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.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
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.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
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
In 2011 I was privileged to be selected by modul-dance to create the performance Slipping Through My Fingers which premiered at Dansens Hus in Stockholm in September 2012.
In this project I deepened my collaboration with three dancers I have worked with for some years now; Katarina Eriksson, Moa Westerlund and Aleksandra Sende, but I also introduced a new dancer to the group; Elizaveta Penkova.
By my side was also Jukka Rintamäki, the composer I have worked closely together with for the last nine years. This time we were happy to invite Johan Skugge, a composer collaborating with Jukka. The duo performed live on stage, playing lap steel guitar and piano, combined with pre-recorded sound.
[vimeo http://www.vimeo.com/51664114 w=700&h=350]
Being a modul-dance artist enabled me to - for the first time - work together with my dancers and musicians outside Sweden creating the piece. The possibility of making new contacts with other artists and of course meeting a new audience is very valuable and supported me to grow as a chorographer.
My collaborators in the different “modules” has so far been two residencies at deVIR/ CAPa in Faro, Duncan Dance Research Center and presentation at Dansens Hus, Stockholm and Mercat de les Flors, Barcelona.
In Faro we started off the creative process. It was a great experience to begin the work in a new surrounding. This week in March we somehow got the chance to meet each other from scratch, since we were all there together under the same circumstances. We became our own masters of our time and the space. We realized how important the atmosphere of the space is and how it affects the qualities of the movements: the quiet, grey light created a strong, contrast to the intense light on the outside. This was a source of inspiration for the light design that I passed on to my light designer, Markus Granqvist. The calm surrounding and the friendly atmosphere in Faro made our group tighter and made us work very concentrated. Jukka Rintamäki found some new sounds on his lap steel guitar and recorded some improvisations that we also used later in the piece, the sounds transformed during the process and got deconstructed and manipulated many times during the process.
In April I had a week of residency in Athens, at The Isadora & Raymond Duncan Dance Research Center. This time I went on my own. It was a very intense week and I had the time to rehearse the solo I created for myself that was a part of Slipping Through My Fingers. I also had the great opportunity to give two classes to professional dancers and got to meet some of the local dancers and choreographers. The last day of my stay I presented a part of the solo work and talked generally about my work in an open showing. It’s very important to continue the discussions about the working conditions in the dance field and how we can survive in the profession.
Dansens Hus in Stockholm was my partner of production and presentation and offered a very generous period in their rehearsal studio and also a longer time on stage, preparing for the premiere. Their support was genuine and important.
Slipping Through My Fingers opened in 28th September, and I was very happy to receive a very positive feedback from both the press and the audience at Dansens Hus.
In November we took part of the SÂLMON< festival at Mercat de les Flors in Barcelona. This was a great experience to us all. It was my first time to perform in the south of Europe and we got a very good feeling coming from the audience. My work is probably different from the work that is created outside Scandinavia in the sense that it’s visually strong and maybe more quiet in the expression. It would have been interesting to have a talk with the audience afterwards and actually discuss the work and listen to the reactions and raise even more thoughts about what is defining us as choreographers. Do we have some recognizable qualities because of our nationality that define us as artists? Do I belong to some Scandinavian tradition in my way of creating and in my aesthetic choices? All those questions actually have grown during my experience with modul-dance.
I’m very happy to hear that the collaboration within modul-dance continues also after the year has finished, that I am still a modul-dance artist and can continue to network and work on new contacts. One year is very short to develop a network and I’m looking forward to seeing all modul-dance people soon again!
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.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
loscorderos is a Spanish company selected by modul-dance in 2012 to develop the piece ULTRA_innocence. We interviewed Pablo Molinero during their residency at Graner, in Barcelona.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
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
By Bertram Müller, Director of Tanzhaus NRW Düsseldorf.
