random working notes-workshop rotterdam

to share with the zoo some inspirational keys we had-gabriella, samir, cristina in the rotterdam workshop in dansateliers -25 and 26 october 08:
We concentrated the focus on the body as an extraordinary box of opportunities, depending also how you imagine to manipulate it trhough the mind, the imagination, or an energetic/emotional state. Body as a universe.

the metamorphosis is then the concentration and the capacity to see things while moving (authentic movement, exercises of stimulation.....etc; staying with one state, one idea, digging into the image...) and the ability to bring the body to become that vision, in the same moment we are watching our own vision being. Can we be transformed while we are aware of the transformation?
exaustion ;
exposing (treating the body as an object, so not having psycological charges on it; but I don't talk about the neutral body because I think it doesn't exist, and if it would exist it wouldn't be very interesting neither to watch neither to dance in !!); one body seen by everybody; against shyness in dance....(and against a showing off that becomes hiding fragilities that anyway will be always visible!!!); imagining parts of your bodies while they are seen, while they are moving....you can alwys have a different image of them, not only a realistic one.....; what does it mean, for instance in ZOO, to expose ourselves as performers? why we do it? and so on...);

set material (I'd like to teach the material trying to avoid as much as possible the use of the spoken words while we are transmitting the material....I want to see how much the transmittion can be physical/energetical and not verbal or mental....the movement contagious, as a desease!!).

the floor work
: floor as the only partner in the dance, forgetting about being a body- you are the partner of the floor, letting the floor move the body......continuity of the touch between body and floor surface, sort of ongoing meditation exercise...never avoid mistakes, gaps, when the continuity interrupts; mistakes are the pleasant part of life. The rest is often boring.

We worked quite a lot, towards the end, with improvisation and nudity.
There is a lot to say on this....somebody wants to?
________________

ZOO video trailer 2008




ZOO video trailer 2007 (old version)

part 1
part 2








«Tonight we are the ZOO.
We are the Monstrosity, the Provocation, the Beast, the Beauty, the Myth;
we are the ones you love, the ones you dream of, the ones you fuck, you manipulate, you trample, you torture, you mutilate, swallow, digest, shit and throw away.
Come along.
Enjoy your ZOO. »


ZOO went on tour to Italy, London and Spain. The piece was also selected for the Aerowaves Festival as one of the best European choreographies of 2006. ZOO is a co-production of Danswerkplaats Amsterdam and Festival Interplay Torino and is financially supported by the Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst.


Choreography: Gabriella Maiorino

Dance: Samir Calixto /Daniel Hayward, Gabriella Maiorino, Fornier Ortiz Bedoya, Marlene Vilhena, Maria Chernova, Valentina Campora, Cordelia Lange, Cristina Leitão

Music: Simone Giacomini

Advise and visual: Ascon de Nijs



Zoo shifted from circus to abattoir, via hospital, club and bedroom on the way, exploring the mucky relationship between man and beast… With vivid satire elevating the more commonplace shock value of its nudity and dark sexuality, Zoo merits a wider audience.”

Lucy Ribchester , Aerowaves, the Place Theatre, London

“…But the standing ovation was for ZOO and the five performers of the Italian, Dutch based choreographer Gabriella Maiorino; four legs and naked, back and forward, they created a cinematographic, feral and mounting rhythm, underlined by the beautiful lights, low and swinging”

Claudia Allasia, “LA REPUBBLICA”, (TORINODANZA)


Performance list:

2008

28 February De Lieve Vrouw, Amersfoort (NL) – try-out
5 March Theater Gasthuis, Amsterdam (NL) – try-out
6 March Theater Gasthuis, Amsterdam (NL) – try-out
6 June Festival Punto Aparte, Murcia (ES)

6 October Theater Bellevue, Amsterdam (NL) – dutch premiere

10 October Kunstlerhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt (DE)
11 October Kunstlerhaus Mousonturm, Frankfurt (DE)
23 October Lantaren Venster, Rotterdam

*25/26 October ZOO workshop in Dansateliers Rotterdam.

28 November PAL Theatre, Amsterdam (NL)
29 November PAL Theatre, Amsterdam (NL)
30 November PAL Theatre, Amsterdam (NL)


2009

17 January Korzo Theatre, Den Haag (NL)
19 January Korzo Theatre, Den Haag (NL) – dansclick showcase

6 February Dansenshus, Oslo (NO)
7 February Dansenshus, Oslo (NO)