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#SilentSunday Before dancing
With attitude!
The weather was fine that Sunday. I cycled up to the Mercat de les Flors. The sun bathed the entrance to the House of Dance. I sat down on a black cushion, with my back against one of the venerable columns.
As we enter the Pina Bausch Hall, our eclectic little group is greeted by choreographers Guillem Mont de Palol and Jorge Dutor. They will be revealing the creative process behind their next show during the ‘Danses romàntiques’ workshop.
Exploring the dreamlike world of the Romantic ballets La Sylphide, Giselle and Coppélia, Guillem Mont de Palol and Jorge Dutor use the genre’s descriptive music, conventions, codes, narratives, clichés and mannerisms to offer audiences an immersive, funny and sensitive experience designed to redefine the genre in relation to contemporary action and the body. They offer an unusual experience of movement, gesture and performative action, navigating between the concrete and the abstract.
Interview ‘Románticos o casi (en conversación con Guillem Mont de Palol y Jorge Dutor)’, by Roberto Fratini (personal translation)
Instead of going through the tedious round of introductions, we learn bits and pieces of vocabulary. A lexicon specific to romantic ballet, a few positions, a few gestures to say I, you, we, to dance, but in movement…
