‘Antistatic’ International Festival for Contemporary Dance and Performance begins in Sofia on April 20
The 11th International Festival for Contemporary Dance and Performance Antistatic will take place in Sofia from April 20 to 30 2018.
On April 2, Antistatic’s international programme kicks off with four solos, constituting “Hommages” of the legendary dancer, choreographer, singer and teacher Mark Tompkins (US/France), who has been awarded the Society of Dramatic Authors Composers (SACD) Choreography Prize for his work and is coming to Bulgaria for the first time.
“Driven by his endless curiosity towards the exaggerated theatricality and eroticism of cabaret and music hall, he puts himself in the position of four artists with great significance to modern dance history – Vaslav Nijinski, Valeska Gert, Josephine Baker, Harry Sheppard – and pays them his memorable tribute.”
On April 21 comes an exciting encounter with the work of the very promising choreographer Uri Shafir (Israel), who until recently was a dancer in the world-famous Ensemble Batsheva Dance Company with artistic director Ohad Naharin, the inventor of Gaga movement language.
Shafir’s performance “Habitat” embarks from the American conceptual artist Robert Barry’s words “nothing seems to me the most potent thing in the world” and tries to capture and express what is really alive in live performance.
On April 24, Benjamin Bertrand (France), another choreographer who is quickly gaining international recognition, will gracefully carry over the stage the movement of wind with his “Rafales”. All that is needed is a man, a woman, a ventilator and a gust of wind which connects them. The rest is fluidity and never-ending wavelike movement, in the words of the organisers’ media statement.
On April 25, the programme vigorously throws us back in our time with the studies of the authoritarian character “Rapture and Rage” of the media and performance collective Ligna (Germany).
For the creation of this work, which opened the theatre season in Frankfurt and received significant attention, Ole Frahm, Michael Hueners, Torsten Michaelsen are joined by the Bulgarian artists Stephan A. Shtereff and Emilian Gatsov. “Together they explore the rising attractiveness of fundamentalism in Europe and turn the audience into the main character of their impressive, interactive performance.”
On April 26 there is “Wonderwomen” by choreographer Melanie Lane (Australia/Germany). She has invited two female professional bodybuilders and positions them into the context of a performance, in order to offer a new perspective towards this highly demanding sport, which alters the body completely. “And inevitably triggers a dialogue with our senses about categories such as strength and vulnerability, athleticism and femininity.”
Tickets for all performances are already on sale and can be purchased from Easypay cashiers across the country, National Palace of Culture’s tickets centre or online at epaygo.by. All tickets are sold at preferential prices in advance and will be more expensive on the day of each performance.
Antistatic’s 2018 international programme is organised by: Brain Store Project, Inform Bureau Association, The Red House Center for Culture and Debate in partnership with the Ministry of Culture of Bulgaria, Sofia Municipality’s Calendar of Cultural Events 2018,French Institute in Bulgaria, Goethe-Institut Bulgarien, the Embassy of Israel in Bulgaria, Nomad Dance Academy Slovenia, as part of Dance On, Pass On, Dream On project – cofunded by The Creative Europe Programme of The European Union, Nationales Performance Netz (NPN) International Guest Performance Fund fro Dance, which is funded by the Federal Govermment Commissioner for Culture and the Media,National Cultural Fund, National Palace of Culture and DNA – Space for Contemporary Dance and Performance, Nikolay Binev Youth Theatre and Jameson Irish Whiskey.
(Photo, from Wonderwomen: Hannes Kempert)
