturality in the smaller greenhouse, and one’s “own” culture in the hothouse, all logically connected on a circuit through which the audience is allowed to wander freely. The venue thereby becomes the representation of a larger circuit or (according to Foucault), a Heterotopia, which draws opposite and remote elements together in a microcosm representing the whole.
Another interpretation is provided through the performers’ biographies, which form one of the fundaments of the production. The individual nature of these prohibits any cultural generalization. There is a variety of body concepts depending on the individual performer and his cultural frame, reaching from the mythical connotations but social exclusion of third genderness, to hormone treatment and finding deliverance in the revised body, textural reflections of the gender shift and the self-confident presentation of both sexes in one body. All of this is presented to the audience not in a brash, but in a quiet, sensitive, humorous, thoughtful and very rich visual appearance. And with this, transsexualism proves itself to be far “more natural” than the dominant heteronormativity and sexual binarity of our society. This allows an intercultural and transgender discourse to be personally experienced, intellectually as well as emotionally. An experience like this makes it clear that talking merely about the third gender is not enough to achieve an acceptance that includes all aspects of sexual versatility.
The spatial semantics of the place itself, the municipal horticultural nursery, is an elementary constituent of this combination of interculturality and transsexuality: the greenhouse as the epitome of our “will to breed”, of the artificial and authoritarian compulsion to frantically produce normativity: a non-place in the pejorative sense, deindividualising and alienating (Augé); monocultures as symbols of a society that wraps a hostile tristesse around non-conforming bodies, compelling them to adapt. But in the end, these bodies look more natural in the eyes of the audience than the compulsive order of “asparagus vs. pansies”. Thus, the imagery of the performance generates an effect of great sustainability in the viewer’s mind, giving her/him a glimpse of utopia.
Also, the production cleverly points beyond the confines of the nursery, as it stands in the shadow of the phallus-like tower of Cologne-Poll’s Technical Control Centre (TÜV). This is not just a place for general (and in this case typical German) normalisation, but had also been the birthplace of the DIN standards for breast implants – a cradle of normalised gender features which the colourful activities of ID-Clash contrasts with the image of versatile self-determination. If one adds the sadness of the adjacent monotonous rows of graves of the Deutzer cemetery or even the nearby (and even more German) allotments with its garden gnomes (including pompously phallic jelly bag caps), it becomes clear that a better location can hardly be imagined for this performance.
In addition, it is worth noting that the 1st of November 2013 finally saw the “third gender” legally recognized in Germany: Hiesl and Kaiser’s performance, which is to run again in Dresden in 2015, can be seen as a celebration of this event. Or better still, an accompanying ritual, which converts the deindividualising place of monoculture and gender norms into an utopian space of intercultural and transgendered freedom.
Picture: Cologne 2013. © Roland Kaiser
When José Laginha, from Capa/Devir (a cultural structure in the sunny south coast of Portugal) introduced us to modul-dance network we knew very little of it, except that some other Portuguese choreographers (Tânia Carvalho and Cláudia Dias) had also been supported by it in the previous editions.
The meeting in Barcelona, in November 2012, was the first moment we got to grasp the dimension of this network. It was surprising to see the variety of artists, programmers and their specific projects/contexts of action. Although big in scale, the meeting seemed to have the right balance of formality and informality for an actual exchange to happen, and we were caught by its intensity and the way everyone was focused to make it significant and useful.
In that meeting we found affinities with a group of four partners that hosted our project - Satellites - in several residencies over the year. They were Arts Station Foundation, Dance Ireland, Duncan Dance Centre and El Graner. Each place had its own atmosphere and each had inevitably a very specific influence in the way we approached our research. It’s intriguing to notice that no matter how concrete and precise your artistic research is, the characteristics of the studio, its temperature, its privacy, the place where you sleep, the food, the streets you pass by, the familiarity or not with the language, the people you interact with and many other details will work on your research stretching it into unpredictable morphologies.