The production process and the guest performance of Narcisses by Coraline Lamaison (France) was an excellent and instructive example of a European coproduction within the frame of the modul-dance project. The respective parts of the trilogy, which deals with the phenomenon of female narcissism in different ways, originated in three distinct places and premiered in three different places as well, in the last instance with the duet Narcisses-2.0, featuring the magnificent dancers Annabelle Chambon and Els Deceukelier. In the run-up, as a result of the second part of the production which originated in France, a great flutter and a fierce debate arose in the press and on the Internet in Düsseldorf because two real wolves were envisaged for that piece. In France that did not entail any problem either from the legal standpoint or for the enthusiastic audience. In a drawn-out debate with animal protection societies, the government veterinary department and the press, the fact was pointed out to the choreographer and the director of the dance centre Tanzhaus NRW that, regarding the stage appearance of animals and particularly of wolves, different and substantially stricter rules apply in Germany than in France. For a wolf to appear, a petition would have to be filed. As a result, the choreographer prepared a suitable German version which, even without the wolves, won warm acclaim and enthusiasm. It was a didactic play about immoral cultural feelings, laws and the fact that the freedom of art in the European countries has different limits. Exceptionally enjoyable was the charismatic British performer Kate Strong, who worked for many years in Frankfurt under William Forsythe and with the Volksbühne, the same as Annabelle Chambon and Els Deceukelier, who are considered essential protagonists in Fabre’s work. Not only the press, but also the audience had warm praise for the depiction and interpretation of female narcissism, terming it existential, humorous, incisive and brilliant. With her three-part production, the choreographer Coraline Lamaison has convincingly shown that, within the frame of modul-dance, she can deal with an extremely topical subject, female narcissism, in an exceptionally exciting production on a highly aesthetic level that confronts the different cultural habits of perception and is consequently of cross-border significance.
Indeed, this production has, as few others, so enthused and convinced many of my colleagues and me myself that I can most sincerely recommend it here to all organizers of today’s contemporary dance.
The modul-dance selected artist Eric Minh Cuong Castaing / Cie. Shonen is working on a new project. Entitled "School of moon", it will be a performance for 10 children, 6 robots nao and 2 dancers. The project is a metaphor for a new world colonized by miniature bodies, evocating a world of tomorrow. This dream resizes the stage, which is changed by the use of new technology too. This cel- ebration of the construction of a micro-society, between robotics and pagan dance, questions our im- pregnating abilities, fascination for artificial, and free will.
SCHOOL OF MOON : " robot, kid, war, love & dance..." from SHONEN on Vimeo.
More information here.
<p class="first">In 2012 MOM/ELVIVERO proposed Lucy Suggate and Sonia Gómez to collaborate in an artistic project. <em>Dance Pals</em> was the first phase of their work together within the Carte Blanche programme in the framework of the modul-dance project, invited by Dansehallerne (Copenhagen) and Graner (Barcelona). <em>The inquisitive middle</em> is a production of the TNT Festival (Terrassa), Sonia Gómez-Lucy Suggate and MOM/ELVIVERO. With the collaboration of Dansehallerne (Copenhagen), Graner and Sâlmon< Festival (Barcelona). Lucy Suggate is supported by Arts Coucil of England.</p>
This interview was done by Graner during their Carte Blanche residency in Barcelona (April 2013).
More modul-dance videos on <a href="http://www.numeridanse.tv/en/channels/moduldance/" target="_blank"><strong>Numeridanse.tv</strong></a>.
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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
Emma Martin has been named by the Tanz Magazine as 1 of the 3 Hoffnungstraeger ("bearers of hope") 2014 in its yearbook. Read here the whole article in German.
Since the premiere of Tundra last May, the reviews of the project have been excellent. Read here some of them.
