TRILOGY OF MOVEMENT: FRACTURED, LA FOLIA, DANCE OF MAGNETIC BALLERINA / Andrea Miltnerová (UK/CZ)

performance length: 60 min
The Body in High Resolution, Fascinating Baroque, Retroexpression in Movement
no language barrier
Choreography and notation: Raul Auger Feuillet
music LA FOLIA: Arcangleo Corelli
sound and lighting design: Jan Komárek
theme, choreography, interpretation, reconstruction: Andrea Miltnerová

This Czech - British dancer and creator presents not one, but three spellbinding works. She starts with Fractured, a performance of extreme physical demands on the performer. She then performs her exacting representation of the baroque dance La Folia, completing the evening with her mercurial Dance of the Magnetic Ballerina.

FRACTURED
Andrea Miltnerová's long term ethnochoreologic research gives the performance ‛Fractured’ the semblance of an adventurous experiment: this experienced choreographer has succeeded in simulating evolution in real time. In this theatre laboratory, in the confined space of a single illuminated square, Kafka's nightmarish metamorphosis transforms itself into various life forms to the fragmented sounds of a Bach concerto.

During the course of the performance the animality of a spider, a grasshopper or a frog begins to take on human substance ... and the dancer reveals her face. The sorrowfully cogent predetermination of every biological mass - development and replication, pulsation, expiration, movement - is the sole comprehensible means of communication with the non human world. In front of our eyes we see a person, an animal, a surreal creation, an extraterrestrial being - the fruits of our imagination or the projection of ourselves? - the instinct driven movements of the dancer break down the barriers of any identity.

The technically precise choreography is based on the expressiveness of detail, on the strength of the image in which time flows at a slower tempo. Precisely timed micromovements unveil the fascinating world of muscles and sinews beneath the skin, attacking the boundaries of physical possibility, provoking the beauty of physicality. With a minimum of creative tools and maximum means of expression it stimulates the audience's imagination.

‛Fractured’ has been successfully presented at the European Festival of Contemporary Dance in Bytom and Cracow, Poland, at euro scene Leipzig, Germany and has been invited to the Unidram festival in Potsdam, Germany and to the Korzo Theatre in The Hague, Holland.

The performance is part of the New Web project 2012 and DANCE PRAGUE in the regions 2012 and 2013.

LA FOLIA

A baroque dance solo for a woman, reconstructed from the original notation, to the music of La Folia, a musical form which has inspired composers from the baroque to the present, from Bach (Peasant Cantata) to Vangelis (his popular film hit Conquest of Paradise).

DANCE OF THE MAGNETIC BALLERINA

Movement in the context of image and sound - image and sound in motion. The magnetic ballerina flutters inside a minimalist yet multi-dimensional space created to expand our perception and experience of dance. Intense movement sequences fuse with a collage of sound and a unique, interactive lighting design to relate a nonviolent, at times irritating, at times vulnerable, personal testimony of an obstinate obsession with movement.

Andrea Miltnerová
British dancer and choreographer of Czech origin, who lives in Prague. For the past few years she has been specialising in baroque dance and its creative fusion with other techniques, above all contemporary dance. She was born and trained in London and came to Prague to dance with the Ballet of the National Theatre. She has also danced in various musicals and currently collaborates as a performer with various Czech and foreign creators.
Her deep interest in the baroque led her to collaborate on the reconstruction of baroque operas and to create her own performances based on movement analysis and ethnochoreographic research, for example The Baroque Body Revealed, Pentimento and Vertical Horizontal. She has worked as a director, choreographer and dancer with the early music ensembles Collegium Marianum and Collegium 1704. She has danced in baroque operas at the National Theatre, at the baroque Castle Theatre in Český Krumlov and in festivals in Slovenia and Hungary. She is currently working with French choreographer Francoise Denieau, performing in her productions throughout France, including Paris (Opéra Comique) and Versailles (Opéra Royale), in Luxembourg and in Switzerland (Lausanne).
Her contemporary dance solo Fractured was recently presented at the European Festival of Contemporary Dance in Poland and at euro scene Leipzig to critical acclaim. Dance of the Magnetic Ballerina has been invited to Aerowaves' festival Spring Forward in Zurich (Zürich Tanzt), to East Gate Europe 2 Festival in Aarhus, Denmark, to The Place Theatre in London and to Paradiso as part of the Julidans Festival in Amsterdam.


Jan Komárek
He studied painting and graphic design at the School of Applied Arts. He worked in various different fields, as well as composing music for theatre and pupper theatre. After emigrating to France, he formed the „Mimo Theatre“, creating puppet theatre for both adults and children , performing himself as puppeteer and clown. In 1983 Jan moved to Toronto, Canada, where, together with composer rainer Wiens he founded the ´Sound Image Theatre´, using actors as well as dancers and various performers to create image-based, poetic performances with live music. He received several prestigious Dora Mayor Awards for Best Play, Best Set and Lighting Design and Best Music. He gradually started to work as lighting designer for other professional theatre companies, particularly in the dance field in Toronto and Montreal. Jan moved to back to Prague in 2001, where he became known on the alternative scene for his own shows and lighting design. He was voted „Theatre Personality of the Year 2009“ by the New Wave Festival and was awarded first prize for Lighting Design by an international jury at the 2010 Czech Dance Platform Festival.