One can almost draw a big circle in a map connecting those four structures we have collaborated with, starting in Dublin, drawing a soft curve until Poznań, then down to Athens and from there making our way up again to Barcelona. Curiously, like Lisbon, all of these cities make part of some kind of geographical periphery. Not to force a geopolitical layer to this coincidence, but there is something quite interesting in our orbit through this constellation of countries that have a lot of similarities in their recent social and economical histories; specially when one of the main axis of our research in Satellites is about the tension between centre and periphery and the atomization of the centre.
Satellites' first residency was in Poznań and it was marked by a particular research on movement and voice. The residency happened in the same space we had presented one of our works, in the context of Malta Festival, half a year before. It makes a lot of sense when there’s continuity in the relation between artists and partners, and modul-dance just made this possible. As it usually happens, the first residency is where we end up doing everything we had previously thought about the project, as if to take those first preconceived ideas out of the way so that other things coming from the experience of doing may emerge. Not to forget the open class we were invited to give to a vigorous and enthusiastic local community.
Then, in Dublin, we've continued the research ending with an informal open-doors rehearsal where we could share some of the embryonic material with a few spectators and discuss the concepts that were being set as a basis for the work. Work-in-progress showings are something that we tend to avoid; yet, the thing that made sense wasn't exactly what we shared but that it served as a pretext for dialogue. We had also the opportunity to discover and be inspired by Casement’s complex and wonderful life (thanks Paul, for The Black Diaries).
In Athens, we've worked for a week mainly on sound and text, using the surroundings to capture different sounds and test a few ideas about the interaction of the body with the space mediated by a recorded voice. It's impossible not to visit the city and be completely drawn into one of he world's oldest cities, especially when the person who's hosting you is such a passionate guide. In the following week we presented a piece of ours in Arc for dance Festival that had a small focus on modul-dance artists.
Finally, in Barcelona we where able to invite two collaborators of our project, and share some of the ideas that we had been exploring previously, testing them with other bodies and amplifying their possibilities. In El Graner, the term residency was accurately employed because we would sleep and work in the same building. Other artists were also developing their own projects and the fact that we shared a physical space together fostered a genuine curiosity for each other's works.
Now that modul-dance's edition is coming to an end we feel privileged to having been part of it. It is clear that it isn't just about the time you spend in the network, or the obvious benefits of being supported by it; but it's also about encouraging dialogue and setting out grounds for future collaborations.
Picture: © Sofia Dias & Vítor Roriz
My first encounter with the modul-dance network was in November 2012 in Barcelona when I presented my work and the idea of the piece Duel. I was trumphally pregnant at that time so I new that if I want to create that show I would really need some support. My budget was ridicoulously small and on top I wished to check for the first time how it is to direct the others without being at the same time a performer (regarding my condition but as well in order to change the way I used to work). And thanks to the modul-dance network I managed.
After the mentionned above presentation it took me a year to finalize the piece. I was already after a first research period. All the working phases took places in the associated dance houses. Luckily three of them coproduced the show (one came "on board" after the meeting in Barcelona). Besides that and a help of the Polish Ministry of Culture (received by the Art Stations Foundation) I did not get any other support. So the budget stayed small but what had mainly changed was the fact that I could offer to the team very good conditions of work. The modular system helped me to get distance to the created material and to continue working in the "between periods". It gave me more time to prepare the studio rehearsals were the whole team would gather together. It was needed as in the same time I was taking care of the production matters. That why I apreciated the fact that we have met everybody personally in Barcelona. It helped the communication process to become smooth and direct without any burocractic nonsense or stiff protocols. It was honestly a great relief and this "humane" aspect of the whole production process I appreciate the most. I find it harder to establish an easy going relation with the programmer than with the other artist but within the modul-dance network it all happened in a relaxed way. I guess because the rules were very clear: it was all about matching. The artists were looking for the right house to get the right support for his/hers work, the curators were looking for the right artists to help him/her develop the right work. And whatever right means it was clear from the beginning that there is no need to come along with everybody.
So now its end of April 2014. My son Leon is 16 months old and the Duel had its premiere in November 2013. But... the show is not over . The original crew of the piece hapilly decided to spread in the world with their own babies so now it is my time to perform the piece. At the moment I'm working with another dancer on an adaptation of Duel which will be presented in Poznań in Art Stations Foundation the upcoming June and later on in CND Paris in November (were I was invited for a residency to rehearse the new version of the show). So luckily, even after the premiere I still get the chance to work on the piece following the idea that the "final presentation" does not have to be the end of creation.