I was recommended by Plesna Izba Maribor as one of the modul-dance artists in 2012. They also promised to be the main producers of the performance and cover the premiere, so all I needed to get on board were at least three partners. I was seducing them in Barcelona and gave it all to catch their attention, which was not easy. It felt like I was a product on sale and they are buying. There was no big interest but in the end I got what I wanted; three research spaces/residencies, one in Portugal, one in Denmark and one in Slovenia. They offered working space, accommodation, travel costs and per diems, so all the basic needs were covered and I could focus on work, away from trivial obligations in my home town. Therefore going abroad seemed very beneficial for developing work and growing as an artist and as a human being.
New environment was refreshing and revitalising. Being in touch with a new culture opened up curiosity and senses, which was also helpful in the creative process because we were more alert for details. In Faro, Portugal we (Luka and me) were totally motivated for work out and discipline. We were waking up at around six in the morning to meditate, rehearsed through the day and went to run in the evening – across town, by the coast, pass the palm trees. It did not correspond with the laid back nature typical for the warm south but we were so grateful for the big, bright studio and the Mediterranean winds were giving us strength. In Copenhagen we rehearsed in a black box, after the theatre closed the season, so pretty cut off from events and other artists, which influenced the nature of our material. We produced something minimal, slow and intimate, which was really useful for us later on because I got pregnant before the premiere and we had to throw out all the dynamic material and forget about big movements.
We could take good advantage from the research and residency modules. The time we could afford to try out, think and re-think was precious. We could go to many places inside the creation, shifted ideas and had a chance to shape material that was developed through sharing our fascinations and knowledge. The premiered version of Working Title framed all those different off springs into a distinct composition, determined by fatal decisions concluded in the last faze of creation. Because we let the performance develop rather than forced it into a predetermined shape it got an unpredictable form and content, for which it seems to me, it was made with a force bigger than us humans. This life force was something we wanted to come through in the performance and touch the audience. We did not get much chance to try out the effect on audiences because I was not able to perform any more and after me giving birth we were not able to sell the piece. This is where we were not so successful. It was clear from the beginning that being a modul-dance artist does not promise you a tour but maybe the last two modules could be organized more carefully. Perhaps they could run another selection from all the finished works; meaning all directors of production houses would watch all videos and than they choose some to tour. Otherwise mostly those artist that got support from big production houses that have money get the chance for some re-runs. Probably too many artists accumulate over years for something like that. But in the end does size matter?
There are still ideas to make a new version of our performance and from a solo extend it into a duet. We will see about that after the next funding call. Before that I will dance in a piece called Hunting Season, choreographed by Malin Tomašik, so you better watch out for this one.
Picture: © Saša Huzjak
Studio footage of a new work-in-progress by Itamar Serussi entitled Frost. Filmed in Bassano and London, 2013. Itamar Serussi - choreography & dance
Interview with Slovenian artist Tina Valentan done in October 2012. In this video, she and her collaborator Luka Martin Škof talk about the project Working Title, where they analyze the relation between a moving body and the gaze.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
My experience with modul-dance began in 2010 at the first meeting held at the Maison de la Danse in Lyon. A group of about forty dance artists and professionals gathered there to get acquainted with each other. As opposed to what often happens, modul-dance endowed itself with the means to create a “true network” by inviting all these people to meet. Occasions rarely arise to create strong ties between structures and artists, and modul-dance came to allow just that.
What immediately struck my interest was the European dimension of this project. My company is based in two countries: Switzerland and France, and my work is deeply marked by this artistic “double life”. In each project I ask myself how these two countries, these two cultures, these two artistic worlds will influence my work. Even if they are neighbours, the politics, codes and ways of thinking of these countries differ, and this has enriched my artistic research. For example, Je pense comme une fille enlève sa robe is a piece that reflects on prostitution since this activity is legal in Switzerland and forbidden in France. In my research, I have met prostituted persons and worked in associations in both countries to understand how their practice is influenced by the political and cultural context of the countries where they live. Consequently, far from being provocative, this piece simply poses some questions and shows how the body and ways of thinking are highly subjective.
