Modul-dance experience. By Emma-Cecilia Ajanki from The Mob

Modul-dance offers selected dance artists the time, space and economic structure to develop their work. Modul-dance has decided that the creative processes they encourage artists to embark on consists of four chapters; research, residency, production and last presentation. Each chapter with it’s own structure and economics surrounding them.

I didn’t get to do all modules within modul-dance, but none the less, I kept the form that was suggested to me to create within. The piece The Mob developed through modul-dance is called BABY IT’S YOU NOT ME. Having only premiered the piece less than a month ago, I will try to sit here and contemplate my experiences.

Trailer for Baby it’s you not me from The Mob on Vimeo.

What next? By Emma Martin

Conceiving and creating a new work is like capturing the detailed minutiae of a dream, except it’s in the future… I don’t think we surrender ourselves to the wild plains of our imagination enough. Art is about creating an elemental experience of life, which the audience is invited to participate in along with the performers.

Within modul-dance, I’ve had research modules at Art Station Foundation in Poznań, Poland and at Plesna Izba in Maribor, Slovenia; and residencies in CSC Bassano del Grappa, Italy and CDC Toulouse in France.

In Poland, in March 2013, I spent half of my time in Poznań, writing, working alone in the studio, chatting to other artists and spending time with an enthusiastic ethnography student from Adam Mickiewicz University, listening to polish lore and folk stories; and the second half in Warsaw, dwarfed by the wind-chilled, wide grey boulevards, and felt the constant shadow of Stalin’s Palace of Science and Culture, absorbing the vibrations (and -8 degrees celsius temperatures) of this multi war surviving “phoenix city”.

Modul-dance experience. By Sofia Dias & Vítor Roriz

When José Laginha, from Capa/Devir (a cultural structure in the sunny south coast of Portugal) introduced us to modul-dance network we knew very little of it, except that some other Portuguese choreographers (Tânia Carvalho and Cláudia Dias) had also been supported by it in the previous editions.

The meeting in Barcelona, in November 2012, was the first moment we got to grasp the dimension of this network. It was surprising to see the variety of artists, programmers and their specific projects/contexts of action. Although big in scale, the meeting seemed to have the right balance of formality and informality for an actual exchange to happen, and we were caught by its intensity and the way everyone was focused to make it significant and useful.

Modul-dance experience. By Jasmina Križaj

In May 2011, the Slovenian artist Jasmina Križaj wrote the following article for a modul-dance newsletter regarding her experience in the framework of the project.
Working period: from 04/04/2011 – 15/04/2011
Where: in Poznan, Poland – Art Stations Foundation
Who: Anja Bornsek, Cristina Planas Leitao, Jasmina Križaj and Tarras Some

Into the Out

Being in Poland was the first time for all of us. Have to admit I didn’t know what to expect. There was a chance that it will feel like home and there is also very strong and in my opinion still somehow “fresh” historical memory. In some way it did feel like home.

Modul-dance experience. By Agata Mazskiewicz

My first encounter with the modul-dance network was in November 2012 in Barcelona when I presented my work and the idea of the piece Duel. I was trumphally pregnant at that time so I new that if I want to create that show I would really need some support. My budget was ridicoulously small and on top I wished to check for the first time how it is to direct the others without being at the same time a performer (regarding my condition but as well in order to change the way I used to work). And thanks to the modul-dance network I managed.

Modul-dance presence at Malta Festival in Poznań

For more than 20 years, the International Theatre Festival Malta has been a melting pot of traditions, themes and forms. The distinctive feature of the festival is the fusion of concerts of international stars, experimental shows, small projects in the city space and discussions with scholars.

Poznań will host from the 24th of June to the 20th of July a new edition of the Malta Festival, where contemporary dance is always present. A representation of the modul-dance project will be concentrated in a few days of the most innovative choreography. Anne Juren will present Tableaux Vivants (25 June) and Magali Milian and Romuald Luydlin, members of La Zampa their Spekies (27 June). Polish audience will have the chance to discover one of the artists selected in 2012, An Kaler who will perform On Orientations/Untimely Encounters twice in the same day (26 June).

Marie-Caroline Hominal and Sofia Dias & Vítor Roriz, modul-dance selected artists, are too part of the programme with other titles, Bat (26 June) and A gesture that is nothing but a threat (28 June), respectively.

All the shows will take place at Stary Browar, home of the Art Stations Foundation Poznań, one of the modul-dance partners.

http://malta-festival.pl/en/