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The Łódź Ballet Festival will open with the Grand Theatre in Łódź ballet?s latest production Chopin wymarzony (Chopin Imaginaire), a show by choreographer Giorgio Madia which features dancers from all over the world led by Dominik Muśko, the company?s director. The Grand Theatre’s ballet is big and diverse, bringing together youth and experience. The production has been devised especially for the festival. The premiere is scheduled for Saturday and Sunday, 9 and 10 May (7 pm), but you may also see the show on 12 May (7 pm) at the Grand Theatre in Dąbrowskiego square.
Giorgio Madia about the show:
We all know the feeling when all of your thoughts get loose ?ether when looking at a painting, listening to the music, or sleeping ? and swarm to create their own, often very strange, worlds. These constructs of imagination coming from some place between dream and reality have always been fascinating to humans and are still subject to extensive research. RenéMagritte even turned them into the central motif of his art: he tried to render this mysterious cognitive process in his paintings. Magritte would chose very simple forms and figures; his paintings present a man, a smoking pipe, an apple, an umbrella. They way they are depicted is what creates an individual, surrealist universe that leaves the onlooker wondering how to conquer it. I followed up on this idea when I started working with Chopin’s music. Each piece inspired me to create a different image, chose a different means of expression, act unexpectedly and surprisingly. Once the emphasis fell on the virtuosity, another time ?on the melancholic mood, or a dose of irony, a funny expression that I sensed and made foundation of a short story. Obviously, the performers of my choreographies have crucially contributed to the construction of these associations. Dance is a direct means of expression; a dancer’s movements are always individual; with their bodies and the gestures which I passed to them the dancers introduce new elements into play. And there is the audience as well: each viewer brings their own fantasies and impressions into the performance when they enter the theatre. But that is just the beginning. It is all about something more than an unambiguous message. As Magritte sees it, you need to experience a mystery ? the mystery of choreography, dancers, and the audience.
Choreography: Giorgio Madia
Scenography and costumes: Cordelia Matthes
Assistant choreographer: Adriana Mortelliti
Assistant scenographer: Fabrice Serafino
Piano: Piotr Kopczyński, Grzegorz Skrobiński
Giorgio Madia is a choreographer, dancer, and educator. Born in Milan, Italy, in 1984 he graduated from the Teatro alla Scala Ballet School. He debuted on the stage of La La Scala, then was a soloist with Maurice Béjart’s Ballet du XXe si?cle, Béjart Ballet Lausanne, Pennsylvania Ballet, and Milwaukee Ballet. He toured Europe, Asia, both Americas and Australia with the show Nureyev and Friends, dancing a duo with Rudolf Nureyev himself. From 1990 to 1992 Madia was a soloist with the San Francisco Ballet, then the first dancer with the Pennsylvania Ballet, as well as the first dancer of Aterballetto and soloist with the Zurich Ballett. In 1997 he retired from the stage becoming an educator and ballet master of Balletto di Toscana. He was later a ballet master and assistant choreographer with Berlin Ballett, Komische Oper. He has also collaborated with the ballet of the Grand Theatre in Łódź, Poland.
Giorgio Madia has danced in over 90 ballets and for such renowned choreographers as Merce Cunnigham, Alicja Alonso, William Forsythe, Josef Russillo, Richard Tunner, Glen Tetley, David Bintley, Hans van Manen, or Roland Petit. He he led master classes at the university and colleges of Luisiana and Colorado.
Madia has worked with the Augsburg Theater Ballett, Portugal National Ballet, and Spain National Ballet. He has created choreographies for many prominent companies. Among them there are: The Merry Widow for Zuercher Ballett; Per un bacio International Music Festival in Elba; Bolero, Dying Swan and Giuseppe (with individually devised fragments) for the Grand Theatre in Łódź. He directed and choreographed The Csárdás Princess; Giuditta; Countess Mariza, The Merry Widow; and The Count of Luxemburg. For the ballet company at the Wiener Volksoper, which he founded, Madia created two full-length ballets ? Nudo and Alice ? which both have his signature style. At the Wiener Volksoper Madia also put on his versions of the operettas Boccacio, A Night in Venice, and Viennese Blood. In 2006 he staged his own choreographic version of The Sleeping Beauty at the Grand Theatre in Łódź. The production received Złota Maska (Golden Mask), a Polish critics’ award. For the Łódź opera house he also staged Cinderella, The Tales of Hoffman, The Nutcracker, and Swan Lake.
Cordelia Matthes started to develop her interest in plastic arts just after competing secondary school in 1988 when she took up an apprenticeship at the scenic workshop of Deutsche Staatsoper in Berlin, under Professor Wilfried Werz. In 1990 he began to study set and costume design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Berlin and Institut del Teatre in Barcelona. She graduated with honours in 1997, then completed an apprenticeship at Berlin’s fine arts academy. In 1992-99 Cordelia Matthes was an assistant to set designers Robert Wilson, Volker Pfüller, and Peter Schubert, with engagements at Staatsoper Berlin, Volksoper Vienna, and Teatro Comunale Florence. She also designed for theatres in Augsburg, Lübeck, Kassel, and Bielefeld. Her most important set design are: Mozart’ The Wedding of Figaro (Augsburg), Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi (Vienna), Millöcker’s Gasparone (Freiburg), Beethoven’s Fidelio (Hildesheim), Verdi’s Rigoletto (Oldenburg) and Simon Boccanegra (Berlin), Rossini’s The Italian Girl in Algiers (Kassel), and Honegger’s Joan of Arc at the Stake (Kassel). She worked with Giorgio Madia on Alice set to music by Nino Rota (Volksoper Vienna) and Fats Waller (Kammeroper Vienna).
Premiere: 9 and 10 May 2015
Premiere with Express: 12 May 2015
Programme of the 23rd Łódź Ballet Festival
Box offices:
Monday?Saturday: midday to 7 pm
Sundays and holidays (and on show days): 3 to 7 pm
tel. + 48 42 633 77 77
Inquiries:
Monday?Friday: 8 am to 4 pm
tel.: + 48 42 633 31 86
tel./fax: +48 42 639 87 49