Picture: © Peter Fiebig
Itamar Serussi was selected for the modul-dance project after being proposed by Danshuis Station Zuid Tilburg. During the modul-dance conference that took place in October 2012 in Tilburg, Serussi talked with us about Mono, the piece developed under the project and inspired while buying a pram for his newly born twins. The advertisement said "In three clicks from mono to duo". In effect, mono is about several effects, directions, decisions and happenings coming together, and thus creating something new. Things that somehow "click" in place as well. As his own life does right now with the birth of his two kids, the international acclaim he experiences and this first chance to make a full-length dance piece for the theater.
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The Italian artist Alessandro Sciarroni was selected for the modul-dance project after being proposed by Centro per la Scena Contemporanea Bassano del Grappa. Here, an interview with him during the research process of his project: UNTITLED_I will be there when you die.
Interview with Alessandro Sciarroni from Modul-dance on Vimeo.
In September 2011 Anne Juren and Roland Rauschmeier wrote the following text regarding their experience within the modul-dance project. They have developed the project entitled Tableaux Vivants, where the art forms interweave and allow hybrid relations to develop between the paintings, sculptures and videos and the bodies of the performers.
Within the frame of the modul-dance project, we worked in three different locations (Faro/Portugal, Poznań/Poland and Ljubljana/Slovenia) on the conceptualisation, ideal configuration and technical translation of our idea for Tableaux Vivants.
During our stay in Faro, the composer Johannes Maria Staud gave us a compilation of his works based on the suite Berenice so that we could take some initial decisions on the choice of music. We also developed a comprehensive mind map that included socio-historic facts, artists and relevant eras for our performance. The southern atmosphere and some very pleasant and spacious studios made Faro an ideal place to work and make an in-depth study of concepts and ideas in a relaxed way.
In Poznań we analysed our artistic stance in the context of plastic and performance arts so that we could establish the underlying structure of the piece. We decided to develop five thematic groups on Europe’s cultural development, using an approach that spanned several, bringing them together in terms of space and performance set-up.
To do so, we stuck to the time sequence of the themes, starting with the wall paintings of Lascaux caves and moving on to the origins of central perspective in the Renaissance and the optimistic abundance of the Baroque. In the fourth part of our artistic research we hit upon the idea of reinterpreting the Oskar Schlemmer and Bauhaus Triadic ballet. The last part tackles the problems of giving today’s artistic output validity and meaning in relation to the media cannons and their inherent evaluation. The choice of each cultural era is tied to personal experiences, such as a trip to Lascaux or extensive research into the influence that Bauhaus has had on the artistic development of Juren and Rauschmeier.
In Ljubljana, during a relatively initial stage of the project’s conception, we were able to work on the lighting for the definitive performance. This allowed us to dedicate more time to experiment with the inclusion of several media and genres with our performers.
We also made the final musical selection, by this point Staud had already made four versions. We would like to emphasise Johannes Maria Staud’s openness and interest in our work and how he adapted to our – ever changing – way of creating. From a musical perspective he accompanied and complemented the development of the piece. In the woodlands around Ljubljana we organised a photographic session in which we researched the "Bauhaus party” of 1924. This session also led to a number of videos and important ideological considerations for future projects.
In short, without the modul-dance project, we wouldn’t have had access to the conditions and resources necessary to create Tableaux Vivants. We hope to be able to bring our performance to as many project participants as possible!
Picture: © Angela Bedekovic
In May 2011, Tina Tarpgaard published this article in one of the modul-dance newsletters. How does she work as an independent artist in Denmark?
In the fall 2011 I will start the first residency as part of the modul-dance project. Together with my group of dancers and software artists (recoil performance group) I am invited to spend two weeks in the excellent facilities at the Tanzhaus NRW in Düsseldorf. Later we will travel to Ljubljana to spend a week researching in collaboration with the innovative dance house Kino Siska. Both giving us a great opportunity to work focused with the concept we have developed as a base for our new production Living-Room. The performance will be produced at Dansehallerne in Copenhagen with the premiere on March 10th 2012.
