Marlene Monteiro Freitas with Andreas Merk | Portugal & Cape Verde
Using wild facial expressions and burlesque bodily contortions the choreographer Marlene Monteiro Freitas has managed to develop a unique aesthetic language between theatre and dance, which is as disturbing as it is humorous. For her latest work “Jaguar”, developed with the collaboration of the dancer Andreas Merk, she was inspired just as much by the carnival festivities of her home country Cape Verde as by the Blaue Reiter, stories by E.T.A. Hoffmann or works by Adolf Wölfli. Dissonant und heterogeneous, the various parts of the evening oscillate between the grotesque and the refined. Puppet-like creatures populate the stage accompanied by music from Schönberg and Stravinsky. Sometimes they dance intimate duets together before suddenly transporting the audience into a strange new world with their bizarre, mechanical movements.
«The facial and bodily gestures of her choreography are mimetic fireworks; each piece is a pirate ship blowing all of its cannons at the same time. Freitas’ new work ‹Jaguar› intensifies this experience even further surprisingly by taming down. She creates one of her weirdest works to date – a circus of the subconscious.»
Niko Hallikainen, Okulaari | zodiak.fi, Oktober 2015
Choreografie Marlene Monteiro Freitas in Zusammenarbeit mit Andreas Merk | Mit Marlene Monteiro Freitas, Andreas Merk | Licht und Raum Yannick Fouassier | Requisiten João Francisco Figueira, Miguel Figueira | Sound Tiago Cerqueira | Recherche João Francisco Figueira, Marlene Monteiro Freitas | Dank an Betty Tchomanga, Avelino Chantre
Produktion: P.OR.K (Lisbon, PT) | Diffusion: Key Performance (Stockholm, SE) | Koproduktion Zodiak – Center for New Dance (Helsinki, FI), CDC Toulouse/Midi-Pyrénées (Toulouse, FR), Alkantara (Lisbon, PT), HAU Hebbel am Ufer (Berlin, DE), MDT (Stockholm, SE) in the frame of [DNA] Departures and Arrivals, co-funded by the Creative Europe program of the European Union; Teatro Municipal do Porto Rivoli (Porto, PT); Arsenic (Lausanne, CH); Maria Matos Teatro Municipal (Lisbon, PT); O Espaço do Tempo (Montemor-o-novo, PT); Les Spectacles Vivants – Centre Pompidou (Paris, FR); Espaces Pluriels (PAU, FR); Tandem scène nationale (Douai-Arras, FR); A-CDC [Art Danse – CDC Dijon Bourgogne (FR), La Briqueterie – CDC du Val-de-Marne (FR), Le Cuvier – CDC d’Aquitaine (FR), L’échangeur – CDC Hauts-de-France (FR), Le Gymnase – CDC Roubaix – Nord Pas de Calais (FR), Le Pacifique – CDC Grenoble (FR), CDC Atelier de Paris- Carolyn Carlson (FR), Pôle Sud – CDC Strasbourg (FR), CDC Toulouse/Midi-Pyrénées (FR), CDC Uzès danse (FR)] | Residenz: STUK (Leuven, BE); Tanzhaus Zürich (Zürich, CH) | Unterstützung: Trafó (Budapest, HU); ACCCA – Companhia Clara Andermatt (Lisbon, PT), Paulo Soares/Peopleware (Lisbon, PT)