Dance has this “magical power” of conveying questions, emotions or sensations through the body, and of transmitting this body language beyond frontiers. For me, module-dance is the only network, as far as I know, which sets itself in this perspective of communication and exchange across countries, and that endows itself with the means required to do so... it is a great opportunity to form part of it and this is what has interested me the most.
I’ve been able to take advantage of the three modules:
- Production: at the ADC in Geneva. This theatre has the tremendous virtue of programming certain pieces for a long stay. I’ve been lucky enough to dance ten evenings in a row, allowing me to build a solid piece. In each successive performance I took the liberty of trying out new things: I changed a movement here and there, prolonged some scenes and eliminated others, listened to the audience’s feedback and if certain aspects seemed interesting to me, I worked further on them... at night! I worked under excellent conditions with a financial support that was of great help in this respect.
- Residency: at the Maison de la Danse in Lyon. I was working on a project that arose at the CulturesFrance residency “Villa Médicis-Hors les murs”, which I did in Tokyo. I met two Japanese dancers there and we were quickly struck by the difference between the professional situation of Japanese and European dance artists. For example, at that time they were working on a piece presented in a theatre with about 400 seats, and each dancer had the obligation to sell 35 tickets. Not only were the dancers unpaid, but they also had to reimburse the theatre for the tickets that went unsold! Conversely, they were amazed to learn that I was paid simply for doing research for 4 months in Japan. Despite their difficult financial situation, I was struck by the dynamic spirit of the Japanese dancers –who are sometimes much more active than some of their European counterparts–, combining personal projects, daily dance courses, creations, performances and side jobs. That made me want to create a project on these exchanges and on these cultural differences. We set to work on the creation of this piece in Lyon. When Airi and Kazuma saw the words “Maison de la Danse” at the entrance, they couldn’t get over their surprise: how could such a big building be devoted solely to dance? That residency was very enriching and very pleasant, especially thanks to the two Japanese dancers who, just the opposite of the French artists, raved about everything: they loved to dance in the big beautiful studio that was made available to us and to be able to use it for as many hours as we wished. They were surprised to receive per diems for our meals and delighted that we were provided accommodation which, on top of it all, was located right in front of the Maison de la Danse. That was in May 2011, just after the big earthquake, which we talked about a lot during the 7 days of the residency, and thanks to these people I came to understand a great deal of things about Japanese culture. Deproduction is performed in English and it is a piece that has been very well received by the public. It presents on stage, in a tone infused with humour, the experiences that the three of us had between Tokyo and Lyon.
- Presentation: at Mercat de les Flors in Barcelona. We have presented Je pense comme une fille enlève sa robe. It was the first time that I performed this piece in Spain and the audience was very receptive. After the performance, several people stayed on to ask me some questions. It was highly enriching to be able to talk about prostitution and the different relationships with the body, with people who live in a different country with a different system. These exchanges and reflections make it possible to give the piece a dimension that extends beyond the stage and this is a part of dance that interests me very much. We ended up by spending the evening with this Spanish audience, dancing and drinking sangria until late!
My latest experience with modul-dance took place in Tilburg this autumn on the occasion of the annual modul-dance conference. I found that it was extremely important that artists of different generations and partners were able to meet again in order to strengthen our ties. We got the chance to get to know one another better and to make new acquaintances. I thought it was fantastic to be able to exchange ideas about the good and bad aspects of our reciprocal experiences and to share them with partners during those three days. I consider it important that artists can take part in the development of this network in order to keep it from becoming a “show market” like so many others that exist today. I appreciate the fact that modul-dance seeks to create a true space-time continuum that allows artists and professionals to look for ideas together with a view to improving the operation of the network.
Victor Hugo said “Expression has its frontiers, thought has none”, and this is precisely the experience that I would like to continue to enjoy in modul-dance... a “ping-pong” of art, ideas, experiences, shows and artists bouncing back and forth between all these countries.
Picture: © Dorothée Thébert
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.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
The Loose Collective was selected for the modul-dance project after being proposed by Tanzquartier Wien. Here, an interview with two of its members, talking about the process of creation of The Old Testament According to The Loose Collective.
