Fot. Kasia Chmura-Cegiełkowska.
The Baltic Dance Theatre is presenting the second instalment of its Netherlands project: a triple bill of Body Master by Izadora Weiss, Falling Angels and Sarabande by Jiří Kylián. Body Master is a tale of a Master, operating in hermetic reality, who is trying to conjure up his own world by the agency of dancers. Falling Angels is a story of the mysterious magic of seduction and sensuality as the truth about human nature. In Sarabande, fluid, undulating movements characteristic for Kylián’s early choreographies give way to his fascination with primitive ritual dances.
The premiere is planned for Saturday, 8 November; subsequent performances will take place on 14?16 November at the Baltic Opera.
Body Master
The title of Izadora Weiss’s latest choreography is ironic. The piece is a tale of a Master, operating in hermetic reality, who is trying to conjure up his own world by the agency of dancers. He is reminiscent of the great reformer of ballet, Edward Gordon Craig. He, too, became seduced by the concept of the perfect Actor ? the Uber-Marionette able to convey preprogrammed emotions. Before and after Craig there have been many prominent creators tragically torn between the demuirgic desire to control the performer and the willingness to elicit truth from them. Using a self-conceived story as an example, Izadora Weiss once again struggles with fundamental questions about the nature of theatre making and the relation between the creator’s vision and the performers who put life into it.
libretto, music editing, staging, choreography: Izadora Weiss
stage design: Hanna Szymczak
lighting: Piotr Miszkiewicz
assistants to choreographer: Elżbieta Czajkowska-Kłos, Filip Michalak
cast: Filip Michalak, Beata Giza, Beniamin Citkowski, Naya Monzon Alvarez, Daniel Flores Pardo, Julia Sanz Fernandez, Michał Łabuś, Filip Löbl, Bartek Kondracki, Paulina Wojtkowska, Tura Gómez Coll, Hodei Iriarte Kaperotxipi, Oscar Pérez Romero, Tania Verdejo Vazquez, Natalia Madejczyk, Jo?o Paulo de Castro Franca, Oleksandr Khudimov, Sayaka Haruna, Jacopo Grabar
premiere: 8 November 2014
Falling Angels
What’s fascinating in Reich’s music for Jiří Kylián is its rhythmic structure, and the use of phasing in particular. Thus the music serves as a fluid backdrop against which choreography may develop independently. While usually Kylián treats music as the primary inspiration for his choreographies, modelling his work to reflect the existing structure of the musical piece, here he began from dance. The outcome is a fascinating, direct flight of eight dancers.
music: Steve Reich
staging, stage design, choreography: Jiří Kylián
costumes: Joke Visser
lighting: Jiří Kylián (concept), Joop Caboort (implementation)
technical supervision over lighting and stage design: Joost Biegelaar
assistant to choreographer: Roslyn Anderson
cast: Beata Giza, Tura Gómez Coll, Naya Monzon Alvarez, Natalia Madejczyk, Julia Sanz Fernandez, Agnieszka Wojciechowska, Elżbieta Czajkowska-Kłos, Sayaka Haruna
world premiere: 23 Novemner 1989, AT&T Danstheater, Haga Nederlands Dans Theater
premiere by the Baltic Dance Theatre: 8 November 2014
Sarabande
Against the backdrop of Bach’s Sarabande, Jiří Kylián continues his efforts to answer fundamental questions asked by children. Simple structures, banal situations, dreamlike visions, retrospections, elements of dance and mime ? these all serve to show that the answer to “Why?” is never coming. Kylián’s Sarabandecame to life, just like many of his latest works, as a “choreographic undertaking”. A black-and-white sketch, the work will be completed and coloured inside the audience’s minds. It is also a reference to Kylián’s other choreographies: No More Play, Falling Angels, and Sweet Dreams.
music: Johann Sebastian Bach (arranged by Dick Heuff)
staging, stage design, choreography: Jiří Kylián
costumes: Joke Visser
lighting: Jiří Kylián (concept), Joop Caboort (implementation)
technical supervision over lighting and stage design: Joost Biegelaar
sound director: Dick Schuttel
assistant to choreographer: Patrick Delcroix
cast: Filip Michalak, Michał Łabuś, Hodei Iriarte Kaperotxipi, Daniel Flores Pardo, Bartek Kondracki, Filip Löbl
world premiere: 13 September 1990, AT&T Danstheater, Haga Nederlands Dans Theatre
premiere by the Baltic Dance Theatre: 8 November 2014
Sarabande and Falling Angels are produced in association with the Institute of Music and Dance in Warsaw under the programme “Choreographic Commissions 2014”.
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Netherlands
Bringing smaller parts together to form a solidary whole that gives each component a sense of power and safety while respecting their specificity ? this is how I’d briefly describe my associations with the word “Netherlands”. The Low Countries’ rich history that has lead to the creation of today’s Benelux, their economic and cultural prowess, and impressive leadership displayed in the process of uniting feuding Europe corresponds in a fascinating fashion with the history of our city. Gdańsk’s Hanseatic links with those countries, its love of freedom and efforts to secure itself independence from neighbouring empires, attachment to the values of civil society, cultivation of local linguistic and cultural traditions, devotion to hard work and thrift ? these all are common threads weaving through the respective histories of the two seaside regions, located so far away from each other, yet remaining so close in character. This spiritual closeness is cultivated in the Baltic Opera by the Baltic Dance Theatre, which chose model itself on the Nederlands Dans Theater as shaped by the choreographer Jiří Kylián.
Having worked with our company in 2012, Kylián formed a high opinion of the Baltic Dance Theatre, and agreed another two of his choreographies ? Sarabande and Falling Angels ?to be staged here. At the same time, Kylián’s assistant at the NDT, Patrick Delcroix agreed to stage his piece Clash with our company. The production is part of a triple bill called Netherlands 1, which also features Izadora Weiss’s two new choreographies, Fun and Light, both drawing on the admiration for the Dutch people and their incredible artistic achievements. Now premiering, the triple bill Netherlands 2, brings together Izadora Weiss’s Body Master, and maestro Kylián’s Sarabande and Falling Angels. Together the six choreographies form one project divided into two evenings. Our company has been working on the whole throughout 2014.
Marek Weiss
General and Artistic Director
Baltic Opera in Gdańsk, Poland
