Art stations fundation - by Grażyna Kulczyk
Studio Słodownia +3
concept / direction
Lia Haraki
performance / interpretation
Eleana Alexandrou, Aleksandra Borys, Diomedes Koufteros, Petros Konnaris, Cathryn Robson
dramaturgy
Joanna Leśnierowska
voice coach
Cathryn Robson
vocal coaching support
Diomedes Koufteros
musicological advisor
Kenneth Smith
costumes
team
music
Henry Purcell’s “When I am laid” (Dido’s lamentation from the opera “Dido and Aeneas”)
in collaboration with
Dance House Lemesos and Nadina Loizidou Studios
The Baroque idea of “the doctrine of affections” in music leads us to question: Can we move/affect the audience with our dance?
The Doctrine of Affections (also known as Affektenlehre) was part of the aesthetic basis of Baroque music. Baroque theorists placed musicians in the role of classical orators: they held that the principal objective of music was to arouse emotional states of being, or affection.
In the process of this piece we are exploring how motion brings emotion and how by witnessing this process one can reach a new state of being.
We invite the audience to share the same space as the performers with an honest presence that might arouse in them a corporeal/emotional response. We tried to avoid presentation or representation of our emotions but instead used the medium of movement to lead us to an emotional state. Being in emotion rather than presenting it – that’s our wish. The process itself made us find a way of being on stage without performing something other than what is there when moving. The practicality needed to physically do something again and again creates a direct and raw type of performance that allows normality to become a way of experiencing affect while at the same time it creates expectations for the future.
The Baroque music characteristics of the unity of emotion, ornamentation, the performer’s interpretation, the element of surprise and variation were also important tools to our process.
Henry Purcell’s aria “When I am laid”, Dido’s lamentation from the opera “Dido and Aeneas”, has also been a landmark of inspiration, research and interpretation.
Lia Haraki (Cyprus)
earned her BA Hons in Dance Theatre Studies at the City University of London (Laban Centre for Movement and Dance) in 1996. Her works have been presented all over Europe, in festivals such as the Athens Festival, Aerowaves London, Tanec Praha, Julidans Amsterdam, Kleines Haus Dresden, Euro-Scene Leipzig, the Kalamata International Festival, Royal Festival Hall London, Unesco Paris and have been produced by organizations such as the Athens Festival and Tanzherbst Dresden. Her pieces “Evergreen” and “Pretendance” were in the Aerowaves final list and she has won the Cyprus Platform choreography award twice. Lia is at the same time a lecturer in the BA Dance Programme of the University of Nicosia in Cyprus. Through her work with her company .pelma.lia haraki and Dance House Lemesos, which she initiated, and through her active participation in networks such as Aerowaves and DanceWeb Europe, Lia Haraki has been providing a vital connection and exchange, between the dance community of Cyprus and the wider European landscape.
Eleana Alexandrou (Cyprus)
received a BA degree in performance and choreography from Bath Spa University, UK.
She has been working professionally, in Cyprus and the UK, as a performer since 2004 collaborating with Precarious Physical Theatre and Multimedia for the production “The Factory”, Lambros Lambrou, Interact Dance Theatre Company, Nothing to Declare and Omada En drasi. She worked with pelma.lia haraki already on 5 projects including the creation and performance of the solo piece “Giraffe” (2010). She collaborates regularly with Dance House Lemesos. In 2010, with Arianna Marcoulides and Eva Korae she directed and made movement for video called “About Side Walks.”
Aleksandra Borys (Poland)
graduated from Codarts / Rotterdam Dance Academy, Holland and National Ballet School in Łódź, Poland. Scholar of Tour d'Europe des Chorégraphes. Worked with choreographers / artists from Spain, UK, Poland, Belgium, Holland, Israel and Italy. In 2010 she became a holder of Scholarship of Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. Resident of Solo Project 2010 at Art Stations Foundation in Poznań in frame of which she created her first choreographic work – solo “Lost in details”. Scholar of DanceWeb 2011 at ImPulsTanz Festival in Vienna.
Diomedes Koufteros (Cyprus)
Is working in theatre, television and film and his credits include the Emcee in the musical “Cabaret” (Best Actor Nomination, Cyprus Theatre Awards), Perre Ubu in “Ubu Roi”, Bartley in “The Cripple of Inishmaan” for the National Theatre of Cyprus (directed by Łukasz Wiśniewski), and “Autolycus” in The Winter's Tale for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, amongst others. The film “Fish n' Chips” (released in 2011) is his latest screen-acting job, while his short documentary “Shushu” (2008) received the first prize in the United Nations “Young Filmmakers” Project. Diomedes has taught Acting and Movement for the Stage at Brandeis University, Boston (where he received his MFA) and was acting/physical coach and assistant director to many shows in Cyprus. In 2010, together with a team of German, Spanish and British actors, he co-created and performed “Islands”, a devised theatre piece, named “Best Play of the Year” in Cyprus media. In the same year he co-created a mask theatre piece, “The Eye of Cassiopeia”.
Petros Konnaris (Cyprus)
graduated dance from University of Nicosia and Mathematics from State University of Cyprus. Since 2004 he’s a member of Selas Dance Company. He has performed with various companies such as Omada 5, Asomates Dynameis, .pelma.lia haraki and worked for number of choreographers such as Alexander Michaels, Eleni Drogari, Machi D. Lindahl and Julia Bredle. He is also creating own choreographies – his 2 debuts in 2006 received first prices in Cypriot Dance Competition. He participated also in the short length movie “The escape of the queen”. Petros is an assistant teacher for the technique classes in the University of Nicosia.
Cathryn VM Robson (United Kingdom)
has recently completed an MA in Voice Coaching at Central School of Speech and Drama, London and is also a qualified singing teacher of classical and contemporary technique. She has taught and performed extensively in the UK, Europe and Cyprus. Her songs have been released on several alternative labels including Sargasso (London), Carbon 7 (Brussels) and Unknown Public (UK) and have been broadcast on left-field radio stations throughout the world. As a performer/singer she is particularly involved with dance-theatre. This is her sixth collaboration with Lia Haraki.
Joanna Leśnierowska (Poland)
educated as dance writer, in 2004 she has created first in Poland regular dance space at Stary Browar Art Centre in Poznań (www.starybrowarnowytaniec.pl) where she’s featuring avant-garde international choreographers and intensively supporting development of Polish dance artists. Following her curatorial work in Stary Browar, Joanna serves as an artistic coach within a residency program Solo Project and as dramaturge, performer and artistic partner co-operates with several Polish and international projects and choreographers (such as Janusz Orlik, Poland; Renata Piotrowska, Poland; Arkadi Zaides, Israel; Minimetal, Switzerland; Marta Ladjanszki, Hungary). In 2003-2009 she co-created Gymnastic Society (performance collective and association). She works also as performer and in September 2011, after years of collective creation, she debuted as independent author with a piece “Reconstruction”. She conceived and curates the Old Music New Dance Project. “Again” is her first collaboration with Lia Haraki.