More modul-dance videos on Numeridanse.tv.
Developing our piece Pausing within the context of modul-dance has been a significant experience for us. As in our work, we are always interested in sharing voices through collaboration, we found this context of modul-dance somehow corresponding to this desire - a group of dance houses collaborating in order to bring forward an idea and allow creation to emerge.
Specifically for us, during the creation we went through the residencies in the Duncan Center in Athens and Graner in Barcelona- places which without the frame of modul-dance would be difficult to get to. The two houses were extremely inspiring and rich for the work - the space in Duncan center as well as its amazing surrounding and atmosphere which Penelope nurtures had an essential impact on the process. Also the possibility to meet other artists and share like our meeting with the other residents at that time - Marcos and Pablo has been super inspiring and simply joyful.
The time in May 2012 in Graner has been just before our premiere and we felt we had to "wrap up the piece". Time was short but exactly this constraint of time allowed a concentrated and focused time of radical decisions when the piece finally got its shape - it was the 4th version of the piece already- and its structure today remained the "Barcelona version" after a tour of around 20 shows by now.
In terms of coproduction, we were supported by Hellerau in Dresden which also hosted us for shows in October. Again a very different house allowed the piece to evolve and adjust itself to the beautiful space of Nancy Spero in the theater. Last April we were invited to show the piece in Toulouse, during a modul-dance reunion which has been interesting for us - for the directors of the dance houses to see the work finalized more than a year after the first encounter in Barcelona and many shows.
It has been an interesting experience to be a part of this frame of modul dance, a different feeling than the "regular one" of independent houses supporting the piece. Somehow this feeling of connection and network feels like a new way that should be explored further. There is great potential in this way as a mode of functioning, a mode that can support more the contemporary dance field as it is today, than the so called standard mode of function of theater/festival and artist.
Picture: © Emmanuelle Bayart
Conceiving and creating a new work is like capturing the detailed minutiae of a dream, except it’s in the future… I don’t think we surrender ourselves to the wild plains of our imagination enough. Art is about creating an elemental experience of life, which the audience is invited to participate in along with the performers.
Within modul-dance, I’ve had research modules at Art Station Foundation in Poznań, Poland and at Plesna Izba in Maribor, Slovenia; and residencies in CSC Bassano del Grappa, Italy and CDC Toulouse in France.
In Poland, in March 2013, I spent half of my time in Poznań, writing, working alone in the studio, chatting to other artists and spending time with an enthusiastic ethnography student from Adam Mickiewicz University, listening to polish lore and folk stories; and the second half in Warsaw, dwarfed by the wind-chilled, wide grey boulevards, and felt the constant shadow of Stalin’s Palace of Science and Culture, absorbing the vibrations (and -8 degrees celsius temperatures) of this multi war surviving “phoenix city”.
In May I travelled to Bassano del Grappa, where I worked alone for the first 5 days of the residency, which I often find difficult to do, particularly as I don't usually choreograph for my own body.
I spent a lot of time reading and writing, and being in another place without the everyday burdens, really helped. Roberto arranged a trip up the mountains for me, led by a young academic fountain of knowledge, Sebastiano Crestani, to see some ancient etchings. Unfortunately the Alpine rain cancelled our hike, and instead we went to Padua, where I saw an exhibition on the ancient Veneti people and an amazing 6 mt wooden horse made in 1466.
For the second week I invited Justine Cooper to join me, a performer with whom I already developed some ideas. We shared some ideas with a wonderfully engaged and generous audience there before we left. We also got to sit in on a rehearsal of an all male choir, singing old Italian and Alpine folk songs, a real treat to watch a committed group of mean aged 30-80 singing like angels!
