The Living Monument
For those who step into the dazzling monochrome colour world of Hungarian choreographer Eszter Salamon, time seems to freeze gradually. Fourteen dancers from the Norwegian national company of contemporary dance, Carte Blanche, form fluidly changing landscapes of looming and disappearing bodies, textiles, and recycled objects.
The Living Monument by Eszter Salamon and Carte Blanche is part of the impressive MONUMENT series. In this project, Eszter Salamon explores the concept of the 'monument' as a shared space for remembrance, liberation and inclusion in response to a world that seems to be spinning ever faster. How can we quiet down and nurture what makes us human?
Festival Julidans
Programme section Julidans On Stage
Dutch premier
Location Internationaal Theater Amsterdam
Venue Grote Zaal
Run time 120 minutes
Genre Dance
Language Language no problem
Like living statues, the dancers slowly leave their positions. They might as well be from ancient times as from a science fiction film. Up to their faces covered in lamé fabrics, creaking leather or lace, they build ever-changing monochrome landscapes with impressive slowness: from black to white, from midnight blue to glowing orange.
The dancers are dressed in fantastic costumes made from recycled life jackets, bottles, pipes, blankets, bouncers, helmets, and plastic tubes. They form an ecological yet baroque landscape, a hallucinatory still life, between dream, reality, past, and future.
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The award-winning costumes (Hedda Award for Best Costume Design) are inseparably connected to the microscopic movements of the choreography. A rhythm and logic of its own emerges, in which something familiar and concrete is abstracted and seen in a different light. The performers move individually and yet they act as one majestic organism, breathing together and moving imperturbably in one particular direction.
The different colour panels are organically linked by Carmen Villain's trance-like score that seems to undulate gently across the stage. As part of the choreography, the performers sing songs from their own memories, stored and carried with them, between the head and the heart.
About Eszter Salamon
Eszter Salamon lives and works in Berlin and Paris. She is currently a PhD Research Fellow at Oslo National Academy of the Arts. She won the Evens Art Prize 2019 and La vie bonne call for projects by the National Center for Plastic Arts (FR) and Aware: Archive of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions in 2020. Salamon’s productions have been shown at institutions and festivals such as MoMa in New York, the Pompidou Centre in Paris, Julidans in Amsterdam, Tanzquarter in Vienna, Festival d’Avignon and Tanz im August in Berlin.
CREDITS
concept, choreography & costume design Eszter Salamon
scenography James Brandily
lighting design Silje Grimstad
composer Carmen Villain
choreography assistance Elodie Perrin and Christine De Smedt
costume design assistance Laura Garnier
sound design Leif Herland
dancers Caroline Eckly , Noam Eidelman Shatil, Nadege Kubwayo, Dawid Lorenc, Adrian Bartczak, Aslak Aune Nygård, Ole Martin Meland, Brecht Bovijn, Gaspard Schmitt, Mathias Stoltenberg, Manon Campion, Ihsaan de Banya, Mai Lisa Guinoo and Naomi Schouten
dancers – original cast Adrian Bartczak, Aslak Aune Nygård, Anne Lise Rønne, Caroline Eckly, Daniel Mariblanca, Dawid Lorenc, Irene Vesterhus Theisen, Lin Van Kaam, Mathias Stoltenberg, Max Makowski, Nadege Kubwayo, Noam Eidelman Shatil, Ole Martin Meland and Tilly Sordat
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pr-photo Sjur Pollen
press & process photos Øystein Haara
video David Alræk