Thousand Colours. Photo: Mirka Maruszak
The Poznan-based Polish Dance Theater (Polski Teatr Tanca) will be making their New York debut at the 34th Annual Battery Dance Festival. The Company will perform on August 16 and 17 at 6:30 p.m., presenting It’s Already Dusk (1994) choreographed by Ewa Wycichowska, and A Thousand Colours (2009) choreographed by Takako Matsuda. The August performances will mark the first appearance of the Polish Dance Theatre at the Battery Dance Festival. Ewa Wycichowska?s It?s already dusk was indirectly inspired by the famous scene from Bergman?s The Seventh Seal featuring a chess game with Death. The performance was first produced 1994, premiering at the Teatr Wielki in Poznan, Poland, and its renewal took place in 2005 at the Norrlands Operan in Umea, Sweden. It?s already dusk has been staged in France, Germany, the Czech Republic, and Japan. A Thousand Colours premiered in 2009 in Poznań and was later staged in Japan.
It’s already dusk
A refined duel fought by the characters with Death depicted as an overpowering figure (a dancer on stilts) arousing an eschatological awe. In Ewa Wycichowska’s interpretation the duel has a perverse and paradoxically optimistic end, which gives rise to reflections on true strength and hope.
choreography: Ewa Wycichowska
music: Henryk Mikołaj Górecki
costumes (new version): Adriana Cygankiewicz
premiere: 05.10.1994.
renewal: 1.12.2005. (Umea – Sweden)
duration: 17 minutes
Thousand of Colours
The show touches upon the essence of transiency which we do not notice in our daily lives. Yet, the reality changes all the time. Everyone has their colour. The colours undergo joyful or sad transformations along with our lives. Takako Matsuda graduated from the Department of Dance Education (course of study: ballet, contemporary dance), butoh and acting at the Tisch School of the Arts in New York (2001). ?New York Times? called her ?the dancer of the magic silence?.
Choreography: Takako Matsuda
Music: Fryderyk Chopin (Mazurek a-moll op. 7 nr 2, Mazurek C-dur op. 33 nr 3, Mazurek C-dur op. 24 nr 2, Walc E Flat op. 18 nr 1, Preludium cis-moll op. 28 nr 10, Preludium e-moll op. 28 nr 4, Preludium c-moll op. 28 nr 20)
Costume: Takako Matsuda , Adriana Cygankiewicz
Choreographer’s Assistant: Anna Gruszka-Kopeć
Premiere: 06.12.2009 w Poznaniu
Dance (7th of February 2015): Karina Adamczak?Kasprzak, Agata Ambrozińska?Rachuta, Agnieszka Fertała, Jerzy Kaźmierczak, Zbigniew Kocięba, Kornelia Lech, Paweł Malicki, Barłomiej Raźnikiewicz.
Duration: 25 min.
Battery Dance Company presents the 2015 Battery Dance Festival (Formerly Downtown Dance Festival).
All Performances are free to the public.
Robert F. Wagner, Jr. Park ? Battery Park City
August 15 to 20, 2015
6:30 to 8:30 pm
Closing Event:
The Schimmel Center at Pace University
August 21, 2015
6pm to 8:30pm
Battery Dance Company
Ingun Bjornsgaard Prosjekt | Oslo, Norway
Shanmugha Sundaram | Chennai, India
