Movement Infinite

The Belgrade Dance Festival – April 9-23 – will be marked by a wide range of participants, including current productions from nine countries, and will feature outstanding national ballet companies, dance troupes and famous choreographers.

By Vesna Kneževic Baletić
Photo by Courtesy of BDF

The seventh edition of the Belgrade Dance Festival (BFI), to be held from April 9-23, features dance productions by national companies as well as dance troupes from Italy, Belgium, Great Britain, China, France, Israel, Portugal, the Netherlands and Switzerland. BFI will also offer accompanying activities, including master classes, exhibitions of dance photography, panel discussions with artists, a film programme and presentations. In Belgrade, performances will be held at the Sava Convention Hall, the Madlenianum Opera, the Belgrade Drama Theatre and the Yugoslav Drama Theatre, with additional performances in Novi Sad, Niš and Sombor.

The Belgrade Dance Festival, from it inception, established itself as a high-class and innovative festival with regional appeal. Its seventh edition shows the Festival as a leader among such festivals, one that stands on par with Belgrade’s top cultural brands. Over the past seven years of its evolution, the Belgrade Dance Festival has played host to the latest and best productions, as well as renowned international ballet artists, allowing it to win UNESCO’s "leading dance project in the region of southeastern Europe" title. At the same time, the audience has identified a remarkable event; viewers from Belgrade and neighbouring countries attend in great numbers. Thus, a new audience has been shaped as well, as home artists have found a master class of sorts in the festival.

"We’re looking ahead to a festival whose programme will be bolder and more vocal than previous ones. The thread connecting this year’s participants and productions is the idea and message that everything lends itself to expression through dance, a universal and familiar language that everyone knows and understands. Movement is infinite in its circular and unfathomable course as it is capable of fluently speaking of love, fear, alienation, freedom, injustice, desire, pain, quest, eternity...", sets out Belgrade ballerina and choreographer Aja Jung, one of the festival’s founders, its director and programme selector.

Who is the biggest star of the7^th Belgrade Dance Festival?

– Three guest choreographers, whom Belgrade audiences have already had the opportunity to get to know and appreciate, are a major attraction: Mauro Bigonzetti, Rami Be’er and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, as well as several outstanding names in contemporary dance whom we have not had the chance to see on local stages. Thus, the most notable Italian choreographer’s Come un Respiro and Terra, performed by the Aterballetto Company, will open this year’s festival at the Sava Convention Hall. The following day, audiences in Novi Sad will be able to see Bigonzetti’s latest achievement – the rock ballet called Certe Notti, put together in collaboration with one of the most popular Italian singers and composers, Luciano Ligabue. The Kibbutz Dance Company is certainly one of the most interesting and active dance companies on the diverse Israeli dance scene, and Rami Be’er is bringing two excellent productions. We will see Upon Reaching the Sun at the Sava Convention Hall, and Kef-Kafim at the National Theatre in Sombor. A star appearing in Belgrade for the first time is Akram Khan with a production for which we have patiently waited two seasons to see. Bahok is as story about modern-day nomads, a production that is the result of collaboration between the choreographer and the National Ballet of China. Akram Khan’s name has lately been linked exclusively to great successes - all his tours and performances have sold out in advance – and to collaboration with Oscar-winning actress Juliette Binoche and ballerina Sylvie Guillem.

Blanca Li is another star who does not restrict here to dance, but who – as a ballerina, actress and director – produces interesting works and enjoys significant success in film and at prestigious film festivals. Thus, in the Garden of Earthly Delights she uses filmlike technology to bring to life Hieronymus Bosch’s painting of the same name. Last year she opened the dance festival in Montpellier with this production, and then proceeded to divide and seduce the audience and critics following 10 days of performing at the Théâtre des Champs Élysées. Another interesting dancer and choreographer from a major London’ address – Sadler’s Wells – is Jasmin Vardimon. She is coming to Belgrade with her Justitia, a singular event, probably with the most interesting stage design ever seen in a dance production, a true dance crime story of incredible pace and humour. Then, there is also the trio comprising Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Saburo Teshigawara and Andonis Foniadakis. Through their presentation the Belgrade audience will for the first time be able to see a ballet company with a long and brilliant tradition – the Geneva Grand Theater Ballet, albeit in a unexpected, modern form in keeping with the company’s reputation as well as with the time such as ours in which the repertoire must evince attractiveness as well as quality. From Amsterdam this year comes Emio Greco’s Hell, a forceful and provocative production whose viewers are neve indifferent. The Peeping Tom company from Belgium is to appear with a completely new production that takes us to 32, Rue Vandenbranden.

Which are the latest and most broadly represented tendencies in the art of dance in the world today?

– Dance is being perfected in the technical sense each day; it communicates with other arts and new technologies, it progresses, gains speed, it runs, as it is born and disappears. Thus, it is safe to say that only on the foundations of classical ballet can one build with any reliability and quality, as well as that all greats artists, dancers and choreographers have their own following. The tenets and techniques of those who left their mark on the past times are still recognizable. We are witness to how many remarkable choreographers used to be talented dancers developing in the mid-20^th century along with John Cranko, Pina Bausch, Hans van Manen, Merce Cunningham, Maurice Bejart... and then again there are also the new generations who have been maturing since the end of the 20^th century until the present time. They have looked up to Jirí Kylián, Mats Ek, Nacho Duato, Mauro Bigonzetti... All this exemplifies ballet history, just as is the case with every other art and artist. It is indeed regrettable that our dance scene has completely been sidestepped regarding this type of information and culture. As a consequence, it is today difficult to create a strategy and find the right path. The festival can merely be a helping hand to facilitate bridging this wide gap and not the main instrument to overcome it.

Is it true that once it was the dancers who were the real stars and that today it is the choreographers? And if so, why?

- Classical ballet has introduced the role categories of principle dancer, soloist, supporting dancers, ensemble dancers, extras, kings and queens, servants, walkers… In this context, it has also established and continues to cultivate the star status. Modern dance treats all dancers in the same way, demanding perfect technique, great endurance, transformation potential, continual presence on the stage… In brief, everyone has their share and their place, which they must accept as also being subject to rotation. Apart from technically superior and experienced dancers, the ballet and dance companies must also have referential names supporting their repertoire. These refer to the choreographers, whose name guarantees quality of the troupe and packed audiences. This is why the job ballet director is today quite different and implies contacts, insight into the entire world production, market conditions, marketing approaches, implies attending festivals…

What are the reactions in the region and beyond to such great success and remarkable quality of the productions at the Belgrade Dance Festival?

- The Belgrade Dance Festival press clipping service is aware of headlines in many prestigious European and American newspapers, magazines and professional periodicals. Recently, we received from Korea, China, Brazil and Japan texts carrying the announcement of our festival… The festival’s chief ambassadors are its former and future participants. When we began to create the festival, we could not hope that the festival would grow as fast and become a referential event exceeding the borders of our country. We were primarily concerned about the quality of the productions, and with the response and positive reactions from home audience. But the small dance experiment, however, escaped control and became a brand name in the big world of dance.