My 4 day trip to Maribor (Plesna Izba) in June was planned to coincide with the annual FolkArt Festival, which is a bit like the dance version of Eurovision in it’s presentational format. Mojca had arranged front row seats for the 3 nights, and I sat there, blown away by these massive ensembles of predominantly amateur dancers (some pretty hefty guys) doing amazingly complex things, passionate about preserving their national dances. I got a private lesson from Vaska, a Slovenian dance historian, choreographer and choreologist of folk dances from the regions. It was here in Maribor where my attention began to focus more towards the crazy music of the Balkans.
My final 2-week residency took place in Toulouse in December 2013, and this time I brought along 5 dancers. It was the first time for us all to be together, and we spent the entire 2 weeks working in the studio. The facilities at the CDC were wonderful, in that we spent most of the time dancing, eating and talking, which resulted in a sense of ease in our environment and explorations. This ease allowed me to go places artistically I’d never been before. Newer, darker, funnier, stranger places. We had some visits from school children who sometimes joined in the warm ups and university students with whom we shared and discussed small segments of our work.
With Tundra I wanted to explore a familiar concept/myth/truth, depending on one’s beliefs, to reveal the poetry of “heaven and hell” and the instability and abysses that exists within us all and in everyday life. I wanted to somehow work with the potential of an unseen world, and feeling the breath of “the ideal”, without wanting to impose any sort of didactic notions on the work. But I am drawn to thinking about reason and logic being overcome by internal and external forces. By that I’m talking about intuition and the connection between our own instinct and a greater external force outside of our control and indeed understanding. Not wanting to sound too esoteric or ethereal, Tundra is a world that’s cosmically misaligned, where time and space lose their boundaries, inhabited by characters who are confronted by fear -of themselves, their existence, their actions and of the unknown, but ultimately they want to break through those barriers to a higher plane. I’ve been thinking about the cyclical nature of time, and how, historically, we can see patterns emerging, where at certain times everything goes into a state of flux and volatility. It looks like we’re in that state right now, and it is a time of insecurity, change and we have witnessed the exposure of a huge amount of human suffering and darkness. I'm endlessly interested in talking and exploring human nature but in particular our chaos, and struggle with desire and death. I enjoy delving into seemingly banal moments, which our mind and imagination has the capacity to make extraordinarily beautiful or horrific.
I like to allow the spectator to receive his own interpretation of each moment for her/himself, and to allow the mind to organize it in it’s own way. It’s an innate process that we naturally do anyway, so it’s not that any special intellectual treatment or analysis is required. But the aim is to allow the arrangement of all of the components of our creation to have an individual effect or Gestalt in the eye of each spectator.
Each piece of work requires a specific language, a movement one, a visual one, a musical one and sometimes a spoken one. And so for me the “sequence of steps” has to take a secondary position to the people who are actually doing them. An intelligent performer requires much more to keep her/himself stimulated than just repetition. And so that’s when the work becomes much more interesting when the performers are also creators and bringing themselves to it. I was really buzzed by the performers that I worked with on Tundra, which demanded a mutual act of searching from us all. They really brought themselves, their experience, memories and, most importantly, their imaginations into the room. The characters are emerged from them, which felt more truthful, than imposing mannerisms and alien stories on them. The performers are paramount to the work- they are the ones that distil, embody and deliver the energy to the audience, and I have been very fortunate to work with some really wonderful artists.
Tundra premiered at the Dublin Dance Festival in May 2014 and was packed up after it’s successful 4 -show run. What next? There’s a new work on the way in 2015, there’ll always be a new work. But it can be exhausting always creating new work for just a handful of performances, and hoping a DVD will magically enable a longer life for it or garner interest in the next new work.
As I Iook back on my modul-dance experience, and attempt to measure the result my participation has had on the work, there are of course lots of interesting and fruitful moments that come to mind, many of which I mentioned earlier. But I also wonder about how the participating artists affect the partners and modul-dance as an organization. This remains a mystery to me. And although it was an enriching experience to develop the piece in new, unfamiliar places, the question of "what next" will not leave my mind.
Picture: © Ros Kavanagh