The advantages of moving yourself and the group you are working with, to a place "away from home" are many. I think most people know the feeling of the intensity that can buil within a group when you not only work together, but also have a mutual experience of new sorroundings, finding your way together, get lost together, dining together. etc.
It amplifies that feeling of a journey and ties connections that are priceless in a working process - at least to me.
But of course you don't move yourself just for the comfort and team building. The challenges and inspirations are equally important. So the prospect of meeting professionals from different arts communities is exciting, both professionals I usually work with but also to meet different approaches.
For example: The way our support system in Denmark is put together (as well as the habits and traditions I suppose) makes it quite rare that choreographers have the means for close collaboration with dramaturges. I believe that this can be unfortunate for the artistic processes and eventually for the performance that is presented to the audience. I am therefore excited to have the chance to meet and collaborate with with dramaturgical professionals at Tanzhaus NRW. In Ljubjana I will have the chance to meet and collaborate with local dancers, a great source of inspiration for me and the group.
Recoil performance group, with whom I usually work and create performances, has a quite specific interest in the collaboration between dance and software art. The amount of work that goes in to this collaboration is usually quite substantial and of high significance to our productions. Therefore I am hoping, that besides meeting dancers, choreographers and dramaturges, I will have the chance to meet professionals from the visual art, video and software art communities. More over I hope to get the artist from the different ways of creating performing arts, to meet each other. This could be in showings, roundtable meetings or other situations that could facilitate dialog, exchange of experience and ideas etc.
Already being part of the initial meeting in Lyon, late summer 2010, it struck me (not surprisingly) that the production habits, economical support structures, level of intervention/collaboration between dance houses and artists etc., are significantly different in between the European countries represented in the modul-dance project. I hope that by visiting both Tanzhaus NRW and Kino Šiška I get at chance to get a deeper understanding of the structures there and how it affects the work of the artists, the audience building and the general working and presentation frame of performing arts.
Working as an independent artist in Denmark has caused me to raise a number of questions to how our structure is put together. For me the participation in the modul-dance project is a great opportunity to seek inspiration and exchange experiences with houses and artist communities on both the creative process as well as the structures that we as independent artist are surrounded by. Especially as the project spans over all the different steps of creation: research, residency and production/presentation. I find this very valuable and hope to exchange constructive ideas that can facilitate the development of artist communities as well as personal development as a performing artist.
Picture: © Søren Meisner
SÂLMON< festival starts its second edition. Mercat de les Flors and Graner remain committed to talent, to creators with new proposals, artists with fresh ideas, European and, sometimes, going against the current. A look at local and international artists in the framework of the artistic residencies offered by Graner, centre for dance creation and the European modul-dance project. A busy programme of events lasting two weeks, with different formats and diverse approaches to the body and movement.
The festival, that will take place from October the 19th to November the 3rd, offers a look at international creations linked to the modul-dance project. The Loose Collective will open the festival with a concert-performance about the Old Testament. Other artists who were in residence at Graner while creating their shows will be presented during SÂLMON
SÂLMON< aims to consolidate itself as a space that gives visibility to different ways of understanding choreography. The festival includes shows, laboratories for professionals, spaces for reflection and spaces for meetings with the public.
More information: www.salmon-dance.com
On 17th April Arno Schuitemaker premiered his modul-dance project "I is an Other" at Chassé Theatre in Breda. Here, some of the good reviews he got:
The climax [of the performance] is smart and touching. (...) Then you see how there can be a dialogue, a shared universe, between two different worlds. Exactly what a metaphor does - Mirjam van der Linden, De Volkskrant (4/5 stars)
The choreography of Schuitemaker is transparant and unimposing, almost poetry, (...) with subtle lines, flowing movements and inventive reflections between the 'I' and the 'other' - Kester Freriks, Theaterkrant.nl (4/5 stars)
Utmost concentration and extreme control over the entire body. And the audience becomes thoughtful and enchanted. - Joris van Laak, Brabants Dagblad
I is an Other is a breath of fresh air. Schuitemaker chooses for depth and content. - Pauline Weijs, Cultuurbewust.nl (4/5 stars)
Tundra
In a nameless land, where there’s more darkness than daylight…he sat in the long white hut, at the table, tapping /his mother sat at the back of his mouth and the black sun was born/ the black sun was born…
Tundra is a wild and dangerous place inhabited by a cast of outsiders, where tension and absurdity simmer and the unseen world stirs. Reality and fantasy blur as the characters meet their darker selves and strive to escape to an imagined future filled with hope and possibility.
