In Olivier Dubois’ “Tragédie,” the curtain unveils a bare stage scattered with eighteen nude dancers, who dress just once for curtain call. In Mette Ingvartsen’s “7 Pleasures,” however, the stage is populated by everyday domestic objects, organized in meticulous order. Fourteen performers seated among the audience, stand up and undress before taking to the stage to slowly rouse total chaos, “dancing” human sexual perversions.What happens during each performance may vary slightly, but the spectator’s eyes, denudes and searches for the same thing: sexual attributes, hair, birthmarks, brushes, wrinkles and bodily fluids. But some members of the audience may shut their eyes or exit; what some may find amusing, beautiful, or even arousing, others may find disturbing or repugnant.Nudity is not new to contemporary dance. In the 1900s, drawn from Greek iconography, Isadora Duncan utilized nudity as a political statement and a feminist act, staging her nude body as sacred. And, with her refined striptease shows in the early twentieth century, dancer Adored Villany used nudity and stillness to stage the female body as an artwork.After the sexual liberation movement in the 1960s, postmodern dancers stripped off to make similar statements: Anna Halprin also challenged the conceptions of nudity and stillness with her “Parades & Changes” in 1965, where dancers dressed and undressed whilst in close proximity with the audience; banned then, it was restaged in 2009.Nudity is a common recurrence in contemporary dance, nowadays ordinary and even cliché. It seems as though the naked body is another kind of costume that not only has social presence, but also bears an individuality impossible to reproduce. But what more could nudity say through contemporary dance that hasn’t been said already?Here are six upcoming performances distinguished by nudity/clothing apparatus, each choreographer with a different motivation, from educational and political, to philosophical and psychological.1. Olivier Dubois “Tragédie” Premiered at Festival d’Avignon in 2012, Olivier Dubois’ “Tragédie” casts nine male and nine female performers in the buff entering into a series of minimal, repetitive gestures using only body parts to then waggle, writhe and quiver with their entire body – set to electronic music in tandem with strobe lighting until they reach a level of libidinal exhaustion that is a form of Dionysian catharsis.In the programme notes you will come across a quote from Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy that, more or less, reflects what happens during the show: “In song and dance, man expresses himself as a member of a higher community. He has forgotten how to walk and speak, and is on the way toward flying up into the air, dancing. He himself now walks about, enchanted.” February 4 at France, Arsenal de Metz; March 17 at La Faïencerie, Creil, France; April 8 at TAP - Théâtre et Auditorium de Poitiers, France; April 15 -17 at Dansens Hus, Oslo, Norway.2. Jan Fabre “Mount Olympus/24h – To glorify the cult of tragedy” Belgian artist and choreographer Jan Fabre’s theatrical activism reaches a career peak with his latest drama-performance, “Mount Olympus.” Paying homage to the notable mountain, it was premiered in its nearby city, Thessaloniki, in 2015. The 24-Hour performance begins one evening, ends the next, and has no intermission.As a Dionysian festival for the 21st century, it is a real-time, spiritual experience with a cast of thirty performers - comprising four generations - ascending the mountain, so to speak, in celebration of conflict, passion, violence, desire, and betrayal. Be prepared for a nocturnal marathon: don’t forget your sleeping bag and energy bars for the overnight stay! March 5, at Teatro Central, Sevilla, Spain.3. Mette Ingvartsen “7 Pleasures”Danish choreographer Metter Ingvartsen presents “7 Pleasures” with a group of fourteen denuded performers of both sexes, taking audience on a joyous yet, at times, disturbing journey in exploration of the notions of nudity, body politics and sexual practice. With allusions to performances by other artists and choreographers, it stages human sexual fantasies and sado-masochistic acts in their most uncanny and risible forms, using everyday objects as masturbatory toys, reflecting on fetishism, forniphilia, and wrestling, to state but a few.“7 Pleasures”: March 2 -5 at Dansehallerne, Copenhagen, Denmark; April 22 -23 at PACT Zollverein, Essen, Germany; October 28 – 29 at Studio Bergen, Norway.4. Mette Ingvartsen “69 positions” “69 positions” places the nude body – again - centre stage. This solo lecture-performance comprises books, videos, images and texts, used both as theatrical props and teaching material through a series of physical actions. This recombinant is the artist’s attempt to create a new choreographic language: ‘69’ refers both to the number of artists discussed and the physical positions the performer undertakes. Emerge yourself for an hour and forty-five minutes whilst Ingvartsen guides you into the history of nudity-in-performances from the 1960s onward, questioning the borders between private and public sexualities.“69 positions”: March 8-9 at Black Box Theatre, Oslo, Norway and, April 5 – 7 at TAP - Théâtre et Auditorium de Poitiers, France. 5. Doris Uhlich “more than naked” Premiered at ImPulsTanz in 2013, “more than naked” is a performance that celebrates, guess what? The nude body in performance! Having developed a technique she calls, “fat-dance,” Uhlich explores the bodily discourses with twenty naked dancers making their flesh waggle, jiggle, and squirm. March 9 – 11 at Le Maillon, Théâtre de Strasbourg Scène Européenne, France6. Florence Caillon - L'Éolienne / Annie Ernaux “Simple Passion” (2013)“From September last year, I have not done anything but wait a man,” writes Annie Ernaux in her novel, Simple Passion (1993) which Florence Caillon adapts in her acro-dance tale of the same name. Taking on a story of love, sex, and longing, the text is set in motion with Ernaux’s words embodied by three female performers, each one’s solo interpreting them with different techniques, from couch dance, trapeze swings, aerial rope acts, to striptease, go-go, and pole dancing.May 19 – 20 at Le Volcan - Scène Nationale du Havre, France.
↧