The contemporary dance performance “FEMINE” will be presented as part of the dance series “Dancing after Prešeren” on Friday, February 9, 2024, starting at 7:30 PM at the Dance Forum Celje.
“Femine” is a contemporary dance performance realized in the production of the Belgrade Dance Institute, and as part of the authorial project of the dancer Mojca Majcen in collaboration with the Balkan Dance Project. The project is supported by the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Serbia, the Secretariat for Culture of the City of Belgrade, and the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia. The performance was created with the choreography of Rita Gobi (Hungary) and Alexandra Madsen (Croatia). The project is also the final performance of the students of the Belgrade Dance Institute.
The “Femine” project represents the meeting of two choreographers whose roots stem from Serbia.
The dance interweaving of the choreographers and their mutual dance dialogues is set in a contemporary form of an interconnected diptych titled “FEMINE” for 5 young dancers who assume a single identity; the identity of young artists and promoters of the “young” contemporary dance scene, both in Serbia and Slovenia.
Each of the choreographers at some point faced the influence of the concept of boundaries in active relation to time. They have experienced the tearing and transformation of personal and cultural identity when encountering the concept of meaninglessness at different levels of living. At some point, through the feeling of their own displacement, both internal and external, they accepted this mechanism on one hand as hope, and on the other, as an absurdity.
Choreographers: Rita Gobi and Alexandra Madsen
Choreography Assistants: Ognjen Vučinić, Mojca Majcen Music
Score and Original Music: David Nik Lipovac
Costume: SvarogArt
Dancers: Katarina Bućić, Tijana Ostojić, Patricija Crnković (SLO), Tjaša Bucik (SLO), and Neža Banovec (SLO)
Photography: Luka Stojković
RITA GOBI Choreography: LINK – CHAIN
As a link in a chain, the individual is connected to the community. The performance examines what it means to live in a community, what it means to be one of many interconnected links. Why does an individual strive to find a community? Why does a community let someone in, and exclude others from its ranks? Do we want to live in a community out of selfishness or altruism? How much courage is needed to be that weakest link?
RITA GOBI is a Hungarian choreographer, contemporary dance and dance pedagogue. Born in Novi Sad, she graduated from the Hungarian Dance Academy in Budapest. She participated in various international dance workshops and residency programs such as the OMI DANCE Residency based in the USA, VARP residency at SE.S.TA-Korespon Dance, in the Czech Republic, and Morishita Studio in Tokyo under the Japan Foundation. In 2006, she founded the dance company Góbi. Since then, she has created several contemporary dance productions, interactive performances for children, and participated in various interdisciplinary projects (exhibition openings, fashion shows, etc.). In recent years, Rita has collaborated with artists abroad, and her performances have toured the world. Her solo piece Volitant has won several domestic and international awards, and with the same piece, she presented at the Solo Festival at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Belgrade in 2022. She is a dance teacher at the Nemes Nagy Ágnes Art School and regularly holds workshops in Hungary and abroad at various festivals. She also works as a choreographer by invitation in puppet theaters and movement theaters in working with actors.
ALEXANDRA MADSEN
Choreography: Wegsittudrlifk
This choreography emerges from the exploration of the meaning and meaninglessness in movement as well as in structure. The primary tool of investigation is improvisation through which the performers find movements that are not pre-refined and given as a bodily language. This vocabulary is established from the active production of the opposite of what is considered to have “sense”. In this way, it challenges the deconstruction of the view on the entirety of movement and the fragmentation of the performance, avoiding content that can be recognized as movement-meaning, movement-kinesthetic sensibility, or movement-aesthetic element. The choreography, therefore, due to avoiding meaningful connections in producing vocabulary, simultaneously questions the issue of presupposed meaning and expectation in performance. Thus, the principle of meaninglessness establishes the vocabulary and structure of the performance. Meaninglessness is not attempted to be “made sense of” but assumes a bodily and performance axiom. This returns the body and structure to the examination of fundamental motivations for movement and the production of meaning. Unlike abstract movement itself, which is more related to the visual aspect of the performance, this choreography emphasizes anticipation as the basis for an aesthetic experience. By avoiding “sense” and conscious contrast into performative nonsense, the performers thus produce choreographic material that varies on the boundary between the absurd and hope.
ALEXANDRA MADSEN graduated in Performance Dramaturgy and completed her BA studies in Contemporary Dance – teaching direction at the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb. She has advanced her skills in Croatia and abroad with renowned dance educators in various dance practices (Laban Center London, ImPulsTanz). She was a permanent member of the Zagreb Dance Company (2009-2016), collaborating with many foreign choreographers. At the same time, she developed her own artistic practice, exploring expanded forms of performance works and choreography, founding the artistic organization MasaDanceCompany with Ognjen Vučinić. As an author, she has created numerous notable performances: YOU, SHE, RAVE (ON)!). She is the recipient of the Croatian Theatre Award 2014 for best dance achievement in the performance “Hermaphrodites of the Soul” by Žak Valenta, and as a choreographer, she received the “Award for the Most Promising Young Choreographer” in 2004, the “Critics’ Award at the Choreographic Miniatures Festival” 2011 in Belgrade, and the Grand Prix at the 6th International Festival of Contemporary Dance in Algiers for the performance “YOU” co-authored with Vučinić. As a dance educator, she teaches in Croatia and abroad, teaching contemporary dance, partnering, and improvisation. She also works as a teacher at the Secondary School for Contemporary Dance of the Franje Lučić Art School in Velika Gorica, collaborates with the Institute for Dance Arts in Belgrade, and with the Academy of Dramatic Art in Zagreb on Contemporary Dance studies. She is a member of the Writers and Performers’ Rights Association and the president of the Board of the Croatian Dance Artists Association. She lives and works in Zagreb.