Summoning beauty and transformation, Tundra explores the antagonistic relations between darkness and light and the poetry of heaven and hell erupting in and around all of us, via folklore and surrealist cinema. Emma Martin Dance presents a bold and ambitious show which will open the 10th Dublin Dance Festival, featuring an exciting blend of theatre, live music and dance.
An Kaler will be presenting Insignificant Others (learning to look sideways) on 16th of October 2013 at RMNSC Krakow and on 22nd of October 2013 at STUK Leuven.
What are ways of distributing, or partitioning, or fragmenting presence when being together?
Insignificant Others examines the Tableaux as a shifting structure that diplays the process of the performers co-operating in modes of conducting, structuring and shifting a shared topography of physical presence and absence in fragmented cycles of movements.
The performers are as spectres and carriers of ambiguous images, still and fluctuating. A series of discontinuous but interconnected still postures that make images and situations between the performers but never quite build a shared narrative. Rather than a dramaturgy of determination, the artists are simultaneously working alone together as if in a field of energy that needs careful management, redistribution and direction, here they are making a dance out of the reabsorption of this energy field into the bodies of the empty space, themselves and the perception of audience. Harboured in that which is deemed unaffirmative pure potential is what is performed.
Picture: © Eva Würdinger
“He got his strength up flush and in full glitter…”
(“Tundra” by Emma Martin Dance – Dublin Dance Festival, May 2014)
Photo by Luca Truffarelli/ © Emma Martin Dance 2014
CoFestival is three festivals in one: modul-dance, Ukrep and Pleskavica. Under the title The Art of Coliving, Kino Šiška Ljubljana presents its second edition, that will take place from 17th to 21th June and from 21th to 27th September.
Under the umbrella of the modul-dance project, the event will open with Marcos Morau/La Veronal and their recently premiered Siena, a reflection on the conception of the human body, used by the artists as a container and projector of meanings, as well as an exploration of the history of Italian art in a journey that begins in the Renaissance (17 June).
Mixing digital arts, urban and traditional dances lil'dragon, piece of the modul-dance selected artist Eric Minh Cuong Castaing, will propose a sensory experience toward a feeling of future, physical and imperceptible (20 June).
The program also includes a new edition of the ShortDanceFilms, a film screenings curated by Núria Font/Nu2's (18 June).
In September, one of the last modul-dance selected artists, Jurij Konjar will premiere in Slovenia his new piece Still.
The complete programme includes not only dance, but also workshops, theatre and dj sessions.
For more than 20 years, the International Theatre Festival Malta has been a melting pot of traditions, themes and forms. The distinctive feature of the festival is the fusion of concerts of international stars, experimental shows, small projects in the city space and discussions with scholars.
Poznań will host from the 24th of June to the 20th of July a new edition of the Malta Festival, where contemporary dance is always present. A representation of the modul-dance project will be concentrated in a few days of the most innovative choreography. Anne Juren will present Tableaux Vivants (25 June) and Magali Milian and Romuald Luydlin, members of La Zampa their Spekies (27 June). Polish audience will have the chance to discover one of the artists selected in 2012, An Kaler who will perform On Orientations/Untimely Encounters twice in the same day (26 June).
Marie-Caroline Hominal and Sofia Dias & Vítor Roriz, modul-dance selected artists, are too part of the programme with other titles, Bat (26 June) and A gesture that is nothing but a threat (28 June), respectively.
All the shows will take place at Stary Browar, home of the Art Stations Foundation Poznań, one of the modul-dance partners.
