The Dansa Metropolitana reaches one of its high points this weekend with a couple of shows that explore its
“unexplored interpretive limits” within a contemporary context. From March 17 to 19, the Mercat de les Flors hosts Oskar Schelmmer’s Triadic Ballet, directed by the Taiat Dansa company, and the cathartic rave Crowd, by Gisèle Vienne.
Three dancers. Three choreographers. Three scenic sequences. Three dimensions. Three, three, three… . The Taiat Dansa company revives the work of the Bauhaus Triadic Ballet by Oskar Schelmmer, a referential piece in the world of art, based on the number three. With this show we wanted to take this number to “the ultimate consequences”, explained the founders of Taiat Dansa, Meritxell Barberá and Inma Garcia, during the presentation.
In collaboration with the now deceased Brazilian choreographer Ismael Ivo and the French choreographer Rachid Ouramdane, the Valencian artists have given life to the work from a contemporary perspective and bringing the discipline of visual art closer to dance, both of which are highly fragmented. “At the Bauhaus, dance was always in the background, while the history of art was revolutionized visually. That is why we have become obsessed with relating both disciplines,” the choreographers detail.
Each dancer was in charge of representing one of the three colors that make up the three parts of the show: yellow for Ivo, black for Ouramdane and pink for Barberá and Garcia themselves. “We love the approach of Ismael and Rachid because they work in a different way. It’s a very nice coexistence”, affirm the directors.
In this piece, space plays with the three geographical forms, the circle, the square and the triangle, accompanied by live music and unified within a sphere with projected light effects, fragments of the original work. “We wanted to put the dance within a sphere, an intimate, different space. A 360-degree vision that breaks the barrier with the public,” say Barberá and Garcia.
On the other hand, the intensity of the music and the emotion unite fifteen people in this space that is Crowd, which explores the roller coaster of emotions or, as defined by its director, the French Gisèle Vienne, “interrelational disorders”.
Crowd represents the epicenter of a cathartic rave of fifteen dancers who form a community and express their euphoria and emotions through the desire and longing for love. Until the work The Pyre (2013), the director and performer dedicated herself more to representing intimacies and private space, through isolated groups. “This is the second time that she has portrayed a group in which social activities and interactions play a fundamental role,” Vienne explained when she presented the piece at the Festival d’Automne à Paris in 2017.
The music of this cathartic rave represents an x-ray of the electronic music that has made people vibrate over the last forty years. “The selection contains records that are important to the history of electronic dance music,” says the director. From Detroit musician Jeff Mills to Ash Ra Tempel founder Manuel Göttsching, the group finds excitement among diverse behaviors that evoke different forms of ritual.
“When you observe a party you realize that there is an extraordinary number of stories that parade before your eyes,” Vienne details. Crowd is a text that is not audible, but intelligible, where the 15 dancers represent people with very different psychologies, imaginations, feelings and histories. A heterogeneity that distorts time linked to music, lighting and rhythmic vibrations.
