Renata Piotrowska-Auffret choreographer and performer, graduate of the Aleksander Zelwerowicz Theatre Academy in Warsaw / Faculty of Puppet Theatre in Białystok, and the Faculty of Choreography at the I.C.I. Centre Chorégraphique National de Montpellier/Languedoc-Roussillon in Montpellier, France (MFA, exerce research and performance).
In her work, Piotrowska-Auffret juxtaposes affective choreography with conceptual thinking. She is interested in the actions which confront the duality of the mind and body, experience and image, concept and practice, humour and seriousness, the individual and the communal. In contemplating contemporary world she draws inspiration from her own experience and theoretical texts in humanities. She is intrigued by contemporary politics of bodies, which she analyses through the lens of politics and representations of historical bodies and bodies from foreign cultures.
Piotrowska-Auffret is the author of such pieces as Now (2007), Dancing with the Enemy (2007, Unknown series (2008 2010), B.R.E.A.K. sztuka wojny (2010), Unknown. Seans (2011), InSide (dance film, 2011, choreography and co-direction), The Forest (2013), Death. Exercises and variations (2014), Wspólne (2015). In 2008 and 2010, her performances: Dancing with the enemy and Unknown were selected for the prestigious Polish contemporary dance review, the Polish Dance Platform.
Piotrowska-Auffret collaborates with such theatres and institutions as the Studio Theatre, NOwy Theatre, Ochota Theatre and the Centre for Contemporary Art-Ujazdowski Castle, as well as the Body/Mind Foundation in Warsaw, the Art Stations Foundations by Grażyna Kulczyk in Poznań, and the Baltic Dramatic Theatre in Koszalin.
She has been awarded multiple scholarships from the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, the ArtsStations Foundation and the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage Młoda Polska programme (2010) and the Ministry Scholarship (2013).
In 2007-2011, she taught regular classes in improvisation and contact improvisation in Warsaw, as well as workshops for adults in Poland and abroad. She also held contemporary dance classes for young people in 2009-2011. She collaborated with Grzegorz Kowalskis video workshop at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw (Faculty of Sculpture), where she taught improvisation and body awareness. An author of the educational dance programme Mam ochotę na taniec (Im in a mood for dance) at the Ochota Theatre in Warsaw, in which she combined theory and practice, Piotrowska-Auffret currently holds classes for young people at the Ochota Theatre and Contemporary Dance Lab. She is also the co-creator and a pedagogue of the Year-Long Course in Experimental Choreography organised by the Burdąg Foundation.
Renata Piotrowska-Auffret is a member of the Centre in Motion.
